Here it is, your most requested smartphone for this year — TECNO’s latest iteration for the POVA Series, TECNO POVA 4!
Looks like the year 2022 is going to be a bit boring but that’s not the case at all. If you have thought before that there will be no love for the budget category, TECNO came to save the day with the latest in the Helio chipset lineup, a sweet design, and an even sweeter price point!
The box
The TECNO POVA 4 box art is nothing new to be commended, but it shows a pretty powerful design choice: consistency. Gone are the days where they needed to be extra flashy and striking to garner attention. To be fair, the shimmery pearl-esque part of the box is still flashy, but does not scream for desperate attention. It shows an air of class. On its back, the highlighted specs are there for a quick skim.
The contents
You’ve got all the nice perks here including a nice jelly case, an 18W Fast Charger, a Type-C port, and an earphone inside a smaller box (because it has a headphone jack) that’s getting rare in most smartphone boxes nowadays. On top of that, you will also get a sim ejector pin, a 12 + 1 Months Warranty card (sorta), a warranty card, and the phone itself. Not too shabby!
The back
What we get is an illustrious back finish that’s both beautiful, striking, and kind of rugged since it’s textured. A “Panther” wording is placed on the camera bump — in contrary to last year’s POVA 3 that has a lighted back. This year, they removed it but we think it’s for the better. The camera bump for a better word: inoffensive.
The sides and its display
Looking on its sides, it has the volume rockers on its right side with the power button sitting flush below that doubles as a fingerprint scanner. On the left side, a sim tray can be found that you can put two sim cards or one sim card and an SD card that can be expanded up to a massive 1 terabytes for your gaming needs (probably).
A gorgeous 6.82 IPS LCD display greets you when you power on the TECNO POVA 4, and it shows a 720p display that’s not too bad because of lower battery consumption. And to be honest, that’s a pretty tasteful sacrifice of a feature to keep the final cost possible. And with 90Hz of refresh rate, if this don’t satisfy you, we don’t know what will satisfy you indeed.
The cameras
The TECNO POVA 4’s 50MP main shooter produced well-captured shots in ideal settings and in natural settings to say the least. However, since this is a budget phone, don’t expect this phone to capture flagship level photos, but it is pretty acceptable– as you’ve seen in a few sample photos. The 2MP macro however to summarize it: serviceable.
As for the low-light mode, it’s competitive and can able to capture fine photos in dark conditions, but not as good as the mid-rangers and flagships.
The battery and performance
A 6,000mAh battery is still huge compared to last year’s 7,000mAh (which is still pretty huge) but the biggest upgrade the POVA 4 has recieved is the processor with an upgrade from Helio 688, to a now more robust and fine-tuned Helio G99.
And with 8GB or RAM that can be extended up to 13GB via Dynamic RAM (+5), the fun never stops. As with Call of Duty: Mobile, the settings are stuck on medium graphics and high refresh rates, as with most budget and mid-range offerings from MediaTek. As with Mobile Legends, you’ll get both high graphics and high refresh rate. As for Genshin Impact, low settings are the best.
What we like:
✔️ Gorgeous redesign
✔️ Large screen
✔️ Fine cameras
✔️ Helio G99 chipset inside
✔️ Massive battery (decreased though)
✔️ Cheap
What we dislike:
❌ Decrease in battery size (7,000mAh to 6,000mAh now)
❌ Charging speed also decreased (from 25W to 18W now)
❌ Decreased screen resolution (from 1080p to 720p)
Pricing: P7,999 (8+128GB)
Conclusion:
Despite all the downgrades, the TECNO POVA 4 is still a very competitive smartphone for its very low price, and I think you wouldn’t complain too much about it in the long run.
FINAL RATING: 4.3/5 (Super Sulit)
