Let’s Take a Closer Look at Sony’s Newest Flagship!

We first caught a glimpse of Sony’s new flagship smartphone during our annual trip to Mobile World Congress earlier in the year. One of its predecessors — the XZ Premium — was awarded 2017’s Best Smartphone at the Biggest Show in Mobile, so we were quite eager to test out the new iteration of the Japanese brand’s flagship and see if it’s a solid option to consider over a stacked lineup in 2018.

Let’s find out.

Sony Xperia XZ2 Specs

• Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor
• Adreno 630 GPU
• 4GB of RAM
• 5.7-inch Full HD+ HDR Triluminos Display, Gorilla Glass 5
• 64GB of expandable storage
• 4G, LTE
• Dual SIM
• 19-megapixel f/2.0 MotionEye rear camera with EIS, PDAF, Laser AF, LED flash, 4K HDR recording
• 5-megapixel f/2.2 Wide-angle front camera with EIS
• WiFi, Bluetooth, NFC
• GPS, A-GPS, GLONASS
• Fingerprint scanner, USB Type-C, Wireless Charging, IP68 rating, Hi-Res Audio
• 3180mAh Battery with quick charging
• Android 8.0 Oreo

A New Look that Honors the Old

The first thing we noticed when we saw the device on the floor of MWC was that Sony has finally bid farewell to its signature design, which gave the device pretty tall top and bottom bezels. Embracing the current 18:9 display trend, the XZ2 definitely looks very different from the devices that came before it but is still very recognizable as an Xperia device by maintaining nearly the same silhouette. The back is curved making the phone pretty thick; measuring in at 11mm at its thickest point. While that’s about 3mm more than most smartphones we’ve been handling, it feels really good in the hand, its weight certainly makes it feel solid but is evenly distributed throughout the device.

While it is comfortable to hold, the problem we’ve had with the device is when you slip it into your pocket or place it on the table. Aside from being a fingerprint magnet, that glossy sheen plus the way the XZ2 tips the scale makes the device pretty slippery. Our review unit has slid out of our pockets on numerous occasions and has almost slid off tables that were a bit askew as well. You can put the device face down but you run the first of scratching up the display over time even if it is protected by Gorilla Glass 5.

There’s also the issue of placement of the fingerprint scanner. Sony has typically embedded it on the power button of the device that worked perfectly in past iterations but has decided to put it towards the center of the device. This means that your index finger would almost naturally gravitate towards the camera, therefore smudging up the lens, instead of unlocking the device. We’ve been using the device for over a week now and we still find ourselves wondering why the phone isn’t unlocking, only to realize that we need to wipe down the glass on the rear camera yet again.

A Device Built for the Ultimate Multimedia Experience

As mentioned earlier, Sony employs the use of a display with a little extra real estate. The XZ2 has a 5.7-inch Full HD IPS LCD panel that may leave some of you scratching your heads since most flagships use an OLED screen to give you really crisp image quality with deep blacks as its base. That’s true but the Japanese company gave the XZ2 support for HDR to give you a wider range of colors that have a nice punch to them; something that you can see with the pre-loaded trailer of the latest Jumanji movie on the phone.

Trouble is, aside from that, HDR content still isn’t widely available. True, there are some Netflix Originals that are offered with HDR but that option isn’t available on mobile devices just yet. One way to enjoy HDR content is by making it yourself since the XZ2 can shoot videos up to 4K with HDR but we’ll talk about that more in the camera section.

One thing that Sony has always done right with their flagship devices is audio. The XZ2 still features a front firing speaker, hidden in its earpiece and a tiny slit on the bottom of the screen, to give consumers a really good experience when watching movies of the phone or listening to music with pretty good sound quality too.

One of the things they were harping on at MWC was the phones Dynamic Vibration System. It’s essentially like having Playstation Dual Shock Controller where the device would interpret lows in what you’re listening to and make the phone rumble a little bit. It’s a cute feature to have but we can’t help feel that it’s a bit of a novelty that you might want to have on every now and then but generally something you want to keep off to maintain battery life. We’re just not feeling it. Yes, pun intended.