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Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus Real Life Usage Review

Lenovo, the world’s largest PC maker and rising player in tablets and smartphones began selling Android smartphones in 2012, since then it has launched a lot of phones in India. After the successful launch of Lenovo K3 Note, K4 Note and K5 note, the company launched its Vibe K5 Plus in India at an event in New Delhi. The phone sports an aluminum back with fairly small bezels around the edges of the display, and weighs just 142 grams. It is priced at Rs. 8,499 and is equipped with decent specifications at this price. Let us take a look at the Real Life Usage Review of Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus

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Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus Full Specs

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Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus Coverage

Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus India Unboxing, Review, Comparison with Coolpad Note 3 [Video]

What are Usage Reviews, Tests and Opinions?

This review is based on our quick tests and usage done with the phone, we try to push the device to its limits and find out the results which will matter if you plan to buy this phone. We hope this review helps you to get your queries answered about the device.

Performance

Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus is powered by a Snapdragon 616 processor, a Quad Core Processor clocked at 1.5 Ghz, coupled with 2GB of RAM and an Adreno 405 GPU. The storage on the device is a mere 16GB onboard, which can be expanded via a microSD card up to 32GB in size.


As far as the performance goes, it is good for basic or moderate user not for heavy users.

App Launch Speed

The app launch speed on the phone is quick but speed largely depends on the size of the app heavy apps take time to load.

Multitasking and RAM Management

Multitasking on the Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus was good. Even with a lot of apps opened on the phone, switching between apps wasn’t a problem. It was able to handle 5-6 apps at a time very easily.

As far as the RAM goes, out of the 2GB, there was 1.2GB RAM available on boot.

Scrolling Speed

For testing the scrolling speed, we loaded the GadgetsToUse homepage on the smartphone and scrolled top to bottom and back on the phone. The scrolling speed was normal.

Heating

Well, we cannot exactly say that the device is having heating issues but it definitely gets hotter than the other smartphones under the same situation. The device heats up during charging and intensive tasks, so this can be added to the disadvantages of the phone. Moreover, Lenovo has not come up with any solution for this heating issue yet. So, kindly look into it before buying this.

Benchmark Scores

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Camera

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On the Camera Front, the Vibe K5 Plus features a rear-facing 13 MP camera with auto focus and an LED flash. The rear camera is considerably good for outdoor and natural light images but like any other budget device, the camera underperforms in low light surroundings. Details and colours look good in day light but do not capture natural colours in artificial light.

The front facing camera is a little disappointing, it comes with 5 MP fixed focus camera. In natural light, you can get a decent selfie but in artificial lights the pictures lacked details. You may not get the picture perfect selfies from the smartphone, but it’s still good for Skype or other video calling apps.

Camera Samples

Battery Performance

Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus is backed by an average 2750 mAh battery which is much less compared to competitors like Honor Holly 2 Plus.

Charging Time

It takes around 1 hours and 45 minutes to charge from 0-100%.

Screen on Time

Screen on time was around 4-4.5 hours.

Battery Drop Rate Table

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Looks and Design

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Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus features 5.0-inch Full HD display an aluminum back which feels solid with fairly small bezels around the edges of the display, which gives a premium look to the phone The best thing about the smartphone is its weight, which is just 142 grams and the thickness is 8.2 mm. It is not the thinnest and lightest but it still has a fine design to look costlier than what it actually costs. It has curved back and rounded edges, which feel great to hold. Overall built feels solid and offers good grip.

In our opinion the phone has above average looks in that price segment.

Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus Photo Gallery

Quality of Material

The Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus sports an aluminum back which feels solid with fairly small bezels around the edges of the display. The best thing about the smartphone is its weight, which is just 142 grams and the thickness is 8 mm. It is not the thinnest and lightest but it still has a fine design to look costlier than what it actually costs. It has curved back and rounded edges, which feel great to hold. Overall built feels solid and offers good grip.

Ergonomics

The phone, despite having a metallic body, weighs just 142 grams, which is considered light. Its dimensions are 142 x 71 x 8 mm, just 8 mm thickness with a metal body gives the phone a very rich look in its price range. This 5 inch phone can be very easily handled with one hand.

Display Clarity, Colors and Viewing Angles

Vibe K5 Plus features 5.0-inch Full HD display and a screen resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels with 441 ppi pixel density. In the terms of display quality, the devices have an IPS LCD display with 16M color depth. screen-to-body ratio is 68.4% and it allows multitouch.

Outdoor Visibility (Full Brightness)

Outdoor visibility is not that good, the colours look dull and the brightness is also limited.

Custom User Interface

The Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus comes with the Android 5.1(Lollipop) OS. The Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus runs on Vibe UI. Vibe UI offers some interesting features like Pocket mode(louder ring when your phone is in pocket), Wide Touch (floating buttons), smart dialer that tilts according to the user and many more, in addition to that you can enable or disable these features.

Sound Quality

The loudspeaker on the Vibe K5 Plus features the Dolby sound system which gives the speakers a really loud and clear audio

Call Quality

Call quality is top notch. Network reception is great and the microphone and speakers work really well.

Gaming Performance

We ran two games on this smartphone, namely the Dead Trigger 2 which good 3D graphic performance and Asphalt 8, which is one of the benchmark games we use to test the gaming aspects. As far as the Dead Trigger is concerned, we are really satisfied with the type of performance it has. We did not notice any issue while gaming, the performance was smooth and lag free.

Surprisingly, Asphalt 8 was also playable at medium graphic level, and we are satisfied with the gaming performance at this price point. It may not look as strong as it is on paper, but it is a charmer when medium level gaming.

Game Lag & Heating

We did not face any unusual lag while playing light weight games, or games like Dead Trigger and Modern Combat 5 on meduim graphic settings.

Verdict

At INR 8,499, K5 Plus is a good option for those who prefer a budget phone with all the features that can satisfy a moderate to basic users. It comes with a name that has proved to be a trusted brand in the budget phones category, so there is no question about the quality and the service. Camera is one of the weaker department, so if you want a better camera then you must revise your options.

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Abhishek Bhatnagar

Abhishek Bhatnagar, a known technology blogger & YouTuber from India. A Software Engineer by qualification, now he works as the editor-In-Chief, Webmaster, & Managing Director at Gadgets To Use. He runs a number of other technology websites as well.