Tecno Camon 20 Premier 5G review: A budget-friendly gem with standout design

The Tecno Camon 20 Premier is a smartphone that showcases Tecno's growing success as a company. While they initially targeted developing countries in Africa, Tecno has rapidly expanded into new markets, and the Camon line has become one of their flagship offerings in their budget-targeted portfolio.

The Camon 20 Premier 5G stands out as the best offering in the Camon series. Its unique camera island design, coupled with the geometric pattern on the back, gives it a distinctive and stylish appearance. The back of the phone is made of a hard rubbery material with a vegan leather texture, featuring deep grooves and recessed design elements. The phone is available in Dark Welkin and Serenity Blue, with the latter being particularly appealing with its subtle pastel colour.

The Camon 20 Premier is comfortable to hold, providing ample grip and a well-balanced feel. It's not a lightweight device, weighing 202.5 grams, but considering its 6.67-inch display and 5,000 mAh battery, it's understandable. The phone's build quality is solid, without any noticeable hollowness.

The 6.67-inch AMOLED display of the Camon 20 Premier boasts a 120Hz refresh rate, offering a visually impressive experience. However, it falls short in terms of brightness, reaching only around 493 nits maximum on the slider. While the automatic brightness boost can improve outdoor visibility up to 684 nits, using the phone under direct sunlight might still be challenging. On the positive side, the OLED panel delivers deep blacks and infinite contrast.

Although the Camon 20 Premier lacks HDR support, it can handle HDR10, HDR10+, and HLG content thanks to its hardware decoding capabilities. Additionally, it holds the highest Widevine L1 DRM certification, allowing services like Netflix to provide Full HD streams, making the most of the phone's display.

With its 5,000 mAh battery, the Camon 20 Premier offers reliable battery life without being exceptional. Powered by the MediaTek Dimensity 8050 chipset, it demonstrates decent efficiency. The phone supports 45W fast charging, and a full charge takes around 1 hour and 15 minutes.

Running on Android 13 with HiOS 13 on top, the Camon 20 Premier provides a user-friendly interface. Tecno's HiOS skin has undergone minor changes, reducing pre-installed bloat and ads, resulting in a cleaner experience compared to previous iterations.

The Camon 20 Premier is equipped with the MediaTek Dimensity 8050 chipset, offering similar performance to the Dimensity 1200 and 1300. It features four fast Cortex-A78 cores and four efficient Cortex-A55 cores, along with a Mali-G77 MC9 GPU. The phone comes with 8GB of RAM and 512GB of non-expandable storage. The Dimensity 8050 runs relatively cool, thanks to Tecno's attention to cooling, including a large graphene sheet, vapour chamber, and high thermal conductivity polymer gel. The phone was snappy in day-to-day usage and while playing games like Asphalt 9 and BGMI.

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The Camon 20 Premier's main camera boasts a 50MP Samsung sensor with tri-axis sensor-shift stabilisation technology and laser autofocus. The standout feature is the super large 108MP ultrawide camera, featuring autofocus and doubling as a macro camera. There's also a 2MP depth sensor for supplementary shots. The main camera took some decent shots but did struggle a bit in harsher light environments. On the front, the phone houses a 32MP selfie camera, lacking autofocus but capturing detailed and natural-looking photos.

Check out some of the unedited camera samples:

In terms of video capabilities, the main camera captures impressive 4K videos with good detail and colours. The ultrawide camera also delivers clean and sharp 4K videos, although with a noticeable yellow tint. The phone features Ultra Steady electronic image stabilisation (EIS) for smoother footage, limited to 1080p resolution.

In conclusion, the Tecno Camon 20 Premier is a well-rounded smartphone that stands out in a competitive market. Its camera setup is reliable and versatile, offering excellent performance. The phone's design is distinctive and sturdy, with a large display that provides an enjoyable multimedia experience. Battery life and performance are dependable, and the phone runs smoothly thanks to HiOS 13. While the display could be brighter, the Camon 20 Premier remains an impressive device worth considering. The phone is available on Amazon for Rs 29,999.

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