Review By Expert: Nokia 2.2 Review | Nokia 2.2 First Impressions

Nokia 2.2 First Impressions:

Review By Expert: Nokia 2.2 Review | Nokia 2.2 First Impressions

Nokia 2.2, HMD Global's latest smartphone, was presented globally at an event in New Delhi on Thursday. Nokia 2.2 is successful last year, Nokia 2.1, which was an Android smartphone, and is the Finnish company's most affordable Android One device. The smartphone is ready to go on sale on June 11 in two variants: one with 2 GB of RAM and 16 GB of storage and another with 3 GB of RAM and 32 GB of storage. We were able to spend some time with the Nokia 2.2 at the launch event, and here are our initial impressions.

HMD Global's newest phone will be available in two color options: steel and black tungsten. Both variants have a glossy finish that attracts a ton of fingerprints. If these colors are not to your liking, Nokia offers the possibility to change the removable back cover of the Nokia 2.2. There will be three Xpress-on covers available at the launch: pink sand, forest green and ice blue.

Nokia 2.2 Features:

Like most Nokia smartphones launched under the tutelage of HMD Global, Nokia 2.2 also feels solid in the hand, despite the all-plastic construction. The smartphone is also very compact and portable, very far from the wide and heavy Nokia 2.1 of last year. The higher aspect ratio and curved edges also make it easy to hold with one hand.

The individual rear camera shares the space with an LED flash, both placed in a pill-shaped casing, below which is a vertically oriented Nokia logo. The Android One brand is proudly adorned on the bottom, with only one speaker at a time. The rear-mounted speakers have practically disappeared, and for good reason. The sound is muffled every time the phone is placed on a hard surface, so we'll be curious to see how this works when we use Nokia 2.2 in the real world as part of our review process.

One of the key features of Nokia 2.2 is the dedicated Google Assistant button on the left edge. Unfortunately, the button is not programmable and can only be enabled/disabled. A single press activates the Wizard and by holding down the button, you can give detailed commands.

The Nokia 2.2 joins the 'no bezel' fashion with a 19: 9 screen and minimal edges. Of course, the lesser bezel is just a marketing discourse, but the borders are much thinner than those found on the Nokia 2.1, which had a traditional 16:9 screen. The screen has a water drop style notch that HMD Global calls a "discrete selfie notch".

The HD+ resolution is more than acceptable at this price point and the screen itself has decent viewing angles. Of course, these are only initial impressions and a detailed evaluation will have to wait until our detailed review of Nokia 2.2.

With Nokia 2.2, HMD Global has abandoned Android Go, which seemed like a work in progress in its early days, for Android One. As such, the smartphone runs a full version of Android 9 Foot, with the promise of two years of software upgrades and three years of security patches.

This has been done by uploading the hardware. While Nokia 2.1 had a minimum of 1 GB of RAM and 8 GB of internal storage, Nokia 2.2 offers a choice between 2 GB and 3 GB of RAM, as well as 16 GB and 32 GB of internal storage. The storage can be expanded through a microSD card, which has a dedicated slot, up to 400 GB.

The smartphone is powered by MediaTek's 12nm Helio A22 chipset, which has four A53 bark cores. There is a 3,000 mAh battery on board with 5W charge support.

In our limited time with the device, the performance was quite smooth, especially for a device in this price range. We experienced a few dropped frames when moving to the Google page to the left of the home screen. That said, the rest of the animations were smooth and the camera application had little delay in capturing and processing photos.

The smartphone lacks a fingerprint sensor, but has a biometric facial unlock, which according to HMD Global has been equipped with a feature called 'vividness detection', which is supposed to help prevent the phone from unlocking through photos and prints. While we are sure to test this feature in our detailed review, in our brief hands we find that facial unlocking is fast and reliable.

On the front of the image, the Nokia 2.2 has a 13 megapixel solitary camera on the back with an aperture of f/2.2 along with a single LED flash. On the front, there is a 5 megapixel fixed focus front camera. A front LED flash is conspicuous by its absence.

There are some AI features built into the camera application, the most interesting of which is the 'AI activated low light fusion technology'. Nokia claims that the smartphone "takes several images simultaneously and, through advanced algorithms, creates a single image with more light. We will be testing these claims in the next few days.

For the base model with 2 GB of RAM and 16 GB of storage, Nokia 2.1 seems an attractive proposition. The variant with 3 GB RAM and 32 GB storage, which has a higher price, might have some chance of facing the recently released Redmi 7. What should be noted, however, is that these are introductory prices valid until June 30, after which the price will rise.