Vivo V5 Unboxing, Benchmarks and First Impressions

Vivo Philippines held a grand event last night where they invited friends from the media, dealers, and VIPs to announce exciting things like NBA star Stephen Curry being the brand ambassador for PH and teasing a smartphone with dual front cameras.

Although apart from that, they also introduced another first in the smartphone game. The Vivo V5 boasts a 20-megapixel selfie camera that should satiate the specs-hungry user in you. It is also packed with additional features that aim to make your selfies look better.

A standard packaging is what the V5 comes with but right from its box, the company is already letting you know about its main feature.

Removing the cover, you’ll be greeted by the unit itself wrapped in protective plastic.

The box includes a Vivo headset, USB to microUSB cable, and its charging head. Vivo also threw in a soft transparent case to protect the device from unwanted scratches.

The V5 has a 5.5-inch display size with resolution maxing out at 720p. It already has fairly thin bezels but the 2.5D curved edges make them appear thinner. In general, its face looks generic and doesn’t offer anything new.

The fingerprint scanner is at the bottom and is not a physical button type that you can press down, although it still has the Home function. Beside it are two capacitive, backlit keys for Back and Options.

Although looking plain and simple up front, the star of the show is tucked just at the top. Here we have the 20-megapixel front camera of the V5 which the company boasts is made up of a 5P lens system that should further aid in delivering quality photos.

At the opposite side is the front-facing soft light flash for shooting selfies in dimly-lit places.

The simplicity of its form factor continues to the rear as we see the same familiar setup — the logo in the middle, rear camera at the upper left, and two strips of chrome linings that give segments to its metal back panel.

An accompanying LED flash is beside the 13-megapixel shooter with phase detection autofocus.

At the right side are volume rocker and power/lock button that are easily reachable whether you’re using your left or right hand. Meanwhile, the left side houses the dual hybrid SIM tray accessed through a pinhole.

Being a midrange handset, the V5 still stuck to having a microUSB port instead of a USB Type-C. However, it supports USB-OTG for connecting USB drives directly to the phone.

As you may have noticed, this area is pretty cramped with other functionalities. We have the 3.5mm audio jack situated here as well as the speaker grille which, in turn, leaves the top devoid of anything.

The Vivo V5, aesthetics-wise, doesn’t offer anything new. It still has the same design as other brands with its glossy white face and a neat back plate segmented by chrome trimmings.

However, having the same form factor retained that curved edges that make handling easy on the hands. It also has a good heft to it at 154 grams and is slim at 7.55mm so you can slide it into your jeans without much effort.

Inside, it sports a 64-bit octa-core processor with 4GB of RAM so it should perform decently. So far, we were able to do our benchmark tests and below are the scores:

• AnTuTu (v6): 41,500
• Quadrant Standard: 20,509
• Vellamo: 1,946 (Multicore), 1,020 (Metal)  2,781 (Web Browser)
• 3DMark (SlingShot ES 3.1): 312
• PCMark (Work 2.0): 2,916

Vivo V5 specs:
5.5-inch HD IPS display @ 1280 x 720 resolution
2.5D Gorilla Glass
64-bit MediaTek MT6750 octa-core CPU
4GB RAM
32GB storage
Expandable up to 128GB via microSD
13MP rear camera w/ PDAF, LED flash
20MP Sony IMX376 front camera w/ F2.0 aperture, 5-piece lens, LED flash
Dual-SIM
4G LTE
Wi-Fi
Bluetooth
GPS, A-GPS
USB-OTG
AK4346 Hi-Fi audio
Fingerprint scanner
Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow with Funtouch OS 2.6
3,000mAh battery
153.8 x 75.5 x 7.55 mm
154 g
Crown Gold, Grey

We will be using it in the next few days so stay tuned as we prepare the full review of this Php12,990 smartphone.