UMIDIGI S5 Pro test - a summer surprise phone that no one knows

For that much money, no one else gives you an AMOLED display and 256 gigabytes of storage.

UMIDIGI S5 Pro - Introduction

UMIDIGI is not famous for premium solutions, their phones are at the bottom of the middle class. However, with this year’s top-of-the-line device, they have rolled an unusually large amount and created serious competition for the mid- and upper-mid-range models of the larger manufacturers as well.

While many people look down on these emerging manufacturers, I appreciate them because we get incredibly good value for money irons that in most cases don’t lag behind top phones in design, and in hardware they know exactly what they need for everyday use.

However, some manufacturers from time to time try to move up and launch devices that are not fighting at the entry level but in the middle class. Cheapness is important here too, and in most cases it requires some willingness to compromise. This is also the case with the S5 Pro, but as you will see, there is no need to doubt it.

What is certain is that the UMIDIGI S5 Pro was, at least for me, one of the biggest surprises of the summer, so I ordered one of it so I can introduce it to you!

Wrapping

The packaging of the S5 Pro offers an exemplary, premium feel, but it’s no wonder, as the S5 Pro is considered a premium device within the brand.

At the top of the black box are greeting cards, the last one I met at the Xiaomi MIX 3. Below it is a black envelope with an English description and a SIM needle, on the next shelf is the phone, and below it is the charging head and the USB Type-C cable, through which we get an 18-watt fast charge.

The phone does not come with a foil and a silicone back cover, as these can already be found on your mobile phone. It’s important to mention that the front foil pair is thinning nicely provided, I didn’t even notice at first that it was on it.

The silicone backing is black, stiff enough and not too thick. Its pattern mimics the skin, it doesn’t slip, so it’s also a quality piece.

External

The line of surprises begins with the hand in hand. The elaboration, the assembly, the chosen materials all refer to a top category, a real premium feeling.

The front glass is 2,5D, meaning the rim is minimally rounded, as I mentioned, with the factory-fitted, almost invisible foil on it.

Removing the silicone case, we can see the curved glass back, which is very nice without exaggeration. Of course, like all glass backs, it is slippery and collects fingerprints, plus the black, factory silicone case hides it from our eyes, so let’s admire ourselves, and then just put that back in place!

The camera island is in the upper left corner, rising only minimally, which is at least unusual these days.

At the bottom edge is a Type-C connector, a speaker grille, and a microphone. The power key and volume controls on the left, and the SIM tray only on the right, you can insert two SIM cards, or a SIM and a memory card, in the usual way. The latter can be up to 256 GB.

At the top edge is the first real surprise, namely a pop-up self-timer camera, which also means that the device has got a completely frameless display, there is no camera island or hole in the display.

Hardware

Processor, memory, mass storage

The soul of the phone is one of last year’s surprise tiles, the MediaTek Helio G90T. It should be noted that MediaTek sent it to fight the Snapdragon 730G. This fight was soon settled as the Helio G730T washed the floor with a Snapdragon 90G said to be of similar ability.

The processor employs eight cores, two Cortex A76s and 6 Cortex A55s. and a Mali G76 GPU is responsible for speeding up graphics. The central chip, which of course also houses the processor, has been liquid-cooled. This presumably plays a role in how great results we got in the tests.

In addition to the pop-up camera, the second special feature of the phone is that it has received a surprising amount of 256 GB of storage, in addition to the considerable 6 GB of system memory.

Before I get to the display, I need to say a few words about the power of the phone and with it the Helio G90T.

I did the first test of the phone live (YouTube link at the end of the article!). When I say the state has fallen, I put it very subtly, but watch the broadcast if you have approx. 1 hour, you will see why.

As I’ve already written, the G90T loosely ordered the Snapdragon 730G released last year, but what’s even worse is that, according to my test results, the Snapdragon 3G released in the POCO X732 this year as well.

This means numerically that while the POCO X3 scored 280 points in the ANTUTU test, the UMIDIGI S786 Pro scored 5 points.

This trend continued in the other tests as well, with PCMark Work 2 pushing the POCO X3 8255 points while the UMIDIGI S5 Pro pushed 10 314 points, which will be a 25 percent plus.

You will find the scores obtained in the further tests in the table below.

Display

I’ve listed some serious virtues like processor speed, which makes the phone faster than the POCO X3, and a pop-up camera, which makes the display frameless.

What I haven’t talked about yet is the kind of display.

Well, this phone does not have an IPS, but an AMOLED panel, with all its benefits. The colors are wonderful, the contrast is excellent, and the brightness results in an image that can be used even in the sun. The diagonal is 6,39 inches and the resolution is 2340 x 1080 pixels.

Unfortunately, AMOLED displays are still only available in the high-end category today, except for 1-2 models, of course. So one of the biggest virtues of the UMIDIGI S5 Pro is that it has already made this great technology available to us in the mid-range.

As far as I know, the UMIDIGI S5 Pro is the only phone that offers an AMOLED display, a powerful mid-range processor, a pop-up camera and 256GB of storage for under $ 250.

Regarding the display, I have to mention that the ratio of the display front panel is huge, over 93 percent due to the lack of a camera island. That is, the frames do not take much of the picture.

If the display is AMOLED, the fingerprint sensor is located under the glass, and this is no different for the UMIDIGI S5 Pro. This fingerprint sensor is the weakest point of the phone.

I have to note that the Xiaomi Mi Note 10 I use is not a bit better in this respect, the only advantage over UMIDIGI is that it also has a face-based screen resolution. From the S5 Pro, presumably due to the pop-up camera, this was left out.

In order for fingerprint identification to be used, we need to put in a few tricks. With these methods, it happens once in 15-20 times that the recognition is wrong, but before that it was 2-3 times out of ten.

One trick is to recognize your most commonly used fingers, up to two or three times, improving performance by orders of magnitude. In addition to this, you should not move your finger during a recognition, preferably touching the part of the display that will unlock the phone most often.

Kamerák

The phone comes with a 16-megapixel self-timer camera, and at the back we find a 48-megapixel main sensor, a 16-megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera, a 5-megapixel macro camera, and a 5-megapixel depth sensor.

As you may have read, the self-timer camera has a pop-up solution, meaning it stands out from the top edge of the frame if you want to use it. The self-timer camera doesn't like too much or too little light, but it produces usable images under normal lighting conditions.

The main camera performed better than expected. The colors are fine and the loss of detail towards the edges is minimal, we get HDR and artificial intelligence support as well. In front of the sensor we find a six-member lens system and the aperture is perfect, 1.79.

The Samsung gm5 sensor in the UMIDIGI S1 Pro naturally works in 4 in 1 mode, so it shoots 12 megapixel images. Interestingly, it is not possible to take 48 megapixel images, but it is 88 megapixels.

This is obviously an upscaled resolution, which can also be seen in the detail of the image. Beyond marketing value, it doesn’t make much sense, we rather neglect it.

The main camera is capable of capturing 4K videos, but unfortunately we don’t get vibration reduction. Thus, no matter how close the picture quality is, the usability suffers.

The 16 mega ultra-wide camera captures detailed images with minimal distortion. However, the quality is not perfect. The colors of the pictures are sliding strongly into orange, it is a pity because the quality would be adequate in all other respects.

However, I have to praise the macro camera. With the 5 megapixel sensor, we can take pictures with the right resolution, unlike the 3 megapixel solution of the POCO X2.

The colors in the pictures are brilliant, the detail is very good, and the background blur is perfect.

Overall, we can be happy with the camera system, the 48 megapixel main camera and the 5 mega macro are perfect for photography, and I say it is suitable for video with some compromise.

Test pictures

12 (48 MP) low light conditions	12 (48 MP) good lighting conditions
13 MP wide angle	88 MP
selfie	macro

Test video

Other skills

The UMIDIGI S5 Pro has ac-standard, or Wi-Fi 5 support under its new name, meaning we also get dual-channel, 2,4- and 5GHz Wi-Fi bands. Bluetooth, of course, is already 5.0, supporting all important navigation systems, including American GPS, Chinese BeiDou, Russian Glonass, and European Galileo.

All important sensors are built in, so we also get a proximity and light sensor, an accelerometer, a gyroscope, and an electronic compass. It is no coincidence that the phone does not miss NFC support and FM radio.

The built-in battery has a capacity of 4680 mAh, which also comes with an 18-watt fast charge via the USB Type-C connector.

Szoftver

The UMIDIGI S5 Pro runs a minimally modified Android 10. The last update arrived on the second of July, and the Android security package was in May.

The basic Android doesn’t spoil us with as many extras as MIUI, but anyone who has used one already knows that it is convenient and quick to navigate.

If the look doesn’t match, of course, you can use another home screen, even the POCO launcher.

It doesn't matter that Android installed on your phone can speak Hungarian!

Experiences

As with all phone tests, I used the cell phone as a live, primary device. The microphone and speaker were flawless, at least the one I was talking to, everyone said the sound was flawless, and I heard them well.

The navigation is also perfect, supporting the Beidou, Galileo and GLONASS systems in addition to the standard GPS. Accurate is also fast. From the test, you can already guess that there is no problem with speed.

The phone gives a premium feel to every taste, only the fingerprint detection mentioned above is what we can be reluctant to buy.

Summary

As usual, I left the price to the end. Nowadays, we can hardly find a phone with an AMOLED display for under $ 300. Plus, the UMIDIGI S5 Pro is both powerful and beautiful, the cameras are usable, and they ask for just $ 240 for that package.

This price is essentially the same as the 3GB version of the POCO X64. It has better sound, better vibration motor and main camera, but worse display, slower processor, much less mass storage, and there are camera holes in the display as well.

The UMIDIGI S5 Pro, as expected, became a good phone and received a very friendly price tag.

As you can see from the article, there are a point or two where it lags behind devices with similar knowledge from major manufacturers, but this is largely forgotten by the price.

The phone is currently priced at HUF 80 with duty-free EU Proiroity Line delivery, luggage loss and breakage insurance by clicking on the following link:

UMIDIGI S5 Pro 6/256GB

You can see a video tutorial on your phone here:

You can watch the longer live test here:

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