Vivo Y55 Initial Review: Mid-range Winner?

Vivo Y55 Initial Review: Mid-range Winner?

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When Vivo came out with their V3 Max, we were quite impressed by how aggressively priced the phone was considering its internals. The V3 Max was a great phone for its price, and still is after its price cut. It comes as no surprise then, that Vivo’s newest phone, the Y55, follows the same strategy and brings seriously competitive specs for its price range.

Vivo Y55 specs

  • Octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 processor
  • Adreno 505 GPU
  • 2GB of RAM
  • 5.2-inch HD IPS display, 2.5D curved glass, 1280 x 720 resolution
  • 16GB of expandable storage
  • 8-megapixel rear camera with flash
  • 5-megapixel front camera
  • Dual SIM
  • 3G, LTE
  • WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, A-GPS
  • 2650mAh battery
  • Android 6 Marshmallow, Funtouch UI
  • Php 7,990

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Initial Impressions: Premium, elegant phone that won’t break the bank

The Y55 is quite a looker, especially when you consider its price. Yes, the phone doesn’t bring anything new to the table as far as its design is concerned, but considering it’s a mid-range phone, it doesn’t have to. The device features a full metal body with curved sides and corners. It’s a little reminiscent of Apple’s iPhones but to be honest, what doesn’t nowadays.

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The power button and volume rocker is on the right side of the phone, while the dual SIM slot is on the left side. We love the fact that there’s a seperate slot for the microSD card, located on the top, which means you no longer have to choose between an extra SIM or more storage. You’ll almost certainly going to be using that microSD slot though, since the phone only comes with 16GB of internal storage.

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The top part of the phone holds the 3.5mm jack. The bottom holds charging port, as well as the speaker grille for the phone.

Flip the phone around, and you’ll see the 8-megapixel rear camera, with the LED flash right beside it. You’ll see the two antenna bands on top and bottom of the phone. The large Vivo logo on the back adds a bit of visual flair to the device.

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Up front you’ll see the 5.2-inch HD IPS display, with the three Android navigation keys right below it. On top of that is the 5-megapixel front camera, along with the earpiece.

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The display itself is bright enough and has good color reproduction all around. The screen also has 2.5D glass layered on top of it, and while the resolution of the display is only HD, the lower pixel count isn’t really that bad because of the small size of the display.

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Inside the Y55 is Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 430 octa-core processor, which has consistently proven itself to be an excellent compromise between power, cost and performance. We’re a little disappointed at the mere 2GB of RAM inside the phone considering competing devices are offering at least 3GB at the price that the Y55 is asking for, but we’ll have to see if less RAM really affects the phone’s performance negatively once we start our review.

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It’s also important to remember that the phone has Android 6.0 Marshmallow with Vivo’s own TouchUI overlay layered on top. Considering that the V3 Max doesn’t have a Marshmallow update till now, you’ll have to contend with the fact that the phone may be stuck with Android 6.0 forever.

That’s pretty much it for the Vivo Y55. The phone is priced at Php 7,990.

You can also check out our reviews for the previous devices by the Chinese brand by clicking on the links below:

Vivo V3 Review: Smaller Size, Max Performance
Vivo V3 Max: Arriving with a Bang

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