Verdict
The Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s class - top battery life and remarkably rugged chops are great , but they terminate up overshadowed by the flaky camera software , the comparatively faint mainframe and — a vainglorious deal to some — the 60Hz sieve .
Pros
Cons
Key Features
Introduction
The Sony Xperia 10 IV is a winning phone on three fronts . It is flyspeck . It is tougher than most headphone at its layer and bombardment life story is excellent .
It ’s a super - humbled - maintenance phone ideal for people who do n’t actually do too much advanced stuff with their mobiles . If you obtain yourself complaining phones are too big and do n’t last long enough , the Sony Xperia 10 IV may be the right Android for you . And while this review will fetch up a crew of weakly field in the phone , it does tender something authentically dissimilar .
However , the Sony Xperia 10 IV does n’t fare that well on the tech side . ThePixel 6aoffers far good photo and the termination here are strangely inconsistent — although it ’s great to have a “ real ” 2x zoom .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV CPU is comparatively weak , and if you have already experience a 90Hz or 120Hz exhibit , this phone ’s 60Hz screenland may come out a minute jerky . It does n’t bother me that much , but it ’s hard to ignore that other telephone set that are better economic value for money .
Still , if you find a heap that matches your budget and like the idea of a low - fuss , long - lasting Android , the Sony Xperia 10 IV Is a sound enough wager .
Design and Screen
The Sony Xperia 10 IV look a lot like the Xperia 10 III and , stepping back to the wider range of a function , much like Sony ’s far more expensive phones .
Sony expend the same design speech across almost its entire family . It ’s a slim brick , with no curve to the back or front panels bar a small rounding off of the last millimetre or so .
I have the contraband Sony Xperia 10 IV , and Androids do not come in more plain and matter - of - fact than this . If you want a more care - grab French telephone , Sony make the Xperia 10 IV in Mint ( green ) , Lavender ( purple ) and white too .
In most esteem the hardware intention is ordinary . The back and sides are plastic , but appear a little deeper and actually get postponement of the Sony Xperia 10 IV , and you ’ll notice some special traits .
This phone use extremist - toughened Gorilla Glass Victus for its display drinking glass , the kind seen in flagship earphone . Google ’s Pixel 6a uses Gorilla Glass 3 . Victus technical school is a full seven age young , and come with good driblet and scratch - resistance claims .
Will an afternoon in a sandy pocket itch it ? surely , but the Sony Xperia 10 IV is a band tougher than it look .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV also has excellent water and detritus resistance , specced to meetIP68and IP65 monetary standard . This means it can take immersion in water at a deepness of up to 1.5 MB , and low pressure water jets .
Once again , these are in high spirits - end phone standard in a mid - range handset . You ’d never guess the Sony Xperia 10 IV was this hardy either , as it is unusually modest and lightheaded . It weighs 161 g consort to my scales and is 67 mm wide . TheRealme GT Neo 3TI used beforehand was 20 % heavier , around 15 % wider .
While I am not a monolithic devotee of the Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s brick - like frame , these trim stats make the phone comparatively easy to handle .
The speech sound also has a microSD slot , and a dandy side - mounted fingermark scanner that take a shit unlocking the phone firmly experience as quick as only press the power clit — because the electronic scanner is part of the power button .
Now let ’s treat the unsound bit . The Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s back cover charge gets smudged with fingerprint grease quickly , and it takes more than a quick rub to pick off those scar . You also get very piddling in the loge . There ’s no case , no power adapter , and these are the kind of accessories included as standard with most phones from Motorola , Realme , OnePlus and so on .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s loudspeaker is quite decrepit too . There is just one verbalizer equipment driver on the bottom , it ’s not notably loud and the tone is relatively slender . In a telephone set this midget it is no surprise the speaker takes a striking . However , I listen to a lot of stream audio through earpiece speakers and most sound in the £ 250 - 400 range do the job better than this Sony .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s display is fine , but will catch from flack from the techy crowd . This is an extra - improbable 21:9 aspect 6 - inchOLEDpanel with a refresh rate of 60Hz .
That last part , refresh pace , is the disputatious specification . Most earpiece in this class have either 90Hz or 120Hz displays , and they make scrolling look a bunch smoother .
I notice this most when flicking around web pages in the Chrome browser app . 60Hz does not allow for the sort of preternatural smoothness a 120Hz phone can — when it ’s not judder for reasons other than refresh rate anyway .
However , a slower refresh charge per unit also contributes to the Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s fundamental selling dot , retentive battery life . I find this phone easy outlasts theOnePlus Nord 2 T , for good example , and you simply would not see this sort of length of service if the Xperia had a 120Hz panel .
There is a dependable argument the Sony Xperia 10 IV should have had 90Hz , though . 90Hz phones can volunteer exceptional barrage living . But people would still have complained it was n’t 120Hz anyway , so there was no winning for Sony here .
Other portion of the display are solid . It ’s an organic light-emitting diode so the dividing line is great , but verbatim sunlight does make the panel itself appear slightly blue or grey — more so than thebest phonesin this socio-economic class . This typically happens when layer in the display architecture reflect a lowly amount of lighter , appear to lift the fateful storey .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV offer up two colour fashion , Original and Standard . Original looks like roughly in - line with the sRGB standard , so may look a bit “ down energy ” to some , while Standard is more like DCI P3 , a richer style most sound aim for these days . The blossom brightness of 610 nits is OK , but nothing special .
Some of you may desire to tweak how the blind represents Android , though . An awful slew of cognitive content is crammed into each page , produce fonts and app icons appear pretty small .
A slider in the display menu permit you surmount up thesis fonts and icon . The Sony Xperia 10 IV looks a morsel less sophisticated and grown - up when you do so , but it ’s a must if your dear - flying field visual sense is not so hot anymore .
Performance
The Sony Xperia 10 IV tend Android 12 and has a Sony UI up top . queerly enough , it had few unwanted apps preinstalled than theSony Xperia 1 IVI receive — just Facebook and LinkedIn .
App folders are Sony ’s major addition to the Android interface design . you may produce separate folder in the app draftsman for , say , games and social media apps . With a flake of organization you could well make an app library fit into a individual screen .
It ’s a no - nonsense interface largely free of potentially pesky additions .
However , the Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s top executive and performance are quite debile for a £ 400 - plus speech sound . It apply the Snapdragon 695 5 G SoC , as seen in much cheaper Androids like theMoto G82and £ 265Xiaomi Poco X4 Pro .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV musical score 1846 ( 663 per core ) points in Geekbench 5 , far below the 2800 - odd of the Pixel 6a or the ~2600 of the Realme GT Neo 3T.
This central processor sticks out awkwardly here , just as the Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s 60Hz display panel does .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV still feel jolly frosty most of the fourth dimension . But after trying various basic bit of pilotage , app loads and web browse side - by - side with the more powerful Realme GT Neo 3 T it is reset the Snapdragon 695 does come with a pocket-size collision to responsiveness .
Everything is just a fraction of a beat slower here , as you ’d wait from a less hefty SoC. Performance is more like that of a £ 230 - 300 telephone than a £ 430 one .
It also means the Sony Xperia 10 IV is not a particularly good play earpiece , but we know that already . Its narrow CRT screen and small - sounding mono speaker made certain of that . Most secret plan will run finely on this Xperia but in Fornite , for example , nontextual matter are limited to the Medium setting and the skeletal system rate to 30fps . Some phones at this price can recreate the plot with much better - looking visuals .
A 3D Mark Wild Life trial scotch of 1215 peak is nowhere near that of the Pixel 6a and its Tensor processor , which score around 6400 points . It is more trial impression the Snapdragon 695 just does not belong in a £ 400 phone in 2022 .
There are positives . I have never feel the Sony Xperia 10 IV get red-hot , which happen all the time with the Sony Xperia 1 IV . A less performant SoC credibly helps with battery life too , just as the 60Hz screen door does .
Still , hooey like this stool the Sony Xperia 10 IV seem a questionable passel .
Camera
The Sony Xperia 10 IV has three rear tv camera and , unlike most mid - range phones , none of them are “ filler ” . How tonic .
There ’s a 12 - megapixel primary quill , an 8 - megapixel ultra - full and an 8 - megapixel 2x zoom . While this raiment is similar to that of the Sony Xperia 10 III from 2021 , dedicated soar cameras are fairly rare at the price .
First impressions are not cracking . The Sony Xperia 10 IV is slow to captivate exposure , with lag both before and after the camera snap a shot . The preview image in the camera app is n’t tops - clear either , an effect naturally exasperate by bright sunlight .
real results are quite inconsistent and , in an strange turn of events , it ’s the primary camera that have issues most regularly . The radical - wide is a flake more robust and the 2x rapid growth is unmistakably solid view the comparatively humble computer hardware it has .
The most common issues centre around exposure , poor lifting of shadows and passably dodgy colour reproduction that , most likely , is fuelled by these photo problem . My take is that the Auto HDR have Sony Xperia 10 IV does not work very well with the master television camera . At times this can make prototype expect unconditional - out eldritch .
It ’s bizarre that you could take a crack with this primary photographic camera , and then switch to the lower - spec ultra - extensive , and yet it is the extremist - wide that delivers less shoot a line - out areas and good mid - tones and visible phantasma item .
When not being challenge by extreme that require clever role of HDR , the track 12MP camera can entrance very pleasant picture . However , I often found that its colours look “ dead ” and the slack approach to bringing out tincture detail means even the better images can require post - shoot pinch to look their best .
One of the speech sound I postulate out to shoot with the Sony Xperia 10 IV was the Motorola Moto G82 , and while that phone is far from perfect its camera has a much higher hit rate than the Sony ’s . Here ’s a comparison :
The ultra - wide camera is distinctive of models at this degree , with much worse contingent and an overall softer facial expression than the primary . My Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s extremist - wide also has poor distinctness in the good 15 % of the figure , suggesting one of the lens of the eye elements may be somewhat misaligned . A fuzzy look towards the corners of the frame is totally normal in a budget ultra - wide , but the way the right suffers more than the odd side suggest something strange is going on here .
My favorite of all three cameras is in all probability the Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s 2x zoom . It offers a literal particular advance over a harvest of the 1x tv camera ’s moving picture , and often produce heater - take care , more colourful image than the primary coil too .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s nighttime images are poor by current standard , with very limited insight in truly dark scene even if you use the Night modality . Phones like the Pixel 6a and OnePlus Nord 2 T hightail it rope around the Sony in duskiness .
TV is fairly limited too . 1080p is the maximum resolution , and I recommend hold fast to the 30fps mode . 60fps footage looks ugly and pixellated , and loses electronic stabilisation .
The 30fps fashion produces OK results , and the ability to switch to the 2x camera and extremist - wide is bang-up . However , jittery focus may spoil thing if you ’re looking to produce dodgy - looking results .
The Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s tv camera is a bit of a shambling , which is a shame when the 2x camera offers something genuinely unlike and useful .
Battery life
No - one is going to quetch about the Sony Xperia 10 IV ’s assault and battery life . It ’s among the longest - lasting phone I ’ve used in the last yr or so , making up for a lot of the other issue I ’ve mentioned in this review so far .
If you ’re the kind of individual I would actually urge the handset to , someone who does n’t want to play intensive games much or rain cats and dogs a lot of video , the Sony Xperia 10 IV could well last the good part of two daytime between charges . On a couple of Day I had almost dead on 50 % chage left by bottom fourth dimension .
It is great to see this form of stamina in a phone that is so narrow and light . The Sony Xperia 10 IV is easily break down to outlast a Pixel 6a or OnePlus Nord 2 T — two earpiece that beat the Sony for camera epitome caliber and performance .
Even this secure area of the Sony Xperia 10 IV does n’t get out without problems , though . You do n’t get a charger in the loge , and after plug into a in high spirits - power USB - PD adapter the charging pace was slow .
While it digest charge speeds up to 20W , for a significant part of the charge it draws 10W or less . You ’re looking at around 2.5 hours for a bursting charge , and the commission pace channelize down to virtually nil while the filmdom is lit when the battery heads above 50 % . Miserable stuff .
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Should you buy it?
The Sony Xperia 10 IV is a little phone that go an unco long meter off a charge , a pipe dream jazz band for some folks .
Below average camera mental image timbre , a weaker central processing unit than similarly - priced alternatives and boring charging make the Sony Xpreia 10 IV seem behind the times in important respects .
Final Thoughts
The Sony Xperia 10 IV is a midget Android phone that provide splendid bombardment life sentence . It easy outlive most of its equal , particularly the smaller ones .
However , there are bad issues elsewhere . Its processor is not peculiarly sinewy , which has a knock on effect in twenty-four hour period - to - twenty-four hours performance and play . The tv camera raiment is a bit of a mess , with processing that veers all over the shop class and a boring tone to shooting .
Some masses will also be non - plussed by Sony ’s use of a 60Hz concealment . These three issue combine to make the Xperia 10 IV bad to urge to most , even if its combo of farseeing battery life , small sizing and IP68 water resistance is rather great .
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FAQs
It has IP65/68 water resistance , able-bodied to handle submersion in H2O .
A classical 3.5 millimeter headphone jack sits on the top of the phone .
A microSD visiting card baby-sit in the SIM tray , letting you tally to the internal storage .
Test Data
Full Specs
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