Best premium all-rounders 2024 - buyer’s guide

The now cheaper €600 Xiaomi 13T Pro remains one the best phones you can get right now. It delivers on every single promise and has plenty of flagship-grade, class-leading features. The new IP68-rated design, especially the one with the vegan leather back, is classy and stunning.

The 13T Pro impresses with one of the best OLED screens in the industry that is jam-packed with premium features, and it can also brag with the smallest punch hole. Furthermore, the Xiaomi 13T Pro employs one of the fastest chipsets on the smartphone market, which delivers excellent performance and stability across the board.

The Leica cooperation must be paying off, as all rear cameras deliver outstanding photo and video quality day and night.

Let's not forget the good battery life, the loud stereo speakers, and the incredibly fast 120W charging - these deserve to be mentioned. Xiaomi's dedication to four major Android updates and five years of security patches is very welcome, too.

The only real setback we encountered on the Xiaomi 13T Pro was the selfie camera. It is a 20MP Quad-Bayer shooter that is just an insult to any cameraphone, let alone one developed with Leica. Its photo and video quality are quite average, too.

Long story short - the Xiaomi 13T Pro is one of the best phones right now, with top-notch hardware, exceptional execution across the board and a promising future. The launch price is also surprisingly good and we do recommend putting it at the top of your consideration lists. You can tell we really liked this phone and we think you'd love it, too.

The Pixel 8 offers an improved viewing experience in line with 2023's industry standards, excellent camera experience, faster charging, 7 years of software support, and timely major OS updates.

Let’s not forget the Pixel camera, which is a huge standout feature and the sole thing that easily sells this Pixel. And it delivers for another year, of course.

But the Pixel 8 isn't without its flaws. For instance, a 3x telephoto unit would have been greatly appreciated as well wider availability for its smart features. After all, many of Pixel’s clever software features can't be utilized to its fullest in many markets. Charging and battery life aren't particularly impressive either, although somewhat okay in Pixel terms. We also wonder why Google decided to skip the autofocus feature on the selfie camera and the support for Pro camera mode on the smaller Pixel.

Bottom line, the Pixel 8 is an easy recommendation because, despite its issues, it's a significant upgrade over the previous generation and manages to pack competent hardware into a compact body.

Apple's smartphone ecosystem is mostly an isolated island at this point, with few people jumping ship from or to Android. As such, it makes sense to mostly analyze the iPhone lineup in isolation, more or less. The vanilla iPhone definitely has its place in said lineup. It likely won't be the hottest seller among its siblings, but the regular iPhone has become something of a "commodity" product. It's the one you get when you simply want "an iPhone," and since it just happens to be the cheapest of the latest bunch, it gets a lot of attention on that front as well.

Plus, as far as innovations go, the iPhone 15 brings much more to the table than its predecessor. The all-new and incredibly bright OLED display is a great step forward, and we appreciate Apple finally unifying its design with Dynamic Island across all models. And speaking of unification, Type-C was a long-overdue change. The other major novelty this year must be the new 48MP main camera. We found it to be excellent all-around and a noticeable improvement over last year's 12MP cam.

All things considered, the vanilla iPhone 15 brings a lot to the table and will get you most of the way there to the full iPhone Pro-level experience. Apple has again managed to strike the delicate balance between familiarity and meaningful innovation - enough to justify an upgrade to the iPhone 15 from an older vanilla iPhone model.

The OnePlus 12R is an excellent offer in India, and the markets it is available in. It’s an INR 40,000 smartphone with a large Fluid AMOLED screen with 1B colors, 120Hz refresh, and Dolby Vision. It also packs flagship-grade Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset with proper cooling solution that helps for good sustained performance.

The OnePlus 12R's specsheet already revealed some of its key weaknesses. The lack of wireless charging and the IP rating that doesn't promise submersion survival will possibly disqualify it for some potential buyer. More limiting, we reckon, is the camera system that features a so-so ultrawide and is missing a zoom unit - that's the weak point that rivals can readily exploit. After all it is not a cheap phone.

That said, stills performance is superb on the main camera and not half bad on the ultrawide, with both excelling in the dark - that's anything but a disappointing performance, if you don't particularly care for video. Add to that a wonderful display, class-leading battery life, and charging speed that's also among the best (in any class), and the 12R isn't looking too shabby, all things considered.

Ultimately, whether the OnePlus 12R is merely good enough or just great for you will be decided on exactly how much you want to be zooming in or out on your cameras. For everything else – it is a fine flagship killer specimen.

The Z Flip5 has two meaningful and significant upgrades over the Flip4. The gapless folding design is finally here, so the handset no longer looks like a prototype - it's sexier this way but also simply more compact. The other thing is the cover display - the new one is large enough to actually be useful for a change.

Alongside those two major developments, we're getting a handful of small ones that add up. The new chipset deserves a mention even if it was a given, but it's also at least partially responsible for the improved battery life compared to the previous generation - it has to be, since battery capacity has remained the same. Similarly, the camera hardware is unchanged, yet the 5 takes better pictures than the 4.

The Galaxy Flips have been steadily evolving, and with the Z Flip5, Samsung is approaching that point where it would need to do something big soon. For this year, however, we think a cover display and hinge will do. We'd be happy recommending the Galaxy Z Flip5 - just be sure to either grab one of the early promos or wait a couple of months for the inevitable price drops.

The Motorola Razr 40 Ultra runs on flagship hardware, asking for flagship money. Both displays are great, and we like the foldable screen implementation. They are vivid and bright enough, while the external screen offers almost full functionality. The chipset may not be the most recent one, but it's capable of running everything you find on Play Store. However, there are several pitfalls that are hard to ignore, even in the context of a foldable device.

The stills and videos are cropped when the device is closed, the charging speed is unimpressive, and the battery life is about average. Sustained performance may also be an issue for some of you who like to play demanding games from time to time. And although powerful enough, the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 isn't as energy-efficient as its successor, the SD8 Gen 2. A flip phone with such a small battery would have benefitted from the extra hardware efficiency gains.

All in all, the Razr 40 Ultra marks a big improvement over its predecessor. It's competitive in the clamshell foldable category, and its asking price may get you any 2023 flagship smartphone with fast charging, longer battery life and excellent camera performance. That's the price - both literally and metaphorically - for getting this exclusive form factor and iconic name.

The Nothing Phone (2) is an excellent sequel and a tempting offer in a pretty over-saturated market, especially around the €600 range. The phone has something that no other phone, well, except Phone (1), has, and that's the Glyph UI. Even better, the LED functionality has been expanded, and it's a really cool and convenient way to see what's happening on your phone without looking at its screen.

The Phone (2) has a larger and brighter LTPO OLED display, with a much more adaptive refresh rate, a welcome update over the Phone (1). The most notable upgrade is the Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 flagship chipset, which makes working with the Phone (2) a breezy experience, gaming included.

Then there is the improved battery life. The richer audio from the stereo speakers. And better photo and video quality across the board. Let's not forget the faster 45W charging speed.

The Nothing Phone (2) also impressed us with the fluidity of its Nothing OS 2.0 - it's so clean, simple, and fast.

The Nothing Phone (2) is not without its issues, though. First - it does not support High Frame Rate gaming, which is a bit disappointing considering the capable hardware platform. The Phone (2) is still not water-resistant despite the now higher ingress protection rating.

The Glyph UI remains the most important thing of any Nothing Phone. You either love it and use it, or you don't, and then the Phone (2) becomes an offer like any other. If you have no use for Glyph, we've explored plenty of alternatives and are sure some will fit your needs and budget.

But if you do, or you just want a breath of fresh air, an innovation of sorts in an otherwise boring market, the Nothing Phone (2), or (1), will not disappoint you. On the contrary, the Phone (2) offers a thoughtful pick of features with a pinch of premium and two of innovation, and that's why we do recommend considering the Phone (2) and even buying it. Because "they just don't make them like the old times" does not fully apply here.

Realme bets on design and camera experience with the 12 Pro+. Battery life is considerably above average too, and so is the charging speed. You also get а very competent 3x periscope telephoto camera.

The display, while of good specs, is largely as it falls behind the competition in terms of max brightness. Some more powerful chipsets are also available, though we found the Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 good enough for most tasks excluding high-end gaming.

One usually gets this Realme 12 Pro+ for its premium design, imaging skills and battery life. Those are enough to put it in this shortlist, though users looking for maximum performance should shop elsewhere.