Sony Xperia Z3 Compact

The Xperia Z3 Compact carries forward Sony’s OmniBalance design ethos, but adds subtle changes that give it a fresh, new look. The blocky, rectangular design and curved corners remain, but edges are now tastefully rounded. While the Z1 Compact’s edges were fashioned out of aluminium, the Z3 Compact’s are made out of a translucent high-grade plastic, with durable corners for protection. The sides adopt the same hue as the rear panel (in our case, a lovely sea green), but in a lighter, almost shimmery shade. The result looks sexy and feels comfortable, and as we experienced, safeguards the phone from accidental drops too.

The Xperia Z3 Compact is slightly larger than the Z1 Compact, featuring a 4.6-inch display with a resolution of 1,280 x 720 pixels. Given its price, we would have expected full HD resolution, although that comes with compromises on battery life. The IPS screen comes with Sony’s TRILUMINOS tech to produce natural colours. By default, Sony’s X-Reality mobile engine is turned on, which helps to produce clearer images. If you want more pop though, you can opt for the Super Vivid Mode in settings. You can also adjust the White Balance to your preference.

There’s nothing very exciting in the way of software. The Z3 Compact runs Android 4.4.4 KitKat as a base, with Sony’s custom UI on top. This user interface is a standard across Sony smartphones, changing the look of stock Android without affecting its simplicity and smoothness.

Like the Z1 Compact, the Z3 Compact gets the same 20.7MP 1/2.3-inch Sony Exmor RS sensor at the back. While we certainly don’t need any extra megapixels, Sony has upped the ante by equipping the camera with 4K video recording capabilities, as well as ISO up to 12,800, the highest available on a smartphone. The front 2.2MP fixed focus camera remains the same.  

Don't let its size fool you, the Xperia Z3 Compact gets the same hefty internals as the Z3, consisting of a quad-core Snapdragon 801 processor clocked at 2.5GHz, and an Adreno 330 GPU. The available memory has been toned down from 3GB to 2GB, but this is still more than adequate for daily use.