Vivo X80 Pro Review: Who needs Ultra when Pro gets you this far

The Zeiss branding is more than evident all across the camera island, while the flash module sits on the right side. The design of the X80 Pro may not be for everyone, but it was comfortable to use and did turn a few heads. Despite the large camera island, the phone still sits steadily on a surface without wobbling.

I haven’t seen the orange finish, but the black model has a very classy vibe that gives the phone that premium aesthetic. But it isn’t just the design, the X80 Pro also has a solid build with its aluminium frame, glass protection on the front, and ceramic back. The phone is on the slightly heavy side, weighing around 220 grams and measuring 9.1mm thick. It also has an IP68 rating for dust and water resistance.

The Vivo X80 Pro has the standard USB Type-C port and speaker grille on the bottom, while the power and volume buttons are located on the right of the phone. I also found the in-display fingerprint reader fast and responsive. Inside the box, you get a charging adapter, a cable, a SIM tray, and a pair of USB-C wired earphones. Additionally, the black case matches the phone and doesn’t take away from the phone’s premium aesthetic vibe.

Display

While the curved display on the front looks gorgeous, don’t let that fool you. This is arguably one of the best screens I’ve seen on a smartphone. Vivo uses a 6.78-inch QHD+ (1440 x 3200 pixels) AMOLED display with LTPO 3.0 technology. The 2K screen is touted to offer a pixel density of 517ppi, 10-bit colour, 100 percent DCI-P3 wide colour gamut, and HDR10+ support. The screen also gets really bright, peaking at 1500 nits, making it easy to check content on the phone even under direct sunlight.

However, it doesn’t stop there. The X80 Pro’s screen boasts a 120Hz refresh rate and up to a 1000Hz instant touch sampling rate. The screen has a variable refresh rate and can go all the way down to 0Hz when the phone is idle. You can also set the refresh rate to 60Hz or 120Hz by default. Vivo has also incorporated an Eye Protection mode and gives you the ability to manually adjust colour temperatures. There’s a Visual Enhancement mode as well that optimizes colour and contrast in some pictures to give the display a more vivid look.

Performance

For performance, the Vivo X80 Pro has your run-of-the-mill flagship hardware and some. The phone is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset paired with 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM and 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage. The handset also comes with a VC liquid cooling solution with a 2691mm2 vapour chamber, which helps keep the phone cool during intensive gaming. In most cases, the hardware here would be more than sufficient to handle any task with ease.

However, Vivo also brings a custom V1+ chip to the table, which acts as both an image chip and an independent display chip. The chip supports MEMC Dynamic Frame Insertion, Display Effect Optimization, and NR Noise Reduction. The V1+ chip has lower power consumption, a longer stable frame and better temperature control, while it also supports 120fps gaming in certain games. A Geekbench test revealed that the Vivo X80 Pro managed a single-core score of 1301 points and a multi-core score of 3311 points.

Some of the games I tested on the Vivo X80 Pro were Asphalt 9: Legends, Call of Duty: Mobile, Raid: Shadow Legends, Apex Legends Mobile, and Diablo Immortal. The X80 Pro ran all five games without any hiccups. All titles were tested on the highest settings possible at the highest supported frame rates. The phone did heat up after around 30 to 45 minutes of gaming, although this is something we’ve noticed across the board with phones using the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset. When it comes to performance, the Vivo X80 Pro is no slouch, this is arguably one of the best-performing Android smartphones to date.

Cameras

While the Vivo X80 Pro has a top-tier spec sheet, the main highlight of this phone is still its quad-rear camera setup. The setup includes a 50 MP Samsung GN5 primary sensor with an f/1.57 aperture, a 48 MP ultrawide shooter with an f/2.2 aperture, a 12 MP telephoto lens with an f/1.85 aperture, and an 8 MP periscope camera with an f/3.4 aperture. The main camera supports OIS and Laser AF, while the telephoto shooter supports OIS and 5x optical zoom. The ultra-stable gimbal OIS is available on the telephoto lens with 2x optical zoom.

Let’s get started with the main camera on the Vivo X80 Pro, which captures a ton of light thanks to the large 1/1.31-inch sensor size. The camera reproduces vivid yet accurate colours but if you are looking for a more natural look, then you can switch to the Zeiss mode, which delivers true-to-life colours, giving the images a more realistic look. The Zeiss T coating also does an excellent job of dealing with reflections or glares.

Getting back to the main camera, which does a superb job in daylight, both in terms of detailing and dynamic range. HDR processing was also on point, while the sensor didn’t overexpose or over-sharpen images. Because of the size of the sensor, there’s a clear separation between subject and background in a photo. The sensor was also adept at dealing with noise and didn’t overexpose darker areas in scenes.

Moving to the ultrawide camera, which was quite effective in daylight. The ultrawide also maintained good levels of detail, although certain subjects appear to be softer than that on the main camera. The drawback of the ultrawide unit was the colour temperatures weren’t always consistent across the main camera. The ultrawide camera also handled dynamic range well and doubles as a competent macro camera.

The X80 Pro also has a portrait (telephoto) lens and a periscope camera. The 12 MP telephoto camera can take impressive portraits in good lighting. However, image quality tends to dip in more complex lighting, although this isn’t uncommon among Android smartphones. The 12 MP portrait lens is also the one that comes with gimbal stabilization in order to offset shaky hands, ensuring better low light portrait shots. The camera does an excellent job with edge detection and maintains natural skin tones when taking portrait shots, although images do tend to look softer.

Last but not least is the X80 Pro’s Periscope camera with 5x optical zoom and 20x hybrid zoom, but you can also go all the way to 60x magnification, although image quality tends to drop off after the 5x hybrid zoom. The X80 Pro couldn’t keep pace with the Galaxy S22 Ultra after the 5x zoom.

The Vivo X80 Pro’s main camera takes excellent shots at night with no noise and vivid colours. High contrast scenes look particularly good with images looking unnaturally bright at times but that’s far from a bad thing. The size of the sensor allows it to capture more light than is visible, this results in getting usable results even when with the smallest of light sources.

The ultrawide camera may not be as competent as the main camera and does require ambient light in the scene to get good results. Images on the ultrawide also lose out on detail and do introduce noise into the scene in certain instances. However, the ultrawide handles HDR well and most shots were taken on the X80 Pro looked better than those shot on the Galaxy S22. Vivo’s night mode also works on its portrait and periscope lenses offering a solid amount of detail and good dynamic range.

The Vivo X80 Pro can capture 8K video at 30fps or 4K video at 60fps. The X80 Pro also has different levels of stabilization with standard stabilization working across 1080p and 4K video and Ultra stabilization locked at 1080p at 60fps. Footage taken on the main camera looks good with solid details and a contrast ratio. 8K footage only works on the main camera.

The Vivo X80 Pro also offers a ton of camera filters that can be used in regular or night mode. You can also turn on the Zeiss mode for more natural-looking shots, while there’s also a high-resolution mode that works with both the main and ultra-wide cameras. The main camera can also capture HDR10+ footage in 1080p resolution at 30fps. The Vivo X80 Pro’s selfie camera can take 1080p video at 30fps, which is unimpressive considering the competition can do 4K at 60fps.

Apart from taking excellent photos, the Vivo X80 Pro also has a ton of camera features baked into the software. Vivo has added Astro mode and a Supermoon mode for taking some excellent shots of the night sky. There’s also a cinematic video mode that takes a wide cinema-style aspect ratio at 24fps with a bokeh effect. There’s also a Long Exposure mode, Double Exposure mode, and a Dual View mode that lets you record video on both the front and rear camera. The AI Group Portrait and Live Photo features are other cool addition to the X80 Pro.

To sum it all up, the Vivo X80 Pro’s cameras deliver some of the best photography results in the business. In certain instances, the X80 Pro’s best was better than both Samsung and Apple. However, video performance is not quite as good as Apple’s best. But users will also benefit from the tons of camera features on offer here. With the X80 Pro, Vivo perfectly matches its impressive camera hardware with excellent software. I can easily see how the cameras here will give Samsung, Apple, and Xiaomi a run for their money.

Battery

Vivo has incorporated a 4,700 mAh battery in the X80 Pro, making it the biggest battery on a smartphone in the company’s X series. The cell delivers all-day battery life under moderate and heavy use. Power efficiency was a point of contention here. While the phone is idle or used for viewing pictures or browsing the web, power consumption is top-notch. However, demanding tasks like gaming or using the camera app drain a much-higher toll on the battery, above and beyond the norm.

Again, this has been the case with most phones using the powerful Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chip. But when you eventually run out of charging, the super-fast 80W charging support will get the X80 Pro to 100 percent in under 40 minutes. On top of that, the X80 Pro also offers 50W wireless fast charging as well as 10W reverse wireless charging.

Software

The Vivo X80 Pro runs on Android 12 based on the FunTouch OS 12 skin. In my short experience with the phone, the version of FunTouch OS was particularly bloat-free. The skin also comes with a ton of customization, while retaining some of Google’s best Android 12 features.

Vivo is also offering three years of major Android updates and four years of security updates with the X80 Pro. Funtouch OS has improved over the years but there are many other Android skins that offer better features and a more seamless experience. Vivo needs to bring some significant overhaul in Funtouch OS to take on the likes of OneUI, Realme UI, and OxygenOS.

Verdict

There’s no doubt that the Vivo X80 Pro fetches a hefty price tag. While most people were impressed by the cameras, the price tag flabbergasted them. But despite its hefty price tag, it doesn’t really feel like you are overpaying for anything here. When it comes to specifications, the X80 Pro can roll with the best with little effort. But then, Vivo goes over the top with the cameras, allowing the X80 Pro to trade back and forth with the big guns – Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra (Review) and iPhone 13 Pro Max. The camera system does have a few caveats, particularly in the consistency department but on balance, this is arguably one of the best cameras on a smartphone.

There are two areas where the Vivo X80 Pro can use some work and that’s in the selfie and software departments. However, the Vivo X80 Pro doesn’t quite offer a massive upgrade over the X70 Pro Plus (Review). But it is still a solid upgrade considering you are getting a new chipset, updated display, a slightly larger battery, faster charging, and improved cameras with a ton of features, all at the same price. Considering what’s on offer with the X80 Pro, I think the Galaxy S22 Plus (Review) and iPhone 13 Pro (Review) do have some cause for concern. While there's no clear winner, I think the Vivo X80 Pro might just be one of the top three best Android flagships in 2022.