Highlights

• The Phantom X2 is powered by a MediaTek Dimensity 9000 SoC.
• Phantom X2 comes with a curved-edge AMOLED display.
• It comes with a 5,160mAh battery, which also has a 45W fast charging support.

Tecno Phantom X2 Review in Brief

India is a huge and diverse country with people of different ethnicities, culture, caste, creed, and language, where they all have different tastes and preferences for various things, especially electronic gadgets like smartphones, tablets, laptops, smartwatches, etc.

People’s tastes are extremely fickle and it is none more evident than when it comes to gadgets because if they don’t find it to their liking, they will immediately switch preference to another tech brand.

Everyone has their own preferences when it comes to smartphone brands where other than the more well-known and popular variants from the likes of Apple, Samsung, Google, and Xiaomi, there are many people who love smartphones from budget friendly brands OPPO, Infinix, Realme, and Tecno among others.

Speaking of Tecno, the company recently launched its new Tecno Phantom X2 in India, following the successful launch of Tecno Phantom X2 Pro that was extremely well received and so the company found it prudent to launch the new variant early into the market to capitalize upon it.

Tecno comes under the Chinese brand Transsion, which is predominantly prevalent in overseas market, with Africa having a sizeable fanbase and anyone familiar with Tecno would know it mostly for their popular Camon line, which is a line of value devices whose main focus is camera experience.

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My Mobile Review

It goes without saying that the Phantom Line or Phantom X-series has carved out a separate identity of its own and whose aim is to truly deliver flagship devices and experiences, which was seen when the original Phantom X in 2021.

Phantom X2 is the latest addition to the Phantom X-Series where the makers are hopeful that the latest variant too carve its own place in the hearts and minds of users so that Tecno will continue growing as a brand in the smartphone segment.

Phantom X2 is a 5G model that came in a black-coloured cardboard slide-out box that was quite large and sturdy, which also contained the usual mobile accessories that were discovered when the unboxing was complete like the 45W charger, USB Type-A or Type-C charging port, which was a standard model sans any extra pins, which meant they could be easily replaced.

At the bottom, there was an in-line microphone and a pair of white-coloured earbuds that were quite comfortable to the ears when put on, along with a free hard case. It gives a nice feeling so it can be called a few notches above than the usual bundled cases because it contains a bonus feature in the form of an integrated kickstand.

When it comes to retail package, it seems Tecno has gone all-in with regards to Phantom X2 and with the bonus gadgets inside, it gives a surreal experience to any user that examines it.

Tecno Phantom X2 5G Launch Confirmed in India in January 2023

Phantom X2 Specifications

• Design & Display

Phantom X2 comes with a 6.8-inch diagonal, which is one of its most impressive features given its 72.7mm width, along with a curved OLED panel on both sides that is covered with Gorilla Glass Victus, and lastly, a 120Hz refresh rate with a 1080 x 2400 pixel resolution.

While the Phantom X2 series is not exactly strong in colour accuracy, the display is strikingly similar to its predecessor, Phantom X2 Pro, which is to be expected considering that the new vanilla model too has 500 nits of brightness on the slider, along with a functioning max auto brightness boost mode during writing time.

It also has a distinctive camera island, along with rounded corners and soft lines surrounding it. Since it has no sharp or jagged edges, Tecno Phantom X2 is extremely manageable when it comes to grip, which extends to the cameras as well.

The phone, being top-heavy, is a little difficult to hold in hand, although when compared to Phantom X2 Pro, it is still manageable due to the firm grip.

The handset is available in two colour options- Stardust Gray and Moonilight Silver, although they’re not considered as glaring as Mars Orange of Phantom X2 Pro, which is why the new design has been toned down.

Both colour modes aim for DCI-P3 colour space that miss the mark considerably, while the bright mode is quite cold in terms of temperature with exaggerated blues, while the original mode dials back things to a large extent.

However, the handset has no HDR support on its display, although its chipset can still decode HDR10, HDR10+, and HLG perfectly, while you can also avail the highest Widevine L1 certification in terms of DRM, through which Netflix and Amazon Prime-like streaming services offer HD of topnotch quality.

• Build Quality Material

If you think colour choices are limited to the handset, you’re wrong as they extend to the realm of materials as the backs are quite smooth and silky, while the Moonlight Silver features mostly a plastic back panel and curves up into a metal frame similar to the front.

Phantom X2 doesn’t have any flex to speak of that gives a sturdy feel upon holding for which the credit goes to its metal frame, not to mention the solid front glass covered by Gorilla Glass Victus.

• Connectivity & Control

The volume and power button are found at the right-hand side of the device where both are equally positioned in terms of height that are quite easy to profile, despite the slim profile.

There is a plastic insert at the top that occupies most of the space that is quite empty when it comes to controls, where you can find a single hole for the secondary noise-canceling microphone.

The bottom has a firing-speaker, along with the main microphone and dual Nano-SIM card tray but with no microSD slot. Then there is the USB Type-C port on the bottom side and USB 2.0 data transfer speeds of up to 480 Mbps. Also found at the bottom is an in-display fingerprint scanner that is quite accurate and snappy.

Regarding connectivity features, it has a dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 5.3 and SA/NSA sub6 5G on both SIM slots, while the Near-Field Communication (NFC) and FM Radio too can be found.

Also available are the full set of sensors on board the device that includes an icm42631 with a combination of accelerometer and gyroscope, along with a proximity combo sensor and stk33562, an mmc5603 compass, and a magnetometer combo, where all the functions are working properly.

• Refresh Rate Handling

Phantom X2 comes in 60Hz and 120Hz refresh rates, and although there is no refresh rate mode in-between such as 90Hz refresh rate, the other two refresh rate modes more than make up for it.

60Hz works as expected and locks the refresh rate at 60Hz, along with the 120Hz and Auto Mode, which is quite odd as it was discovered during testing that the 120Hz mode triggers the actual 120Hz refresh rate more consistently than Auto.

The high refresh rate has been handled decently by the device, although there is a lot of room for improvement as well, while the available modes are quite confusing and overlap to a certain extent.

• Battery Life

The battery capacity of Phantom X2 is quite large at 5,160mAh units, which is the same as X2 Pro, which is understandable as both handsets share the same display and identical chipsets, where users can get a 110 hours of endurance that was confirmed during testing phase.

• Android 12 OS

Phantom X2 runs on Android 12 OS, along with Tecno’s custom HiOS 12, which is another similarity it shares with X2 Pro, although it must be said that Tecno has been running on its own steam for quite some time now, while the situation on both fronts seems to have considerably improved as X2 doesn’t have any annoying notifications and pushy offers like some of its predecessors.

It can’t be denied that there are numerous pre-installed apps and utilities as Tecno has stuck to its traditions of developing and deploying its own set of apps for covering basic features, while users getting fed up of third-party apps pestering them with constant notifications can disable them immediately, either from the app or from Notifications settings.

The face recognition and fingerprint sensors are there as usual where the former can be unlocked by tapping or pressing, similar to the latter. The lockscreen comes with a single shortcut at the bottom right to access the camera, moving on which you find the standard homescreen interface.

• Performance

Phantom X2 is powered by the flagship Dimensity 9000 4nm chipset because Tecno wants to push its flagship territory with the X2 series, while MediaTek is offering customizability on the chipset, although Tecno is running it at stock speeds. The CPU configuration includes one ARM Cortex-X2 core running at up to 3.05GHz, three Cortex-A710 ones clocked up to 2.85GHz and four Cortex-A510 cores at up to 1.8GHz.

They’re paired with a 10-core Mali-G710 MC10 GPU that is clocked at 850 MHz, while Phantom X2 comes with 256GB of fast UFS 3.1 storage and 8GB of physical fast LPDDR5 RAM.

In terms of performance, Phantom X2 has received high marks in all of its performance tests conducted by the likes of Geekbench where it has done wonderfully in terms of integrating and making the most out of the Dimensity 9000 chipset, while the devices’ fluidity with HiOS is also excellent.

• Camera

Phantom X2 comes with a triple camera setup and there are a lot of differences between X2 and X2 Pro in this case as the new vanilla model doesn’t get a 50MP retractable portrait telephoto camera. This has disappointed many fans but on the bright side, X2 comes with a 64MP main camera of high resolution that is equipped with optical image stabilization (OIS), a feature not found on X2 Pro.

The 64 main camera uses Samsung S5KGGWB- 1/1.7-inch, 0.8 ISOCELL sensor, along with a Quad-Bayer arrangement sensor with RGBW pixels, where you get an excellent low-light performance.

The 13MP ultra-wide lens is based on Samsung S5K3L6 sensor– 1/3-inch size and 1.12um individual pixels, while the PDAF is also implemented in the handset, which will be a standout considering it can double up as a macro camera.

Lastly, there is the 2MP supplementary camera based on GalaxyCore GC02M1 sensor, while the 32MP selfie camera in the front is perfect for taking selfies. It uses Samsung S5KGD2 sensor– 1/2.8-inch, 0.8um ISOCELL, Tetrapixel RGB Bayer sensor, while the selfie camera has been taken from Tecno Camon 19 Pro.

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Day-Light Image

The primary camera looks quite clean with great attention to detail and natural-looking if a bit desaturated colours, which is down to the lighting and weather conditions, while the contrast too is on point, along with the strong dynamic range.

The camera can also shoot at 64MP mode, where the shots have more details than the regular ones to the point where users can consider shooting in higher resolution as long as they don’t mind dealing with larger files.

The main camera is perfect for taking portrait shots, while the subject detection and separation are quite good, along with the background blur. Users can also avail digital zoom from the main 64MP shooter, along with a 2x toggle front and center on camera UI.

Ultrawide Camera

Phantom X2 has been straightaway taken from Phantom X2 Pro that beautifully captures clean and detailed shots.

Selfies

32MP is quite extensive in terms of resolution, which is why it is easy to shoot selfie portraits without any kind of applied effects to get just as great 8MP stills, which doesn’t seem to have any issues either except maybe an autofocus would have definitely enhanced its features.

Tecno Phantom X2 Conclusion

All in all, Tecno Phantom X2 is a worthy example with which the company hopes to branch out into flagship territory as the handset can easily match up to the features of X2 Pro as there is a minimal segmentation between the two handsets where except for the spotlight portrait camera, Phantom X2 is indistinguishable from Phantom X2 Pro.

My rating for Tecno Phantom X2 is 4.5/5 stars.

Tecno Phantom 2 Specifications (Table)