Gadgetory

folks meet the world's most beautiful Android smartphone the essential phone now some of you might argue against that for certain reasons and I totally get that but there's no denying the fact that the company has pushed boundaries when it comes to smartphone engineering with their first device now don't get me wrong there were a lot of issues with the essential phone since launch but gradual you know software updates have addressed some of them but not all of them and given how it's been through a major price shift recently should you still consider one in 2018 let's find out but first a quick message from our sponsor experienced every pixel with the GeForce GTX 1080 Ti and enjoy these awesome new games and full 4k resolution at over 60 frames per second and get destiny 2 for free for a limited time full details in the description below all right guys let's get something straight the essential phone screams minimalism all OERs design and I love it the titanium construction throughout the body practically means that it can resist dents scratches and bending unlike aluminum the result is a durable smartphone that's also quite heavy to hold in the hand now be mindful that the rear side of the phone can pick up grease and fingerprints easily so a skin or case is highly recommended if you need some more grip essential has also made a few accessories that simply click onto the phone via this proprietary magnetic connector for instance there is this 360 degree 4k camera module that just snaps onto the device and the connectors take charge of transferring the data although be mindful that the camera app tends to crash sometimes after attaching module it only happens like say once and three times when you're using the module you'll also find the fingerprint reader at the back that's easier to reach but it takes a few seconds to unlock the device it's honestly not a huge deal but that's something I noticed instantly coming from the pixel 2 I also noticed that the power and volume buttons were placed in an odd location personally and much rather have them flipped so power at the top and volume at the bottom but that could just be me the essential phone doesn't come with a headphone jack but they have included a type c 2u 3.5 millimeter the phone also doesn't support wireless charging which makes sense since it's pretty complex to pass current through the robusta titanium body but essential is working on a dock that would use the magnetic connectors to charge the device I guess you could call that Wireless but I don't know what are your thoughts on that let's know in the comments down below be mindful that the phone doesn't come with any water-resistant reading either so I would take extra precaution when handling a device especially outdoors I'd want to get the specs of the essential phone they are right on par with what competitors offer so we've got a snapdragon 835 cpu four gigs of ram 120 gigabytes of storage that unfortunately cannot be expanded a 3000 milliamp hour battery 5.7 inch display which is qHD and it runs Android 7.1.1 as it making this video now while the price point might seem old compelling for some users out there one great example one great alternative to the essential phone would be the 1 + 5 T because it offers better specs than this and of course it comes with a lot of software related features which is pretty awesome and you can check out our full review right over here moving on to the display it sports a 5.7 inch IPS LCD panel sporting a qHD resolution with an 85% screen to body ratio and boy does it look so good physically that is sure the top notch with the front-facing cutout could be a distracting element for some users but I got used to it right away at least it isn't as bad as the iPhone 10 that's for sure now given that this is an IPS display viewing angles are great there's a good contrast ratio I'll be it not as good as AMOLED panels so if you're someone who's looking for the deepest blacks or if you just want colors to pop you might not be that pleased with the color rendition on the essential phone unfortunately the screen lacks brightness output meaning even at max setting it doesn't do just as using the device outdoors here's an interesting comparison to Google's offering the max brightness setting on the essential phone is roughly the medium setting on the pixel - and that's kind of disappointing you know one major concern that I had with this device was the terrible screen jitter or scroll lag if you want to call it that way it was very noticeable when scrolling through menus and apps there's a good amount of black which really killed the user experience and that just didn't make any sense given that the phone featured a Snapdragon 835 flagship CPU now obviously doesn't explain everything because it could be a communication issue with the screen and the software but honestly that's just not acceptable for $500 I mean phones like the LG G 6 do much better at that yet they cost less the screen shooter also effects content consumption just a bit especially when you're watching fast-paced visuals again this all comes down to software and hardware optimization and essential has yet to fix this major issue but they are looking into addressing it with an update very soon hopefully until then I would stay away from this device essential played it safe this time by pre loading the phone with a cleaner version of Android so for those of you who prefer stock Android this should feel like home there are no custom launchers or any bloatware applications installed which is highly appreciated now with the type of making this video the phone is running on android 7.1.1 nougat and awaiting the 8.0 or u update and as mentioned earlier essential has promised that they'll be addressing the issues in that update and I actually appreciate the fact that the company's transparent about these problems and that's all thanks to the AMA reddit session that they have opened for their customers it's a great way to interact with a company and I'm hoping that they'll continue to open these discussions in the future do note that you are getting a cleaner version of Android meaning that there aren't any unique features added to the device to elevate the user experience for instance you don't get this squeeze to activate Google assistant feature that's found on the pixel to which quite frankly I did miss speak you're missing out if you didn't catch our one plus 5t review make sure you do so as dimitri spends a good amount of time talking about the amazing software features are built into that device seriously it's far superior to the essential phone especially since they both cost the same and i'm kind of disappointed then essential just took it plain this time without adding any productivity enhancing features within the OS the battery life is respectable on the essential phone it features a 3000 milliamp hour battery and it charges via a USB type-c it doesn't support Qualcomm quick charge protocol but essential has included rapid charging it's just not as quick as quick charge that's something to keep in mind I go roughly four to four and a half hours of screen on time in some cases only three and a half and that's under heavy usage which involves content consumption check you know my social media accounts emailing etc now screen Oh times aren't the best way to describe battery life because it all comes down to usage but in my case it kind of makes sense because I can compare the essential phone to the pixel to that I've been using before this guy so normal usage would get me roughly four and a half to five maybe even five and a half hours let's get on time on the pixel too but with the essential phone it's much lower than that and that makes sense because the CPU has a lot to process in terms of you know the much higher resolution display and of course optimizations they play a huge role when it comes to battery life so don't expect two day battery life out of this guy just don't and the last thing to discuss here is the camera performance so there are two thirteen megapixel sensors with an F 1.9 aperture one shoots color and the other one shoots monochrome this was done to capture more light in order to retain the detail in the shadows and theoretically you know that would result in better low-light photos but that's not the case as you can see you lose quite a lot of detail in those scenarios even with HDR turned on as for brighter scenes two camera captures good dynamic range but the color seems a bit washed out and in some cases the highlights are just blown off essentials also included portrait mode and it works really well outdoors with proper lighting and exposure but again it doesn't do just as in low-light but I'd love to hear your thoughts on the results down below now before I get to the rest of the samples I need to mention that the camera app experience on the essential phone is absolutely the worst not really sure who designed the app but quite frankly this is not something that I would expect on a smart film that cost five hundred dollars as you can see there are very limited options when it comes to adjusting the settings on the app you don't have the option to add grid lines to help you compose shots and that was kind of disappointing most importantly you can't toggle between different frame rates so for instance you don't have the option to shoot at 4k at 24 frames per second or even 1080p at 24 frames per second the only options you have is 4k and 2k HD and 60 P which is disappointing I wish they gave us more options to play around with video resolutions and here's worst part I normally shoot everything in HDR and leave everything else in Auto which is what I did with the shots that you're about to see every time when I go back to the app it automatically disables HDR's so I'm not sure why does that it resets back to HDR turns on flash automatically so it feels like the camera is fighting back with me rather than me trying to adjust it the way I like so overall pretty frustrating experience with the app I'm sure you can download third-party camera applications and you know solve all these issues but that's just something you'll have to live with until they actually fix that problem with an update hopefully all right let's go back to the samples so this is the video test on the essential phone currently shooting in 4k at 30 frames per second and as you can see but there aren't any image stabilization built inside so the video is quite jerky wenyard when you're walking so if you're thinking of doing any fast or just motion related stuff but you should probably avoid this phone the dynamic reach is pretty good I wouldn't say it's the best but it's obviously not on par with the 1 plus 5t because that phone cost exactly the same and here's a point yesterday autofocus it works pretty well I mean but you can also test the detail on the video it's again not the best as I would say but ah man I'm pretty disappointed with the video on the essential phone to be honest so I guess it's about time to conclude my thoughts on the essential phone and guys I really wanted to like this device when it arrived here in the studio I was ready to throw away my pixel 2 and switch to this guy immediately which I did but things like the scroll lag and just to screen to the terrible performance on the device plus the you know shorter battery life of the camera performance they're all kind of man the software experience was also not the best given how I was going through the screen jitter issues I mentioned earlier it just killed the experience I was not really pleased by the performance of the essential phone on the other hand the design on the smartphone is absolutely breathtaking it's seriously right on par with the iPhone 10 if you were to ask me but of course this is a smart phone and they have a lot to work on they are continually working on updates to fix issues with this device and I'm hoping that they will with the upcoming 8.0 update perhaps I'll make a follow-up video with that update running and about whether or not if it's actually interest in all those issues but as of right now I think you should completely avoid the smartphone because I still feel like the 1 + 5 t offers a lot of features for its price when compared to this guy because sure it's running a stock cleaner version of Android but the hardware and software optimizations aren't quite to the level as I'd expect it to be so yeah just just avoid the essential phone well that's it for me thank you so much for watching I'd love to hear your thoughts on the essential phone is it worth its price would you actually consider this over the 1 + 5 t and are you willing to take the compromise that I mentioned above like the lack of a headphone jack or the you know the screen issues that I mentioned earlier and of course what do you think about the camera performance does it do well in portrait mode and how do you see that comparing against the pixel 2 and the other smartphones or the rest of the Flash's smartphones let us know in the comments down below I new bar with hardware connects thank you so much for watching and we'll see you in the next one