Joined in 2023 
82 
63 About this deal
We encountered another glitch when we got to reviewing a bunch of our photos, with around half a dozen out of 70 or so shots inexplicably orienting in portrait when we quite clearly shot them in landscape. Our main camera has a 64-megapixel Samsung S5KGW1 sensor, a large 1/1.72-inch 64-megapixel chip. It’s used across a bunch of Xiaomi phones including the Remi Note 9 Pro, but only one Samsung line to my knowledge – the Galaxy A71. Despite being rich in megapixels, Samsung doesn’t use it in its top-end phones. Meanwhile our standard 90-minute looping HD video test drained just 10%. When you consider that the Realme X2 Pro drained 13% in the same test, you’ll appreciate that TCL’s frugal approach has paid off in this respect.
On the front of the phone you’ll find a 6.47-inch curved AMOLED display with a teardrop notch for the front-facing camera. Resolution comes in at 2,340 by 1,080, for a pixel density of 398ppi. However, 4K/30 does support electronic image stabilisation, which is a must if you want handheld footage to look smooth. Nxtvision also automatically upconverts SDR to HDR, earning the phone Netflix HDR10 certification. Really, our only complaint is that the display can be a little difficult to see in direct sunlight. There are colour character presets (choose your vividness level), an SDR-to-HDR converter filter and Reading mode. With the latter you choose for apps to run in a warm, low saturation mode – which, I suppose, is meant to be easier on your eyes.Video capture tops out at 4K resolution, 30 frames a second. And, unusually, there are no 60fps capture modes, even at 1080p or below. The quad-lens camera system on offer here combines a 64-megapixel primary wide-angle shooter with a 16-MP ultrawide one, a 5-MP macro camera and a 2-MP sensor devoted to low-light shots. The front of the TCL 10 Pro features a 24-MP camera which, it must be said, is more megapixels than you typically get for selfies. The Google Pixel 3a XL and Xiaomi Mi Note 10 are considerably better in this respect. It’s no disaster for the TCL 10 Pro’s camera, though, since it’s able to render better shadow detail than the Samsung Galaxy A51. TCL promises at least one major Android version upgrade for the 10 Pro, which isn’t encouraging but also, unfortunately, is the status quo for cheap Android phones. Google supports all its Pixel devices with three years of updates, while you can expect even more than that from Apple for the new iPhone SE. TCL 10 Pro review: Verdict
The TCL 10 Pro’s software utilizes a custom UI on top of Android 10. But the TCL UI isn’t the worst take on Google’s operating system we’ve ever seen.There are subtler signs of the TCL 10 Pro’s display quality, too. Curved OLED displays can leave a phone with edges that look dimmer than the rest, but the effect is minimal here. There’s also very minor shift in colour tone when viewed from an angle. Less advanced OLED screens can take on a blue tint when they’re not viewed dead-on. A few issues stop it earning a higher score. Battery life should be better than it is considering the TCL 10 Pro has a solid Qualcomm CPU and a 4500mAh battery. There’s no zoom, and the cameras and image processing isn’t as good as that of the bigger names. This impacts low-light performance, too, which is fairly poor. All that’s well and good, and if that were the end of the display conversation, I’d rather have the TCL’s panel, as it’s rare to find an OLED screen this good for such a low price. But for all TCL’s Nxtvision bells and whistles, the 10 Pro’s display comes up short in one very important respect: brightness. Whereas the iPhone SE can be cranked all the way up to 625 nits, this handset tops out at 398 nits, making outdoor viewing a little more difficult than it should be. TCL 10 Pro review: Camera In addition, general image processing isn’t nearly as good as that of Google, Xiaomi or Huawei phones at the price. Fine textures sometimes end up looking “painted”, turning gravel into brush strokes, and fine detail is over-sharpened.
TCL's aforementioned NXTVISION display tech is seemingly omnipresent in the software. You're regularly prompted to enable it, and it handles everything from SDR-to-HDR conversion to automatically adjusting settings like contrast and saturation, and enabling a monochromatic Reading Mode that's easy on your eyes and the phone's battery. Quad rear cameras with dual LED flash: 64MP (ultra high-res) with hybrid auto focus + 2MP 2.9μm super low light video + 16MP (123° super wide-angle) + 5MP (macro). 24MP front-facing selfie camera.The phone does come with an 18W fast charger. It isn’t the most powerful around but still able to offer good speeds. From flat, a 30-minute top-up will get you to 43%. An hour so this figure reach 80%. No issues here; it’s fast enough for a mid-price phone. Certified military-grade protection and ToughRhino Technology for double protection against drops and scratches. There’s also a little shutter lag to the TCL 10 Pro camera. It’s only around a third of a second, but this is noticeable when comparing directly to phones from some of the better-known names. Numbers are helpful, but the real question is, do the Adreno 612’s deficiencies make the TCL 10 Pro that much worse to game on compared to similarly-priced handsets? Honestly, I don’t think so. On Standard mode, the TCL 10 Pro covered 172.3% of the sRGB color space. That translates to noticeably more vibrant colors than the 111.2% iPhone SE, which utilizes an LCD panel. However, the iPhone’s hues were more realistic, as Apple’s phone notched a Delta-E score of 0.20 compared to the TCL’s 0.28 (numbers closer to zero are better).
The TCL 10 Pro comes with a 4,500mAh battery. That's pretty large when you consider that The OnePlus 8’s is 4,300mAh and the Realme X2 Pro’s is a mere 4,000mAh. Those are two higher-end devices.The TCL 10 Pro also has a mode for shooting in low-light conditions, called Super Night Mode, and above you can see how it compares to Google's implementation of Night Sight in the Pixel 4. Now, this isn’t a totally fair comparison; the Pixel 4 is, of course, a legitimate flagship, rather than a midranger like the TCL 10 Pro. That said, I didn’t have a Pixel 3a on hand when conducting this TCL 10 Pro review, and besides, sometimes it’s good to see precisely what you’re missing when opting for a cheaper phone over a pricier one. Unfortunately, neither fingerprint sensor is particularly great. The in-display sensor on the 10 Pro is located frustratingly low down the display, making it hard to reach with your thumb, and both sensors are slow. On the other end of the complexity spectrum is Super Bluetooth — a feature that allows the 10 Pro to play audio concurrently on up to four separate Bluetooth devices. In theory, this feature sounds great, as it saves you from having to daisy chain multiple identical speakers to play music across a large space.
Great Deal 
New Comment