Micromax Infinity N12 Review
Instead of talking about Processors, RAM, and Megapixels, we are going to talk more about how the experience was in my day to day usage. What others said about the phone, how long the phone lasted and so on. But if you still eager to know, check out the complete specification here. The one we are using is a 3 GB RAM / 32 GB Storage variant.
Build, Design & Display
The N12 offers a unibody polycarbonate design which houses a tall display i.e 6.19-inch with HD+ resolution and a broad notch. In my day to day usage, the phone did not feel heavy even with the big display (weighs around 164g). However, the glossy plastic panel on the rear, which is tight fitted, can be a little slippery. That said, expect a lot of smudges on the rear. When I showed it to a couple of friends, they liked the overall design and the Blue Lagoon color. The curved edges and corners go well in the hands.
When it comes to the display, color saturation, and the wide view looks good. I watched a lot of movies on the phone during my recent trip, and it worked out well both in daylight and lowlight. You will have to adjust your screen a bit because of the reflections during the daytime. You get a powerful speaker at the bottom, with audio jack, and micro-USB charging port. Then you have volume knockers on the left, and a power button on the top. The SIM tray goes on the top! On the rear, you have the dual camera with flash and the fingerprint sensor. Along with the display, front holds the LED flash, ambient sensor, and the earpiece.
Battery
The Infinity N12 packs in a 4000 mAh battery, and it left me impressed. The phone lasted for approx 23 hours with 4+ hours of screen time. The usage included social networking apps like Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and others. I had used it heavily to watch movies on Netflix and part gaming. That said, the phone doesn’t offer any sort of fast or quick charging. It comes with a 5V charger head, and it takes a really long time to charge the phone. Probably more than 2 hours of charge time.
Performance & Features
The phone is powered by almost stock Android experience (Android 8.1 / December 5th Security Patch) with a bit of customization and pre-installed apps. In my day to day usage, there were no major hiccups. The Helio P22 chipset with 3GB of RAM did well. Application launches were smooth, the apps switched nicely, and casual games like Temple Run 2, Hill Climbing, and others performed well. However, when it comes to heavy gaming, this phone is not the kind you would buy for gaming. Asphalt 9 and PUBG had a lot of frame drops through the gameplay. When it comes to features, apart from what you always expect from Stock Android, you get Face Unlock, Fingerprint Unlock, Adaptive brightness and so on.
Camera
N12 houses a primary 13-megapixel sensor paired with a 5-megapixel snapper. On the front, you will find a 16-megapixel selfie camera with flash. Overall, I found the camera to be strictly OK. Do take a look at the pictures below to judge for yourself. That said, the camera interface is good. You can flick between video, photo, beauty, FaceCute, and Bokeh effects. Part of their AI effort, you have a dedicated AI button to improve images which mostly helps in outdoor shootings. The camera also supports HDR, but there is no auto HRD mode. The Bokeh features work decently with the default settings. You can change focus later as well. However, changing the aperture to the extreme doesn’t really help. You get Portrait mode in front camera as well, but you cannot edit it later. (Note: Click here for full resolution images of below pics)
You also get a PRO mode which is under the menu. You can choose to change ISO, Exposure, saturation, contrast, brightness. The layout of the control is such that you can easily change it using your thumb. Regarding the front flash, instead of a continuous flash when taking pictures, it rather blinks and matches with the shutter. I liked it compared to continuous flash as it blinds the eyes most of the time. When it comes to video, you can shoot 1080P video (on both the cameras), slow motion and timelapse.
Others
The phone supports VoLTE, two nano SIMs, and a dedicated MicroSD card slot. I had no issues when it came to network or video calling. Comes with a powerful speaker with great audio quality. The Notch is rather big, and many a time it cuts off the screen on the full screen. So WhatsApp Status, Facebook Stories etc had their display cut on the top. Includes FM Radio.
In my opinion, Micromax is up for a decent (re)start. The hardware is good, comes with great battery life, and the display is nice. The best part is that the phone is priced at Rs 9,999. It will make sure that it can at least compete, and since its only sold in the offline market, it should do ‘OK’.
