Why you can trust TechRadar We spend hours testing every product or service we review, so you can be sure you’re buying the best. Find out more about how we test.
Camera
Ah, yes, the vertical dual camera which first made headlines on the iPhone X and then on the Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus with dual aperture. Vivo V9’s rear camera has a 16MP primary sensor and a 5MP secondary lens. It has the usual options for Panorama, Pro Mode, Video and Portrait modes. What they’ve added are augmented reality (AR) stickers.
AR stickers can be used in the selfie mode as well as normal mode. What’s nice about the Vivo V9 is that it has a lot more options than the Oppo F7, but it’s not pleasant usage experience at all. Like it was mentioned before as well, the minute you switch over to the AR sticker mode, the camera app starts to lag like a phone from 2005.
In artificial light, the Vivo V9 takes bright pictures but they can be a little over saturated at times and the edges aren’t clearly defined. The Vivo V9 struggles to handle differentiated exposures and you can see colors getting smudged together.
Despite having bright results with light, the camera doesn’t do too well in low light conditions. It’s not that the pictures aren’t detailed they are and they have depth too but, they aren’t nearly vivid enough.
The front camera with a 24MP lens functions well. In fact, it functions slightly better than the Oppo F7. Even even the AI mode turned on, the Vivo phone delivers photos that look less processed than the Oppo F7.
The main issue with the Vivo V9 camera, good or bad, is that it’s inconsistent. You can’t rely on it to always take good photos in any condition.
Verdict
Overall, the Vivo V9 seems like a device that wasn’t thought through. They have the notch but they don’t use it properly. They have a big screen, but the colors in the display are off. The version of Android is up to date but the chipset is behind the times. There’s even a dual camera, that refuses to function in low light conditions despite over exposing shots in artificial light.
The phone may be priced at Rs 22,990 but belongs in the 10K-20K segment according to the features and performance.
