Lava V5 review: Could have been so much better

Indian handset maker Lava launched yet another budget smartphone V5 in India. Priced at Rs 11,499, Lava V5 is the company's latest flagship smartphone. Lava V5 comes with a 5.5-inch display, 3GB RAM, 13MP camera and quad-core processor, which are pretty standard for any other budget smartphone available in India, in this bracket.

We reviewed the device to see where it stands in the over-crowded budget smartphone market. This is our review of the Lava V5 smartphone.

Design and Display

Lava V5 is a sleek smartphone, which flaunts a 5.5-inch HD display. The smartphone features curved edges and is surrounded by a metal rim, which gives it a premium look. The front of the device (besides the large display) houses an 8MP selfie camera and an LED flash for low light photography. There are also three capacitive keys on the screen to jog through options, home and return functions. The rear panel of the handset sports a 13MP rear camera accompanied with dual LED flash and a speak er grille at the bottom. The volume rockers and power button are placed on the right side, whereas the audio 3.5mm headset jack and micro-USB port are placed at the top and bottom edges, respectively. The back cover of the device is made of plastic. This can be removed to insert the sim and microSD cards.

The Lava V5 features a 5.5-inch HD display with 1280x720 pixels resolution. The display offers decent pixel density and the colour reproduction is also sharp. The touch screen is responsive and provides good visibility under bright sunlight. The display is big enough to offer a great gaming experience to the users. Moreover, the viewing angles are also fine and you will not have any complaint about the display of the handset. The screen is also protected with a coating of Corning Gorilla Glass 3, which protects it from getting damaged.

Read alsoLava V5 smartphone's first imp ressions

Performance and Camera

TheLava V5 runs on Android 5.1 Lollipop operating system and it will also get an upgrade to Android 6.0 Marshmallow. The interface is clean and easy to use. There is an app drawer where you can place all your apps. Our software experience was quite nice and we did not face any issues.

On the hardware front, the Lava V5 is powered by a 1.3GHz quad-core MediaTek processor paired with 3GB of RAM. The internal storage of the device accounts to 16GB out of which only 11.23GB is available for the user. The storage can also be expanded up to 32GB using a microSD card. The handset also delivers lag-free performance. Over that, the large display makes the gaming experience a complete delight. Moving on to the voice and sound, the quality was fine on headphones, but not that great on loudspeakers. The call quality was good even in low signal reception area.

Skipping to the camera, the Lava V5 comes equipped with a 13MP rear camera with dual LED flash and an 8MP front snapper with LED flash for selfies. The company claims that the camera is the main USP of this smartphone, but we were not happy with its performance. The images captured using the 13MP camera during the day was pretty decent; the colour reproduction was also sharp. However, the images taken in indoor and low light conditions failed to impress us. There was too much noise and blur. The camera app is simple and it offers various modes such as HDR, GIF mode, multi-angle view and others.

Just like the rear camera, the 8MP front camera is also not great. The LED flash in the front is not of much help, and the low-light selfies are not good enough, too. There is a lot of colour saturation and one can easily see a lot of noise in the images capture d using the front shooter. The company has also incorporated some beautification features for selfies, which work fine.

The Lava V5 performs well in terms of gaming, but camera is surely not the high point of the device.

Verdict

The Lava V5 4G comes with a price tag of Rs 11,499. The device offers a 5.5-inch HD display and runs on Android 5.1 (upgradable to 6.0 Marshmallow). As far as the performance is concerned the handset is pretty decent. However, it has a major setback in terms of camera, which is a little disappointing.

Those looking for alternatives can consider going for the recently launched Coolpad Note 3 Lite, which costs Rs 6,999 and is an excellent performer. The smartphone features a 5-inch display and is also powered by a quad-core processor. Coolpad Note 3 Lite also has a 13MP rear camera that delivers good shots.

Source: Lava V5 review: Could have been so much better