Vivo smartphones in general are well designed, and the S1 is no exception. This sleek smartphone is designed to attract the fashionable users who love style and want a very affordable and powerful device.
THE LOOKS
After spending some time with the Vivo S1 I can say that, for its price ranger, it’s one of the best-looking smartphones. The S1 comes in two colors, Diamond Black and Skyline Blue. It has a super cool diamond pattern design on the back with a gradient color texture. Depending on the angel of the light, the diamond patterns reflects in a really catchy way.
THE HARDWARE
The Vivo S1 sports a 6.38-inch display with a teardrop style notch at the top. The AMOLED panel houses an in-display fingerprint scanner and supports a Full HD+ resolution and offers 19:5:9 aspect ratio with a 90 per cent screen-to-body-ratio. The brightness level is pretty impressive indoors. However, in outdoor situations, the brightness seems slightly low. Overall, Text and images look sharp.
Body wise, Vivo has opted for a plastic frame that is rounded with the power button on the right side along with the volume buttons, with a dedicated Google Assistant button as well.
The Vivo S1 is a lightweight device despite its massive 4500mAh battery which delivers a surprising performance. Power management is very good on this phone, and was able to handle around a day and a half on a single charge with around 5 hours of screen-on-time. The S1 also supports fast charging, but unfortunately lacks the USB-C port and keeps the traditional Micro-USB (and no, it doesn’t no support wireless charging), but that’s fair considering the price range.
THE ENGINE
Under the hood, the phone houses a MediaTek Helio P65 octa-core processor with 6GB of RAM + 128GB ROM setup which delivered a very good performance during our testing. The device was able to handle multitasking and gaming fairly good. For gaming, there is a dedicated ‘Ultra Game Mode’ to help boost the experience as well which supports multiple modes depending on the type of game played. The Vivo S1 ships with Funtouch OS 9 which is based on Android 9 Pie.
THE PHOTOGRAPHY
The Vivo S1 has a triple camera setup at the back; a 16MP primary camera, 8MP ultra-wide camera and a 2MP depth sensor with a 32MP shooter on the front for those marvelous selfies. The triple camera with the Sony IMX499 Camera Sensor is powered with AI. In general, produces good and clear shot on good lighting conditions, the colors are very accurate and vivid, sadly that’s not the result in low light conditions, but that also understandable seeing that this is not a flagship competing with the big boys.
The camera has additional options like a dedicated A.I Beauty Mode, Fun Video mode which targets Instagram users. The S1’s 32MP Front Camera comes with the Ultra HD Resolution feature which allows users to capture their best selves with high clarity and precise details. The S1 also makes selfie-taking even more enjoyable and fun thanks to multiple tailoring and enhancing selfie modes, such as AI Face Beauty, Selfie Frontlight, AR Stickers and AI Filter.
THE VERDICT
At AED 1049, the Vivo S1 offers a very competitive package of performance for its segment. This is definitely a device worth trying out without being a burden on the pocket.
