The Indian smartphone market is now among the fastest growing markets in the world, and is on track to overtake the United States as the largest market for smartphones. However, unlike the U.S., low- to mid-range smartphones are the ones that are selling like hot cakes in the country. Combined with India geographically located near China, it has allowed Chinese OEMs to flood the market with a variety of budget smartphones. Lenovo and Huawei are two such smartphone makers who have had phenomenal success with their smartphones in India. Last year, budget handsets from both companies — the Lenovo K3 Note and the Honor 4X — sold like hot cakes in the country. Building on their success, both Lenovo and Honor have launched their new budget mid-range smartphones in India: the Vibe K4 Note and the Honor 5X. Both phones pack in a lot of gadgetry for their price and offer such value for money that can give iPhone users a buyer’s remorse. Considering that both phones are priced almost the same, which one is better between the two? Let’s compare the two and find out.
Build quality
Metal chassis and full unibody construction were previously found only in smartphones that costed $400 or above. Both, the Lenovo Vibe K4 Note and the Honor 5X, are setting a new trend: metal build in sub-$200 phones. While the Vibe K4 Note only comes with a metallic chassis and a removable plastic back, the Honor 5X features a unibody metal body with the back made from diamond-polished aluminium alloy that is then finished with a special brushing technique that gives it a very unique look and feel. The metal unibody construction does give the Honor 5X a more premium feel, but that does not mean it can rival the iPhone 6s when it comes to build quality. Additionally, the aluminium used does flex a bit when under pressure and can be scratched easily as well. On the other hand, the Vibe K4 Note with its metallic chassis and hard plastic back does not feel as premium as the 5X, but it is not far behind. While the back does attract body oil, it is not as prone to scratches as the Honor 5X. In the long run, I feel that the Vibe K4 Note will stand the test of time better, with the 5X getting all scratched up. Plus, if you are not a fan of the plastic back of the K4 Note, you can always buy one of the different textured backs that Lenovo sells for the handset.
Design & Display
The Honor 5X looks just like any other smartphone with a block of touchscreen on the front. With no Honor logo in the front or any key design feature, the 5X looks like a ‘chinese’ smartphone from the front. It houses a 5.5-inch Full HD display, the earpiece grille, RGB notification LED, proximity and ambient light sensors, and a 5MP front camera. The rear with its diamond-polished aluminium alloy has a very unique look and houses the fingerprint scanner, with the 13MP f/2.0 camera and a two-tone dual-LED flash sitting right above it. There is also an ‘honor’ logo located towards the bottom at the rear. The bottom part of the 5X houses two speakers grilles with a microUSB port mashed in between them, but the sound only comes out from the left speaker grille.
On the other hand, the Vibe K4 Note with its front facing stereo speakers has a very unique look that sets it apart from other mid-range smartphones. Aside from the stereo speakers, the front of the Vibe K4 Note also houses a 5.5-inch display, some sensors, RGB notification LED and a 5MP front camera. The rear, though made of plastic, houses the same contents as the 5X: a fingerprint scanner, a 13MP camera with two-tone LED flash, and Lenovo and Dolby Atmos branding. To me, the Vibe K4 Note is a better looking phone compared to the 5X, all thanks to its stereo speakers that not only deliver fantastic sound quality (more on them later), but also makes the device look different from other smartphones. Both phones come with a 5.5-inch Full HD display that can get plenty bright, have great viewing angles and contrast ratio. I don’t really like how the display on the Honor 5X has another black bezel surrounding it, which is becoming a commonplace in many other phones from Chinese OEMs as well. In display, I will say that both these devices are almost equal.
Software and Performance
Out of the box, both phones run on Android 5.1 Lollipop. Huawei’s Emotion UI is more flashy of the two and looks prettier as well. However, in terms of features Vibe UI and Emotion UI are almost on the same level. They are packed with a plethora of customisation options including fingerprint gestures, ability to customise almost every aspect of the UI, various battery saving modes and more. On paper, the Honor 5X is the more powerful of the two handsets here. It comes with an octa-core Snapdragon 616 chipset clocked at 1.5GHz, while the Vibe K4 Note comes with a slower octa-core MediaTek chipset clocked at 1.3GHz. The former also comes with a more powerful Adreno 405 GPU, while the MediaTek chipset inside the K4 Note houses an ARM Mali GPU. The K4 Note, however, does come with 3GB of RAM compared to 2GB RAM found on the 5X. The extra horsepower on the Honor 5X should make it a clear winner here, but that is not the case. Despite coming with a faster chipset, the Honor 5X just does not feel that smooth in day-to-day usage, which is largely due to Huawei’s heavy Emotion UI. In comparison, the less flashy Vibe UI on the Vibe K4 Note ensures that it does not suffer from any lags or performance issues in day-to-day tasks. The extra horsepower of the Snapdragon 616 chipset inside the 5X does benefit the phone while under load and playing heavy games like Asphalt 8. Even at full settings the 5X was able to play games like Asphalt 8 and Nova 3 without any issues, but that was not the case with the Vibe K4 Note. The slower chipset ensured that the handset was unable to play such heavy games at full or even medium settings. It was only after I dropped the graphics quality to low that these games were somewhat playable on the K4 Note. If you hardly ever game on your handset, the Vibe K4 Note is easily going to suffice all your needs. If you are a gamer though, stay away from the K4 Note.
Camera
The Vibe K4 Note and Honor 5X both come with a 13MP rear shooter, though the former’s camera has an f/2.2 aperture while the latter features an f/2.0 aperture. The cameras at the rear are also assisted by a dual-LED flash. The camera experience of both devices are very different from each other: the Vibe K4 Note has a very simple, no-frills camera app, while the camera app on 5X features a plethora of modes and effects. The extra horsepower of the Snapdragon 616 chipset on the 5X does allow it to offer slow-mo video recording, which is missing on the K4 Note. The HDR mode on the Vibe K4 Note also takes its own sweet time to process photos, while the Honor 5X suffers from no such delay.
Coming to the image quality, both phones perform decently in daylight. They both are quick to focus and the shutter lag is very minimum, which makes for a pleasant camera experience. The photos taken from the Honor 5X do have a yellowish tinge to them, while the Vibe K4 Note suffers from no such issue. In low-light, the Honor 5X is the clear winner thanks to its slightly wider f/2.0 aperture and a special night mode that automatically kicks in low-light. In this mode, the Honor 5X takes a wee bit longer to take photos in low-light, but the resulting photos have less noise in them. The Vibe K4 Note employs no such special trickery in low-light, thus its images have more noise.
Battery life & Conclusion
The Vibe K4 Note is powered by a 3,300mAh battery, while the Honor 5X features a 3,000mAh battery. With its slower chipset, the Vibe K4 Note is easily able to last longer than the Honor 5x. However, the battery life of both these handsets are so good that it is unlikely you are going to notice a difference. On both phones, I was consistently able to squeeze almost two days of battery life on a single charge, and on heavy days, the handsets were easily able to end the day with anywhere between 35 to 50% charge still left. Despite having a slight edge in the battery life department though, the Vibe K4 Note ultimately loses to the Honor 5X because it does not support quick charging. Ironically though, Lenovo has bundled a 2A charger with the K4 Note, which allows it to charge faster than the Honor 4X that comes with a 1A charger. In the end, while both these phones are priced very near to each other, they do cater to different users. The Vibe K4 Note is perfect for someone who only wants a phone for watching videos and regular work, while gamers and heavy users should look at the 5X. In most of the other aspects, both phones are largely the same: great display, build quality, reliable fingerprint scanner and all-day battery life, and whichever handset you decide between the two, you are not going to be disappointed.
