iQOO just dropped its first smartphone in India, and it’s quite impressive. The iQOO 3 is an absolute beast, especially on the performance front. iQOO arrives as India’s second 5G handset and the second Snapdragon 865 SoC powered phone to launch in the country.
The iQOO 3 is priced, starting from Rs 36,990 in India for the base variant. The Vivo spin-off brand offers its new phone in both 4G and 5G variants, but 5G connectivity is only limited to the top-end model. You can also get the phone in multiple colours, including - Volcano Orange, Quantum Silver and Tornado Black.
The iQOO 3 will go on sale for the first time on March 4 at 12.00 pm on Flipkart and iQOO.com. Launch offers include a No Cost EMI payment option, Rs. 3,000 cashback on ICICI Bank credit and debit cards, and benefits worth Rs. 12,000 for Jio customers.
iQOO 3 Price
| Model | Price (Rs) |
| iQOO 3 (8GB + 128GB) | 36,990 |
| iQOO 3 (8GB + 256GB) | 39,990 |
| iQOO 3 5G (12GB + 256GB) | 44,990 |
The iQOO 3 is powered by the Snapdragon 865 SoC paired with up to 12GB of RAM and up to 256GB of storage. Moreover, the brand offers LPDDR5 RAM and UFS 3.1 storage standards, which adds to the already impressive performance. The iQOO 3 also features improved cooling technology.
Since we are on the subject of speed, it is worth noting that the device’s 4,400 mAh battery can go from 0 to 50% in 15 minutes with the 55W fast-charger. The iQOO 3 runs on the new iQOO UI 1.0, based on Android 10. The new custom UI brings several of software tweaks for gamers.
In optics, the phone packs a quad-camera setup on the back with a 48-megapixel f/1.8 Sony IMX582 sensor at the helm. You also get a 13-megapixel f/2.46 telephoto shooter, a 13-megapixel f/2.2 ultrawide lens and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. On the front, the punch hole notch houses a 16-megapixel f/2.45 selfie camera.
The iQOO 3 sports a 6.44-inch Super AMOLED display with an FHD+ resolution, HDR10+ content playback, a pixel density of 409ppi and an in-display fingerprint reader. The screen is capable of reaching up to 1,200nits of brightness in some scenarios, iQOO calls it “Polar View Display”. The iQOO 3 features a higher 180Hz touch sampling rate to minimize input lag but gets a 60Hz refresh rate, which does seem like a bit of a letdown.
The iQOO 3 is covered in Glonass on the front and back and has an aluminium frame. There are two shoulder keys, which the brand refers to as Monster Touch buttons. Holding down on the two buttons can activate Monster Mode that runs the chipset at 100-percent.
Additionally, the Vivo spin-off brand also provides 4D game vibrations that simulate recoil when shooting a gun in a game. Given its price and feature list, the iQOO will go head-to-head with the recently launched Realme X50 Pro 5G.
