“The new iQOO smartphone also has a 4,000mAh battery and comes in four variants”

Vivo’s new sub-brand iQOO has launched its first smartphone in China. The handset, simply named iQOO, is touted to offer a strong build and a powerful performance. Among the key iQOO specifications are the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 SoC, up to 12GB of RAM, triple rear cameras, and a display with a waterdrop notch. The smartphone will take on the new flagship smartphones that have entered the market, such as Samsung Galaxy S10+, as well as existing players such as OnePlus 6T, iPhone XS Max, Huawei Mate 20 Pro, etc.

Vivo iQOO price, availability

The iQOO price starts at RMB 2,998 (~Rs 31,500) for the base 6GB + 128GB variant. The models with 8GB RAM + 128GB storage and 8GB + 256GB storage are priced at RMB 3,298 (~Rs 35,000) and RMB 3,598 (~Rs 38,000), respectively. Positioned above these is the iQOO Monster variant, which has 12GB of RAM and 256GB RAM and is priced at RMB 4,298 (~Rs 45,000). While the first two variants come in Electro-Optic Blue and Lava Orange colours, the other two will be available only in the Electro-Optic hue. The handset is presently up for pre-orders in China via the official Vivo Shop and will go on sale at 10am on March 6th.

Vivo iQOO specifications

The Vivo iQOO ships with a tall 6.41-inch full-HD+ (1,080 x 2,340 pixels resolution) AMOLED display with ‘Halo’ notch up top that pushes the screen-to-body ratio at 91.7 percent. The handset is powered by Qualcomm’s 7nm Snapdragon 855 octa-core chipset, coupled with Adreno 640 GPU. It runs Android 9 Pie-based FunTouch OS. As mentioned above, the smartphone comes in four configurations: 6GB + 128GB, 8GB + 128GB, 8GB + 256GB, and 12GB + 256GB.

In the camera department, the Vivo iQOO features triple rear cameras consisting of 13-megapixel primary + 12-megapixel wide-angle + 2-megapixel depth of field sensors. The front camera of the phone employs a 12-megapixel shooter for selfies and video calling. Powering the device is a whopping 4,000mAh battery; while the base variant gets 22.5W support for fast-charging, the other three options get the 44W Super Flash Charge capabilities by Vivo. The company claims that the tech can add 50 percent juice to the smartphone in just 15 percent and another 50 percent in 30 minutes. In terms of connectivity, the iQOO offers USB Type-C, dual-SIM support, 4G LTE, dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS/ GLONASS.