Yesterday Lenovo finally released its year-end flagship smartphone, Lenovo ZUK Edge, although it called ‘Edge’, it is not a curved smartphone, the biggest highlight of Lenovo ZUK Edge is the screen to body ratio up to 86.4%, which can be the best rival of Xiaomi MI MIX. Of course, you can also check Xiaomi MI MIX VS Huawei Magic Review first. And in terms of the design, ZUK Edge can be considered as the combination of ZUK Z2 and Z2 Pro. Because it has ZUK Z2 dual curved 2.5D glass and Z2 Pro mid-metal frame. As for the specs, ZUK Edge is also its own first Snapdragon 821 processor flagship with RAM 6GB ROM 64GB internal storage, and the price is at 2,299 yuan which is highly competitive compared with Xiaomi MI MIX. In addition, its home button uses touch screen which is not pressed. So will Lenovo ZUK Edge is more worthwhile to have a try than Xiaomi MI MIX?
Design
Lenovo ZUK Edge package is similar to Z2 Pro with black color and good quality. ZUK Edge shows its model, Z2151 on the bottom of the package. Today we test the RAM 6GB ROM 64GB titanium crystal black version. After unboxing, it has 5.5 inch 1080P TDDI screen, 403 PPI with very sleek design, 1500:1 contrast, 85% NTSC color gamut, and 500 nit highest brightness, which is the most excellent screen until now. Lenovo ZUK Edge is covered with a 2.5D glass, on the screen is the receiver built in light sensor and proximity sensor, which is very simple about the forehead, there is a front camera on the right side of the receiver. Under the screen is a U-touch button which is touched instead of pressed operation, this is the first time that ZUK Edge use touched home button. Of course, it can support fingerprint scanner. On the back, Lenovo ZUK Edge still uses 2.5D screen, back camera is in the middle, stands out a little. Under the camera is a dual tone LED flash, and then lower the LED light is the heart blood oxygen sensors to support heart and blood monitor. On the top is the de-noising microphone, at the bottom from left to right is 3.5 mm earphone, microphone, USB Type C port, speaker, and on the right side is the power button, volume button, SIM card is located on the left side, it supports Dual Nano SIM card, but can’t support MicroSD card for expansion, you can use quick charge, 13.25W（5.3V/2.5A）power adapter.
As for Xiaomi MI MIX, it has reached 91.3% screen to body ratio, 6.4 inch 2.5D screen with 2040×1080 resolution, looking very cool. In receiver design, Sharp Crystal 305SH adopts bone conduction technology, according to vibration to make screen becomes the receiver, when the ear is close to the screen, you can take the phone call. But Xiaomi mix doesn’t use Sharp vibration technology, but Cantilever piezoelectric ceramic guide which means it is built in piezoelectric ceramic to drive the unit from signal to Mechanical energy, then make the sound with smartphone frame vibration. In fact, when we make phone call, Xiaomi mix all frame makes sound, the volume is loud with good sound quality. Of course we can wear an earphone to take the call to avoid our privacy leaked. Xiaomi MI MIX uses Ultrasonic distance sensors to reduce the ports on the phone, and its light sensor and front camera are designed under the screen to ensure three bezel-less high screen to body ratio design. In SIM card, Xiaomi MI MIX supports dual Nano SIM card. In all, Xiaomi MI MIX has brought us much surprise in its design.
Hardware
Lenovo ZUK Edge and Xiaomi MI MIX are both powered by Snapdragon 821 Quad core processor with 14nm FiFET Samsung second generation LPP architecture technology and the brand new Quad core 64big Kryo CPU and Adreno 530 GPU, 2.35GHz, its CPU performance has been improved 10% than Snapdragon 820 smartphone, and GPU improves 5%. In addition, Lenovo ZUK Edge is equipped with ROM 64GB UFS 2.0 and RAM 6GB LPDDR4, which can meet different needs for faster speed. Let’s test its Antutu score,
According Antutu test, most parts of Snapdragon 821 performance is fluctuated from 50% to 100%, the overall load is between 80% to 100%. In all, Snapdragon 821 performance is very stable, quad core can run at the same time, and it adjusts the cores smartly to control the power consumption and over heat.
From Antutu test, Lenovo ZUK Edge has reached 162,723 antutu score (Left), second to A10 Fusion processor of Iphone 7 and iphone 7 plus, compared with iPhone 7, the main difference between Snapdragon 821 and A10 Fusion is CPU algorithm, as for UX data processing and UX strategy game, Snapdragon 821 processor wins in UX GPU and 3D Park test. According to Antutu test score, ZUK Edge has no big gap as Le Pro 3 with Snapdragon 821, but it wins over Huawei Mate 9 with Kirin 960 and Oneplus 3 with Snapdragon 820.
Geekbench 4 Test
In Geekbench 4 CPU test, due to its an engineering phone, ZUK Edge has lower single core and multi core points, compared with Le Pro 3 with Snapdragon 821 processor, they have big gap, but it wins over huawei mate 9 with Kirin 960.
But Xiaomi MI MIX is also powered by Snapdragon 821 processor, based on 14nm FinFET LPP architecture, 2.35GHz, Adreno 530 GPU, it has LPDDR 4 and UFS 2.0. In LTE, it uses X12 LTE, Cat 12/13.
According to test result, Xiaomi MI MIX RAM 6GB ROM 256GB has reached 119,152 points, its single core has 1837 points, multi core has 3895 points,therefore, in terms of Antutu test, Lenovo ZUK Edge is the best one.
Camera
Lenovo ZUK Edge is equipped with Samsung 2M8 sensor, this CMOS continues Samsung ISOCELL pixel isolation technology, which can improve the light exposure under the strong light, it has 1/2.6inch, 1.34um pixel, 13MP back camera, f/2.2.
It supports EIS and PDAF+CAF dual mode focusing, fast focusing speed to 0.1s and 960Fps video recording. It has 8MP front camera to support 1080P video recording, the back 13MP camera can support 4K video recording.
ZUK Edge camera interface is very simple, it supports flash light mode, photographing mode, and HDR mode. When you click the camera, then it has many choices such as slow motion, fast motion, panoramic mode, etc.
The camera is in default in 4:3, let’s test the camera and see the sample.They are all taken under automatic mode.
Lenovo ZUK Edge has adjusted ISO below 300, the exposure time is less than 1/33 second, it has less noise and keeps large parts of details, The overall saturation doesn’t reduce and it has nice glare control. In general, although ZUK Edge doesn’t use Sony sensor, it still has high level performance, especially taking photos at night, it controls over exposure well and very pure picture. But you need to know ZUK edge doesn’t support OIS but EIS, we need to take photos in stable posture.
Below are Xiaomi MI MIX samples:
Xiaomi MI MIX is built in front 5MP camera, OV5675 model, 1.12μm pixel inch, supporting the third generation 36 level beautification, the front camera is very special,under the screen. The back camera adopts 16MP , OV16880 model,1/3.06 inch, 1.0μm pixel inch, supporting PDAF, Dual Tone LED flash.
In all, Xiaomi MI MIX can take nice photos with rich color and details under the good light, although under the dim light, it doesn’t have much competence, it still can meet daily needs.
Therefore, ZUK Edge can be better to take pictures under the dim light than Xiaomi MI MIX.
Battery
Lenovo ZUK Edge comes with 3,100mAh battery to support quick charge, the power adapter has only 13.25W（5.3V/2.5A）, Let’s test the battery of ZUK Edge.
Test from 2% power, record the power per 10 minutes until charging full, during charging, keep the screen off, wifi starts, clear all apps occupied.
In terms of diagram, the first part of charging speed of ZUK Edge performs well, it can charge 35% in half hour, 72% power in one hour, then the charging speed is slow, it takes 120 minutes to charge full, but for a flagship smartphone with 3,100mAh battery, the speed belongs to mid-range or low level.
Antutu battery test includes game, CPU, searching the Internet and multi-media four parts, after this test, the battery has reduced from 89% to 84% in 25 minutes, so it can be used for more than 8 hours.
From PCmark battery test, it supports 9 hours 17 minutes, which is quite good for users.
As for power consumption, we test by Antutu hardware, it shows Xiaomi battery performance has 9873 points, which belongs to mid-range level in 4400mAh battery smartphone. It can meet one day use for us.
In quick charge, Xiaomi MI MIX supports QC3.0, we have tested it, and record in every ten minutes, the result shows that Xiaomi MI MIX takes 120 minutes to charge full, from 0 to 80%, it charges very fast, it can charge 484mAh power in 10 minutes, and in 30 minutes, it charges 1452mAh battery, so the overall performance is good.
Therefore, they both need to charge full in 120 minutes, but Xiaomi MI MIX will have longer battery life than ZUK Edge.
Conclusion
According to real hands on test, ZUK Edge and Xiaomi MI MIX have their own advantages, ZUK Edge can win over Xiaomi MI MIX in hardware, camera and price, but Xiaomi MI MIX can be better in the design and battery, if you like a small screen phone with more powerful performance, then choose ZUK edge, if not, then try this future phone, Xiaomi MI MIX.