Over All Rating 4/5
PROS 👍
- Slimmest fold in the market
- Fingerprint sensor on both displays
- 5700mAh battery with 100W Fast charging
CONS 👎
- Average cameras
- Only water-resistant[IPX8]
Vivo X Fold3 Pro Review
Foldable phones are becoming more common, making it challenging for brands to differentiate themselves. While there’s still room for improvement, many features, particularly those related to the foldable screen, are becoming standard. We recently received the vivo X Fold3 Pro to test out. Upon initial use, it’s clear that this device has the potential to significantly impact the foldable industry and present intense competition for established tech companies. The question is, is the vivo X Fold3 Pro the best foldable phone to purchase in 2024? I tested the device to determine if it outperforms all previous foldable phones.
Features of Vivo X Fold3 Pro
vivo X Fold 3 Pro is the first Foldable smartphone from vivo for Indian customers priced at ₹1,59,999/-. It brings stylish design and India’s thinnest and lightest foldable smartphone. Checkout more about vivo X Fold3 Pro on Exhibit Magazine Instagram page.
Design & Build
The vivo X Fold3 Pro stands out immediately with its elegant and distinctive looks. It features circular camera bumps, similar to those found on other vivo smartphones like the vivo X100 Pro and vivo V30e. Despite the off-center placement, vivo manages to make the camera bump look balanced and stylish thanks to a clever visual trick. The camera bump houses three cameras, two tiny LED flashes, and the ZEISS branding near the empty space of the bump.
The vivo X Fold3 Pro is a stunning device, especially because of its slim profile when folded. The phone measures just 11.2mm when folded, making it the thinnest foldable smartphone on the market. Despite its size, the device is incredibly light, defying the stereotypes of foldable smartphones. It stands out as one of the largest devices in the foldable market, offering an impressive screen size. To maintain its lightness, vivo utilized a Carbon Fiber Ultra-Durable Lightweight Hinge to minimize the visibility of the crease and enable the phone to fold shut seamlessly.
The vivo X Fold3 Pro is a foldable phone that turns into a small tablet, requiring both hands when unfolding. While it’s comfortable to use with one hand when closed, it’s necessary to use the other hand to interact with the top part of the display for tasks like opening the notification drawer. This is particularly true for the vivo X Fold3 Pro, which is larger than other foldable phones. The 6.53-inch external display, when folded, makes the phone easier to handle. The textured back of the phone provides a better grip, though it’s unfortunate that no protective back case is included in the box.
The ultrasonic fingerprint sensor on the screen makes unlocking the phone with one hand relatively easy. You don’t have to struggle with the power buttons located on just one side of the phone. This feature is rare on foldable phones, and even more impressive is the fact that the vivo X Fold3 Pro also has a similar in-display sensor on the inner display.
Performance
The vivo X Fold3 Pro is packed with high-end hardware you’d expect from a premium flagship at this time of the year. It features a powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, 16GB of RAM, and 512GB of storage. This means it can handle anything you throw at it without lacking in power. However, playing graphics-intensive games can cause the phone to get quite warm. While it’s not hot enough to burn your skin, it might affect frame rates and make you want to take a break from gaming.
The phone has a dual battery with a total capacity of 5,700mAh, which is impressive for a foldable device. Due to the power and two displays, the battery life might be shorter than that of regular smartphones with the same battery size. vivo compensates for this with 100W fast charging, one of the fastest in the foldable category. Additionally, it supports 50W wireless charging with a compatible charger.
The most notable feature of the vivo X Fold3 Pro is its foldable screen, which is currently the largest in its category. It delivers impressive performance, particularly in terms of brightness. However, watching movies on this phone has its disadvantages. Because of the smartphone’s square shape, there are large black stripes on both sides, making it difficult to fully enjoy the movie. Watching a 2-hour movie at maximum brightness consumed approximately 42% of the battery. The main advantage of using a foldable phone is multitasking, as you can watch a video while chatting or browsing the web simultaneously.
As for software, the vivo X Fold3 Pro is equipped with Funtouch OS, based on Android 14. The phone includes its own set of apps, such as the “v-store” for downloading apps and games. One of the best features of the V-Store app is that it allows users to download apps without requiring a Google account sign-in. Thankfully, the vivo X Fold3 Pro doesn’t come with any unwanted pre-installed apps, which is something I would expect from a premium phone. The transition from viewing content on a smaller screen to a larger one is seamless and offers a great user experience. Furthermore, all the applications are optimized to support both screen sizes, ensuring that popular apps like Instagram and other previously non-compatible apps work flawlessly on different screen sizes.
Camera
The performance of foldable phones in terms of mobile photography hasn’t been impressive due to design and space sacrifices. We observed the same with the vivo X Fold3 Pro, as it presents a mixed experience.
The vivo X Fold3 Pro features triple rear-facing cameras, including a 50-megapixel primary camera with an f/1.7 aperture, a 64-megapixel f/2.6 telephoto camera with 3x optical zoom, and another 50-megapixel ultrawide camera. The phone also has a 32-megapixel camera for selfies on both the front and inside foldable display.
The 50-megapixel primary camera takes decent-quality photos in daylight with a nice dynamic range. The images are not too saturated or over-processed. However, I noticed the images are unattractive, especially when taking HDR images. Despite this, photos taken in bright daylight using the primary camera have a lot of detail.
The 64-megapixel telephoto camera performs well in daylight, capturing images with consistent colour tones and detailed highlights and shadows similar to the primary camera. However, the images it produces tend to be slightly softer compared to the primary camera, despite having higher resolution, maybe due to additional processing. While it offers the option for up to 100x zoom, the images at this zoom level are very soft and of low quality, making them hardly usable.
The ultrawide camera utilizes the same 50-megapixel resolution, resulting in softer images that require ample light for good-quality shots.
The 32-megapixel front-facing camera on the front and foldable display handles harsh lighting situations well. Still, there will be some instances where the images tend to have ramped-up shadows, especially with the backlit shots.
The vivo X Fold3 Pro can shoot videos up to 8K at 30fps. Using the primary camera, I recorded several videos at 4K, and the results were good. The camera performs well in bright sunlight and captures a good range of colours. It’s also helpful in capturing moving shots, and the stabilization is quite impressive. The telephoto and ultrawide cameras also produce good results. Surprisingly, all three rear cameras maintain a consistent colour tone for videos. In low-light conditions, the cameras struggle and produce a noticeable amount of noise, especially the telephoto and ultrawide cameras.
Verdict
The vivo X Fold3 Pro clearly aims to set a new standard. Its sleek design and slim form factor make it a perfect foldable phone. In addition to its powerful hardware, the foldable phone offers unique features such as larger screens and in-display fingerprint sensors on both screens, features that even industry leaders still need to offer. Unfortunately, vivo’s camera has slightly underperformed. While this is not a deal-breaker on its own, it does make the overall experience less than ideal.