The Indian consumer has the luxury to get the best value for money when it comes to smartphones. Consumers have multiple options to choose from - right from budget smartphones to premium flagship devices. While the budget and mid-range smartphone space has remained crowded, companies have started launching more and more premium smartphones in India.
Vivo has joined the ultra-premium segment in India after a really long time, if not for the first time. The company’s ultimate flagship offering for H1 2021 is the Vivo X60 Pro Plus. Priced at Rs 69,990, the smartphone packs a lot of hardware wrapped inside a vegan leather body. Is the Vivo X60 Pro Plus worth the price? Or should you consider buying the OnePlus 9 Pro? We have used the device for about two weeks to help you decide. Here is our Vivo X60 Pro Plus Review
Vivo X60 Pro Plus Review
To make it easier to highlight the Pros and Cons of the device, we are going to break our Vivo X60 Pro Plus review down into two parts: What’s good, and What’s not so good.
Vivo X60 Pro Plus Review: What’s Good
Design
If we were to vote for a smartphone that offers the best in-hand feel and a premium experience, the Vivo X60 Pro Plus would be among our top picks. The device comes with a Blue coloured Vegan Leather finish on the back with very minimum branding. While the competition offers a frosted/ matte glass back, this faux leather rear panel looks quite aesthetic and feels premium in its own different way. Add to it the 191 grams weight, which might seem a lot on paper, but is not. It surely isn’t the slimmest Vivo smartphone at 9.1mm thickness. The curved rear panel aids in offering a snug fit when holding the phone.
Display
The 6.56-inch AMOLED FHD+ display is sharp and offers punchy colours. Some might complain that there is no WQHD+ resolution found on the likes of the OnePlus 9 Pro and the more-expensive Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra (Review). However, we did not find ourselves wanting a higher resolution display as 1080p is more than enough for most people. If you want a 2K display, check out the OnePlus 9 Pro. Much like the completion, the screen is curved and offers a bezel-less look for an immersive viewing experience. Our X60 Pro Plus review unit’s display offered excellent viewing angles. We did not notice any off-axis colour shifting or black crush issues.
The display also comes with 120Hz refresh rate support. We chose to set the refresh rate to “Smart Switch”, which switches between 60Hz and 120Hz depending on the kind of content or activity on the screen. There wasn’t any noticeable lag or stutter while using the device for our Vivo X60 Pro Plus review. The screen is also HDR10+ certified and offers vibrant colours with enhanced contrast for a better viewing experience.
Performance
Our only gripe last year with the Vivo X50 Pro (Review) was that it came with a less-powerful Snapdragon 765G SoC. While the SoC was more than capable to perform daily tasks it did not offer absolute value for money. This time around, Vivo has gone all-in, ensuring there is no compromise in the performance bit. The X60 Pro comes with a Snapdragon 870 SoC, whereas the Pro Plus model comes with a Snapdragon 888 SoC. The flagship chip can handle anything that you throw at it. We did not notice any lag during our Call of Duty Mobile sessions, which lasted for close to 2 hours on some days. However, there is some amount of heating. We noticed this during our OnePlus 9 Review as well, which comes with the same SoC. The device does cool down after a few minutes of idle time.
With regards to RAM and Storage, you get 12GB of RAM as standard along with 256GB of internal storage. This should be more than enough for most users. In the rare situation where a demanding app wants more buffer memory, the system loans 3GB of internal storage as Virtual RAM. Once the app’s RAM utilisation is over, the occupied internal memory is released. We did not experience any slowdown and the phone performed exceptionally well without any hiccups.
Battery
The Vivo X60 Pro Plus comes with a 4,200 mAh battery, which is also found on the Vivo X60 Pro. However, you get a faster 55W fast charger in the box. During our 14-day use case, the phone lasted for about five hours on a single charge on most days. There were times when the battery died within 4.5 hours. This was typically when we played games or used the device for video calls. The 55W charger takes roughly an hour to charge from zero to complete 100. When we tried charging the same using a Stuffcool 65W GAN charger, the device took approximately 1 hour and 50 minutes to charge from five to 100 percent.
Camera
We saved the best for the last. If you checked our Vivo X60 Pro Review, you must have noticed our praises for the camera system. The Vivo X60 Pro Plus takes it a notch higher by offering a versatile camera setup that lives up to the hype. Vivo has partnered with Zeiss to co-develop the quad-camera setup on the back. There is a 1/1.3-inch 50MP ISOCELL GN1 primary camera that clicks detailed shots. Its lowlight performance is excellent too and there were times when we did not bother switching to the Night Mode. The primary “Photo” mode was enough for most situations. Colours are slightly boosted but look pleasing to the eye. Click here to check some sample images that we shot for our Vivo X60 Pro Plus review.
The ultrawide camera also manages to capture some good quality images. However, the edges are slightly distorted but that’s common for most ultrawide cameras. It also has a noticeable difference in the colour temperature compared to the main sensor. This should not bother many as not everyone captures the same shot using the main and the ultrawide sensor. That being said, Vivo needs to fix this via a software update. The ultrawide camera also comes with a five-axis Gimbal Stabilisation 2.0 to offer smooth, stable photos and videos. While it certainly helps capture less-shaky content, do not expect the stabilisation to be as good as a GoPro Hero 8 and the likes.
The 8MP telephoto lens is capable of 5x optical zoom and 60x digital zoom. The output is decent till 10x and you will start noticing loss of details and colours as you zoom further. Lastly, that 32MP portrait camera. It shoots the best portrait mode photos with creamy bokeh that does not look artificial at all. Vivo is also offering a few styles and bokeh options to choose from. The edge detection, in most cases, is on point and it did not blur the ear or hair.
We were pretty impressed with the overall front camera performance. The colours are close to real and the dynamic range is excellent. You get good details from the 32MP sensor but there is some skin smoothening. This was with the beauty mode disabled, by the way. Click here to check some sample images that we shot for our Vivo X60 Pro Plus review.
Vivo X60 Pro Plus Review: What’s no so good
When you are paying Rs 70,000 for a smartphone, you would want to know the parts where it lacks in terms of performance or might feel like a compromise. In the case of the Vivo X60 Pro Plus, there are a few shortcomings.
Software
Vivo X60 Pro Plus runs on Android 11-based Funtouch OS 11 out of the box. The software experience has improved significantly over the years. Funtouch OS 11 offers so many features and customisation options. These include dynamic animations, templates for Always-on display, privacy features, etc. Even the overall look of the skin has improved. However, the software keeps throwing V-App Store notifications that cannot be disabled. For a premium phone, I personally would want to disable these unwanted recommendations or suggestions. Also, there are a bunch of Hot Apps and Games that, even after not installing at setup, are present on the Home Screen. You can uninstall it though after long-pressing the app icon and using the Remove option. There are a few third-party apps as well like Moj, Flipkart, Osom Rummy, etc. Not every bloatware is useless and some users might find some of these apps useful.
No Stereo Speakers
The Vivo X60 Pro Plus comes with a single speaker on the bottom edge. Although loud, it isn’t the best in terms of quality when at full volume. It is disappointing to see a flagship smartphone not offering a dual speaker setup. Hopefully, with the X70 Pro Plus (if that is the name of the next flagship), Vivo introduces a dual speaker setup.
No IP Rating: Vivo X60 Pro Plus does not have any kind of IP rating. For comparison, the likes of the OnePlus 9 Pro, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Plus (Review), come with an IP6X rating for water and dust resistance.
No wireless charging
There is no wireless charging on the Vivo X60 Pro Plus. While this is not a deal-breaker for many, the equally-priced OnePlus 9 Pro comes with 50W wireless charging support. Having an option to wirelessly charge the device is a nice thing to have. We hope to see the successor offer wireless charging support.
Vivo X60 Pro Plus Review: Verdict
The Vivo X60 Pro Plus is the company’s first bet at offering a true flagship smartphone experience. With the versatile camera system, a powerful performance unit, and an excellent display wrapped inside an elegant-looking design, the Vivo X60 Pro Plus does deliver in offering a premium experience. However, it falls short in some areas we mentioned above. Most of these shortcomings are unlikely to be a deal-breaker for many. However, with the increasing competition, consumers are likely to opt for a premium smartphone that has very little compromise to offer.
If you find the listed drawbacks do not affect your use case, then we can certainly recommend the Vivo X60 Pro Plus. Its best features include the camera and overall system performance. The cherry on top is that vegan leather design, which gives it a premium look and feels.
If you want a close-to-similar experience with a glass back design, considering reading our Vivo X60 Pro review.
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