Black Shark 5 Pro review

Competition

The Black Shark 5 Pro retails for about CNY 4,200 ($660/€595) in its home Chinese market. There are plenty of competitors in this price range. Seeing how one of the key features of the Black Shark 5 Pro is its gaming prowess, it is fair to assume that anyone eyeing it is drawn to some of its gamer-friendly aspects like the great, responsive, tactile magnetic pop-up triggers. Luckily Xiaomi has been putting these in a number of other phones as well.

Left: Xiaomi Poco F4 GT • Right: Xiaomi Black Shark 5 Pro

The first phone that springs to mind is the Xiaomi Poco F4 GT. It has those same triggers combined with a slightly more neutral-looking exterior. It is available internationally and can already be had for under EUR 600. Specs-wise it is similar to the Black Shark 5 Pro, including its chipset and display. The Black Shark 5 Pro has a beat in the camera and storage departments, though. The Xiaomi Redmi K50 Gaming is essentially the same phone but appears to be harder to find.

Xiaomi Poco F4 GT • Xiaomi Poco F3 GT • Lenovo Legion Y90

Another viable option is to potentially consider the older 2021 Poco F3 GT. It offers the same experience as the Black Shark 5 Pro - an excellent 10-bit, 120Hz, HDR10+ AMOLED display and stereo speakers, plus those same physical, magnetic pop-up triggers. It even has a bigger 5,065 mAh battery and costs less at this point. The Dimensity 1200 chipset is perhaps one of the most significant compromises you'd have to live with.

The Lenovo Y90 is another excellent option. Specs-wise and price-wise, it is very comparable to the Black Shark 5 Pro. It has the same chipset, stereo speakers and a larger 5,600 mAh battery. A slightly larger, even if just 8-bit, 144Hz, HDR10+ AMOLED display and a lesser camera setup. The substitute for the physical pop-up triggers are the ultrasonic capacitive buttons, which, while not as great, are still a step up from just having the touchscreen.

Of course, there is the obvious choice of the Asus ROG Phone 5s Pro. While we still regard the ROG line as the top dog in the gaming niche for a number of reasons, its high price makes it hard to recommend in the current landscape. Plus, the Snapdragon 888+ equipped current model is due for a refresh likely shortly.

Our verdict

The Black Shark 5 Pro is an iterative rather than a major upgrade over the Black Shark 4 Pro, and it's not exactly a straightforward upgrade either. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 is now on board and the engineering team has tried to squeeze the most out of it, all at the cost of poor in-hand comfort due to the scorching hot body. The two giant vapor chambers keep the powerful chipset cool by dumping all that heat straight to the user's palms in a frankly uncomfortable way.

Moving on, the display now offers 10-bit color while retaining its other excellent features like a 144Hz refresh rate and HDR10+ support. However, it still measures 6.67 inches which is not exactly huge, while it seems that many fans were hoping to get something bigger, like a return to the Black Shark 3 Pro and its massive 7.1-inch display. The same goes for ingress protection, which the Black Shark 5 Pro lacks. Oh, and let's not forget - the 3.5mm audio jack is gone. These are all important points for consideration, particularly on a gaming phone.

On a more positive note, we appreciate the extra love the camera setup has received. It performs decently well but still has room for improvement. The intriguing split storage setup is also a nifty addition to the mix, which we can't fail to mention.

All things considered, it shows that Black Shark engineers are trying hard. The Black Shark 5 Pro manages to incrementally improve over its predecessor in pretty much every way while also maintaining a reasonable price tag. That being said, we can't help but feel that all of the engineering efforts were invested in sort of auxiliary aspects of the phone without really doing anything to push it above and beyond and make it stand out. Bottom line - the Black Shark 5 Pro is a solid and dependable phone that manages to be competitive among the gaming phone crowd. It just shouldn't be your first choice if you are after a well-rounded phone first and an occasional gaming platform second.

Pros

• Bright, 144Hz OLED display with HDR10+ support and now 10-bit color.
• Great-sounding stereo speakers.
• Dependable camera experience overall.
• Plenty of useful gaming features, physical shoulder triggers with additional functionalities.
• Super fast 120W charging.
• Awesome haptic feedback around.
• Solid sustained and peak performance.

Cons

• Convoluted high refresh rate handling both for games and UI.
• Phone gets extremely hot to the touch in an effort to keep the internals cool.
• Battery life is hardly great.
• No ingress protection.