Nokia 6 (2018)

Nokia 6 (2018) design

Last year's Nokia 6 was lauded for its tank-like build quality and industrial design. HMD Global has stated that its biggest priority while designing the new Nokia 6 was maintaining the build quality of its predecessor. True to its word, the Nokia 6 (2018), which has been milled from a single block of 6000 series aluminium, feels incredibly solid in the hand.

Advantage & disadvantage

Design
Display
Software
Performance
Battery Life
Camera
Value for Money

Good
Great performance
Stellar build quality
Android One and no software bloat
Good battery life

Bad
Poor low-light camera performance
Iffy fingerprint

During our review, we dropped the phone many times and it did not incur any damage whatsoever. In fact, to kick things up a notch and really test Nokia's durability claims, we tried to bend the smartphone. All our attempts came to naught. Just like its predecessor, the Nokia 6 (2018) is surely a contender for the most durable smartphone of the year.

The solid construction comes with its own set of caveats though. At 8.5mm, the smartphone is not the slimmest out there and it feels quite bulky in the hand. The thick borders above and below the screen do not help matters in the slightest. We felt that single-handed use over long periods was not very comfortable as the phone is a bit too wide.

Verdict
The Nokia 6 (2018) has terrific build quality, great performance, good battery life, and pure Android with the promise of regular software updates. The Nokia brand name has always been associated with solid phones, and the Nokia 6 (2018) proudly carries that flag forward. It might not be the flashiest smartphone around but is very capable nonetheless.

Software
The original Nokia 6 was a sleek and well-built smartphone that did not have the power to match its looks. With the Snapdragon 630 under its hood, the Nokia 6 (2018) is a different beast altogether. During our review period, it tackled both day-to-day tasks and intensive workloads with ease.

Even the heaviest games did not exhibit any dropped frames or stutters, which was common in last year's Nokia 6. We were also pleased to report that this smartphone did not get warm even when playing resource-intensive games, navigating around town with the GPS, or recording videos in full-HD.

We put the Nokia 6 through our tests where it managed a respectable 88,8869 in AnTuTu, 18fps in GFXbench T-Rex, 10fps in GFX Bench Manhattan 3.1, and 879 and 4,931 in Geekbench's single- and multi-core tests respectively.

The 5.5-inch LCD screen is a step up from the one on last year's model, with punchier colours and higher brightness. However, the viewing angles could have been better.

In our experience, calls were clear and crisp. 4G connectivity was good even in areas known to have spotty network reception. While the single loudspeaker located next to the USB Type-C port delivers loud and clear audio, it is a step down from the stereo speakers of last year's Nokia 6. The bundled earphones are strictly average as well, which is not uncommon at this price point.

Last year, HMD Global chose to differentiate its smartphones with near-stock Android. Now, the company has taken things to the next level by embracing Google'sAndroid One programme. As a result, the Nokia 6 (2018) has no third-party bloat whatsoever. There are a few non-intrusive value additions, such as the 'Glance screen' which shows notifications for missed calls, alarms, and notifications without waking the phone from sleep, and a couple of motion-triggered gestures. HMD Global has promised updates to Android P as well as Android Q, when they are released.

In our HD video loop battery test, the Nokia 6 (2018) lasted 11 hours, 45 minutes, which is quite good. In terms of real-world performance, we never found ourselves reaching for the charger before the wee hours of the night. The phone easily lasted us the whole day with medium to intense use, with juice left over for more. In our tests, the bundled fast charger took the Nokia 6 (2018) from an empty tank to around 40 percent in 30 minutes, which is fairly impressive

Nokia 6 (2018) specifications

Display

5.50-inch

Processor

2.2GHz octa-core

Front Camera

8-megapixel

Resolution

1080x1920 pixels

RAM

3GB

OS

Android 8.0

Storage

32GB

Rear Camera

16-megapixel

Battery Capacity

Details

Camera nokia 6

3000mAh

That said, the Nokia 6 (2018) is not a home run by any means - it does not have an 18:9 display which is fast becoming the norm. The rear camera struggles in low light, and has colour rendition issues in auto mode. Its biggest competitor is the Redmi Note 5 Pro (Review), which is priced starting at Rs 14,999, offers an 18:9 display, and has better hardware. What the Redmi Note 5 Pro lacks though is stock Android and the same level of ruggedness as the Nokia 6

The cameras on the Nokia 6 (2018) are a bit of a mixed bag. Even with the addition of the ZEISS moniker, the 16-megapixel rear camera struggles in low light. Shots taken after dark had a fair bit of noise and lacked detail. The autofocus was also quite inaccurate and we had to manually tap the screen on several occasions.

That said, the camera performs admirably when there is adequate light. During the day, the camera managed to get the exposure right most of the time, and capture a hefty amount of detail. Even shots taken in favourable lighting indoors were crisp and detailed. The dual-LED flash does a decent job of lighting up scenes. Colour reproduction however is not the this phone's strong suit. In auto mode, the white balance was always off-kilter with colours looking slightly pale and muted

Thankfully, there's a powerful professional mode that lets you control the exposure, ISO, shutter speed, white balance, and autofocus. By tweaking the settings slightly, we managed to get accurate colours. We hope Nokia can fix this problem with a software update, as most users will stick to the auto mode which as of now has trouble rendering colours accurately.