Tecno Pova Curve 5G

On the back, the phone's 64MP (Sony IMX682) primary camera sits in a large ring, highlighting its size and prominence. At 1/1.73-inch size, it is a bigger sensor than the 1/1.95-inch sensor inside the POCO M7 Pro. Even though the iQOO Z10x hasn't specified the sensor size, its 50MP sensor has a lower resolution than the Pova Curve 5G's sensor.The high resolution and the large sensor size, coupled with a f/1.8 aperture, let in ample light, resulting in detailed daytime shots with close-to-natural colours on the Tecno phone. However, its aperture size isn't as big as the one on the POCO M7 Pro, and it also lacks OIS. So, once the sun sets or in low light settings, the shots out of the Tecno phone are good, but fall short of the competition.Here, you can see the comparison shots taken from the Tecno Pova Curve and the iQOO Z10x:Daylight The photo from the Tecno Curve 5G is softer in comparison, retaining fewer details. You can see this if you zoom in on the texture of the leaves, the building surface and the window reflections. But without peeping in, the Tecno's clicks appear more appealing thanks to their vibrancy and HDR processing.PortraitThe first thing we noticed in this comparison is the Tecno camera's stronger background blur, which looks slightly artificial. The iQOO Z10x's shot has a more natural bokeh effect. But the colours and detail retention are better on the Tecno phone. This is noticeable in the beard and hair texture, the text on the shirt's buttons, and the colour of the shirt. While Tecno handles edge detection well for the most part, it misses blurring the side of the chest area. So, the subject looks better on the Tecno phone. It just needs to improve the blur processing.SelfieIn broad daylight, the Tecno phone captures more pleasing selfies with warmer colours and better exposure. In contrast, the iQOO phone produces cooler, more muted selfies. However, facial features and shirt details are clearer in the iQOO shot than on the Tecno one.However, when the selfies were taken indoors, the one on the Tecno phone looked softer, with washed-out colours. The iQOO phone produced oversaturated colours, but had ample details. Low-light (night mode)When you enable the Super Night Mode on the Tecno Pova Curve, the photos have better exposure, and the details are clearer. You can clearly see the Metro Station name on the Super Night Mode photo compared to the regular photo. The exposure and noise control are also better than the iQOO Z10x. The left-side building and the leaves appear grainy on the iQOO phone. Not so the case with the Tecno photo. Moving to videos, the 4K 30 FPS support on Tecno phones' front and rear cameras is rare in this price range. The output from the primary camera is serviceable with quick focus capture thanks to PDAF. It is pretty stable even without OIS.

The underlying Dimensity 7300 Ultimate chipset uses the 4nm process node and tops at a 2.5GHz clock speed. The chipset is a proven performer found even on some midrange phones. The performance is reflected in our in-house benchmark tests:The performance is backed by up to 16GB LPDDR5 RAM (including 8GB extended RAM) and 128GB UFS 2.2 storage. There is no expandable storage support. In comparison, the iQOO Z10x offers faster UFS 3.1 storage, while the POCO M7 Pro includes LPDDR5x RAM and a microSD card slot.I wish Tecno would offer user-expandable storage and newer RAM and ROM standards, as some competitors do. Still, it doesn't take away from the Curve's performance as it boots quickly, loads apps fast, and handles scrolling and switching smoothly. Even in the Burnout throttling test, the phone fared better than the POCO M7 Pro and iQOO Z10x.As for gaming, you can play both casual titles and demanding ones, though the latter will run at lower graphics settings. For instance, we could run BGMI at an Ultra frame rate, only at Low graphic quality. The same is true for COD Mobile.The performance feels good partly because of the Android 15-based HIOS 15 software. This UI looks clean, and yet, it is quite feature-rich and customisable. You can clean it further by uninstalling many of the pre-installed apps, choose a unique cum uniform icon theme called Vision Art, use a sidebar to access recent files and favourite apps quickly, get a glance at important service information and notifications via a Dynamic Island-like pill-shaped UI, mulitask with floating windows and split screen options, and run two accounts of a platform simultaneously using App Twin.The software also includes table-stakes AI features like text or voice summary, translation, document analysis, math problem solver, and writing assistant. There is also a device assistant named Ella Voice. While it is good to have options, the experience can be a hit or a miss. Although not labelled as an AI feature, the Tecno Curve 5G includes an "Intelligent Hub System" that allows you to make calls between two Tecno phones without cellular connectivity. You can make calls through the pre-installed FreeLink app. Like OPPO's Beacon Link, the handset uses short-range connectivity and works only within a limited range, similar to a walkie-talkie.

The Tecno Pova Curve 5G packs a 5,500mAh battery with 45W wired fast charging (adapter and USB-A to USB-C cable included). In the PCMark Battery Test, the Pova Curve 5G ran for 11 hours and 19 minutes in our rundown test, which is behind its competitors like iQOO Z10x with 14 hours and 20 minutes and POCO M7 Pro with 17 hours and 46 minutes runtime.However, it lasted longer in real-world usage. We ran a 30-minute YouTube session at 50 percent brightness and 50 percent volume, and the phone's battery drained just 3 percent. This suggests decent real-world endurance. And it held up well during my weekend trip to the hills.As for charging, the bundled 45W charger can take it from 20 to 100 percent in under an hour. That's close to Tecno's claim of 50 percent in 15 minutes and a full charge in 45 minutes. Moreover, it's much faster than some phones in the segment, including the iQOO Z10x, which takes more than 1 hour and 15 minutes to fully top up. 

The Tecno Pova Curve 5G strikes a balance between style and substance. The handset boasts a very ergonomic design, and this is partly thanks to the curved AMOLED display, which is pleasant to read and interact with. At Rs 15,999, you are also getting a reliable MediaTek Dimensity 7300 Ultimate chipset that handles daily use and light gaming well. It is interesting that despite being slim, the handset still fits in a big battery and charges fast with the 45W adapter.