Here’s a well-pruned list of the best premium smartphones you can buy.
Smartphone innovation has reached to an extent that there's hardly a bad smartphone, per se. Every smartphone offers something good, and some that may not live up to the promise. And then there are some smartphones that take care of almost everything, offering a wholesome, all-round experience that is quite frankly the best you can get right now. And by that, we mean the best-in-class display, reliable camera, long battery life, and top-notch performance. Here’s a well-pruned list of the best premium smartphones you can buy —
iPhone 11 Pro Max
Pros: Most consistent smartphone camera
Apple A13 Bionic SoC outperforms the competition
Picture perfect display
Cons: Camera lens design may not sit well with everyone
The iPhone 11 Pro Max is the ultimate camera flagship smartphone you can buy today. With three lenses offering consistent image quality, the 2019 flagship iPhone is perfect for both photos and videos. The A13 Bionic’s clever design of integrating the CPU and GPU with a dedicated NPU, leaves the competition lagging far behind and is quite frankly, the benchmark for performance so far this year. We clocked steady frame 60 FPS frame rates for most games with stability in the high 90s. The display is also the brightest in its class measuring in at 860 nits. This time, Apple also addressed concerns about battery life by increasing the size of the battery and introducing nifty software features like dark mode. We clocked 5-6 hours of screen on time on an average. If you’re looking for a smartphone that’s the best in everything it does, look no further than the iPhone 11 Pro.
Digit Rating: 84/100
Design: 86
Performance: 88
Value for money: 84
Features: 79
2. Samsung Galaxy Note 10+
Pros: Productivity powerhouse
S-Pen capabilities offer a unique experience
Improved low-light camera performance
Cons: Focus drops in video
No 3.5mm headphone jack
If all-round entertainment, productivity, gaming, and camera performance is what you are looking for, the Samsung Galaxy Note 10+ is the answer. It’s perfect for both creative professionals as well as camera and gaming enthusiasts. With a class-leading 6.8-inch Dynamic AMOLED display with HDR10+ support, the Note 10+ offers deep contrasts and over 1000 nits of brightness, which makes watching movies and playing games on this screen quite immersive. The Note 10+ also takes some of the best photos we have seen from a smartphone and with a Night Mode that kicks in automatically, low-light photos also come out bright and vibrant. Finally, there’s the S-Pen that’s now more productive than ever before with support for air gestures and handwriting recognition and more. The Note 10+ is one of the best flagship Android smartphones you can buy.
Digit Rating: 84/100
Design: 88
Performance: 82
Value for Money: 84
Features: 84
3. Huawei P30 Pro
Pros: Sets a benchmark in mobile photography
Day-long battery life
Smooth, lag-free performance
Cons: Expandable storage only via proprietary nano memory cards
The Huawei P30 Pro is a camera flagship that’s sleek, durable, and supercharged with top-notch hardware. The P30 Pro rocks a 40MP quad-camera setup with a custom RYYB primary camera co-developed by Leica along with a periscope telephoto lens capable of delivering up to 50X hybrid zoom. Photos from the P30 Pro come out realistic and full of details, the level of which will leave you astounded. The camera covers a whole bunch of options ranging from an ultrawide field of view to a close-up macro shot, with excellent details, colour reproduction, and dynamic range. The phone also sports a curved AMOLED display that’s good for gaming and watching movies. It’s perfect if you like saturated colours on your screen. Finally, the P30 Pro can deliver more than a day’s battery life and tops up in less than an hour thanks to a 40W fast charger.
Digit Rating: 82/100
Design: 83
Performance: 83
Value for Money: 85
Features: 81
4. OnePlus 7T Pro
Pros: Blazing fast performance
Benchmark leader
Bright and vivid display
Cons: Phone sometimes heats up when shooting
Slightly heavy
The OnePlus 7T Pro is all about speed, yes but it’s also a wholesome flagship with an all-round performance. The phone is designed to be ergonomic and a bezel-less curved AMOLED display makes everything on the screen look more immersive with punchy contrasts, vivid colours and QHD+ resolution with 90Hz refresh rate. This is OnePlus’ first attempt at entering the premium segment and it makes quite a statement. There’s up to 12GB of RAM on offer along with 256GB UFS 3.0 storage, which along with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855+ SoC makes the phone achieve some astonishingly high benchmark numbers. The hardware is perfect if you like to keep hundreds of apps installed and frequently multitask. The battery life is also solid with around 7-8 hours of screen-on time on average, and the new Warp Charge 30T can top up the battery in less than an hour. The triple camera setup is versatile and covers all the bases — Ultrawide, telephoto, macro along with 4K video recording at 60 FPS and slo-mo. The OnePlus 7T Pro’s camera is particularly good at getting the colours just right and producing exceptional sharpness in photos.
Digit Rating: 80/100
Design: 72
Performance: 79
Value for Money: 81
Features: 87
5. Oppo Reno 10X Zoom
Pros: Class-leading design
Consistent camera performance
Lag-free performance
Cons: Bloatware in UI
Slightly heavier
The Oppo Reno 10X Zoom is perhaps the best-designed smartphone out so far, but it’s also much more than just a good-looking smartphone. It’s every bit a flagship performer and an excellent camera smartphone. The Reno 10X Zoom as the name suggests offers a periscope telephoto lens that can take high-detailed zoomed shots, where you can even read the text off far-away hoardings. The 48MP primary camera is also quite adept at balancing the colours and dynamic range with adequate details and sharpness. Then there’s the bezel-less display with HDR10+ certification and produces vibrant colours that make gaming and watching movies quite enjoyable. It also aced benchmark scores back when it launched and still comes in the top 10 best performing Android smartphones. If a premium design is what you’re after without compromising on the performance and camera, this is the one to go for.
Digit Rating: 74/100
Design: 71
Performance: 77
Value for Money: 75
Features: 74
Follow Us
Team Digit
Team Digit is made up of some of the most experienced and geekiest technology editors in India! View Full Profile
