Meizu M5s review: Shiny armor, rusty ammo

Introduction

Meizu M5s might be coming late to the series, but the phone has a certain charm worthy of our attention. The M5s is akin to the M5 in lots of ways, but the choice of materials and chipset are not among those.

Meizu has chosen a premium metal build for the M5s, while the M5 was keeping the budget low with a plastic shell. Oddly, the company has demoted the MT6750 chipset down to the MT6753 (don't mind the numbers), which powered the m2 note back in mid-2015.

Meizu M5s at a glance:

• Metal unibody; 5.2" 720p IPS display of 282ppi
• MediaTek MT6753 chipset: 8x 1.3GHz Cortex-A53 CPU, Mali-T720MP3 GPU, 3GB of RAM
• 13MP camera, two-tone LED flash; 1080p @30fps; 5MP front-facing camera
• 16/32GB of built-in storage, microSD slot
• mTouch v2.1 Home button with a fingerprint scanner
• 3,000 mAh battery, 18W fast charging (45% in 30 minutes)
• Android Marshmallow 6.0 OS with Flyme 5.2
• Dual SIM; LTE Cat.4; Wi-Fi a/b/g/n; Bluetooth 4.0; GPS and GLONASS; microUSB port

We appreciate the M5s metal body, and we'd sure take its exterior over the M5's. But the MT6753 chip is the elephant in the room and addressing it will be a lot more challenging that picking metal over plastic.

The Meizu M5s receives our shorter review treatment, though we are not dropping our long articles, so don't panic. Our goal is to give you our impressions in a concise manner, but without sacrificing the performance assessment and the results from the full tests, we normally perform. We hope you enjoy it.

Hardware

Meizu M5s has the same dimensions as the M5, but it has gained 5g courtesy of its new anodized metal body. The design takes after the already available Meizu M5 Note, and if it weren't for the small difference in display size, it would have been hard to tell those two apart.

The retail package of the Meizu M5s is basic - there is a microUSB cable and a charger plug but no headphones.

The real surprise here is that Meizu ships the M5s with a fast charger, which is a rarity in this price range. The bundled charger provides up to 24W of power (it can work at 5V/2A, 9V/2A and 12V/2A), which is incredibly high, but according to Meizu, the phone's charging maxes out at 18W (which is still as fast as Qualcomm's QuickCharge 3.0). The fast charging tech inside the Meizu M5s is proprietary and not Mediatek's Pump Express Fast Charging.

Meizu M5s and its retail box

The M5s returns to the made-of-metal league and the metal back is welcome. We see the mandatory antenna strips, which are made of plastic, but they blend in quite nicely with the rest of the matte surface. Finally, we like the glossy silver lines emphasizing the antenna borders even though we've seen those on quite a few phones already so they've turned into a bit of a design cliche already.

The glass with 2.5D edges covering the front makes for an upmarket look and feel. The 5.2" screen has an IPS LCD panel with 720p resolution, and that amounts to a pixel density of 287ppi. Its viewing angles are excellent - wide and with no color distortion, while its sunlight legibility is about average with a score of 2.580.

Sunlight contrast ratio

• Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
  4.615
• Samsung Galaxy S7 edge
  4.439
• OnePlus 3
  4.424
• Samsung Galaxy S7
  4.376
• HTC One A9
  4.274
• Samsung Galaxy Note7
  4.247
• Samsung Galaxy A3
  4.241
• OnePlus 3T
  4.232
• Google Pixel XL
  4.164
• ZTE Axon 7
  4.154
• Samsung Galaxy S6 edge
  4.124
• Samsung Galaxy Note5
  4.09
• Huawei Nexus 6P
  4.019
• OnePlus X
  3.983
• Vivo Xplay5 Elite
  3.983
• Apple iPhone 7
  3.964
• Oppo R7s
  3.964
• Huawei P9 Plus
  3.956
• Meizu Pro 6 Plus
  3.935
• Lenovo Moto Z
  3.931
• Samsung Galaxy A7 (2016)
  3.918
• Samsung Galaxy C5
  3.911
• Samsung Galaxy C7
  3.896
• Samsung Galaxy A5
  3.895
• Samsung Galaxy J7 outdoor
  3.879
• Samsung Galaxy J2 outdoor
  3.873
• Samsung Galaxy A8
  3.859
• Samsung Galaxy A9 (2016)
  3.817
• Motorola Moto X (2014)
  3.816
• Samsung Galaxy A5 (2017)
  3.804
• Samsung Galaxy J7 (2016) outdoor mode
  3.802
• LG V20 Max auto
  3.798
• Xiaomi Redmi Pro
  3.798
• Sony Xperia XZ
  3.795
• Samsung Galaxy A5 (2016)
  3.789
• Apple iPhone 6s
  3.783
• Meizu Pro 5
  3.781
• Microsoft Lumia 650
  3.772
• Samsung Galaxy J7 (2016)
  3.756
• Oppo F1 Plus
  3.709
• Vivo X5Pro
  3.706
• Sony Xperia X Compact
  3.694
• Samsung Galaxy A3 (2017)
  3.688
• Apple iPhone SE
  3.681
• Huawei Mate 9
  3.68
• Samsung Galaxy A7
  3.679
• Meizu PRO 6
  3.659
• BlackBerry Priv
  3.645
• Apple iPhone 7 Plus
  3.588
• Apple iPhone 6s Plus
  3.53
• Motorola Moto Z Play
  3.526
• Samsung Galaxy J3 (2016)
  3.523
• Samsung Galaxy J3 (2016) outdoor mode
  3.523
• Acer Jade Primo
  3.521
• Microsoft Lumia 950
  3.512
• Oppo R7 Plus
  3.499
• nubia Z11
  3.466
• Samsung Galaxy J7
  3.422
• Meizu MX5
  3.416
• LG V20
  3.402
• Oppo R9s
  3.352
• Oppo R7
  3.32
• Lenovo P2
  3.316
• Xiaomi Mi 5s
  3.276
• Xiaomi Mi 5
  3.24
• Samsung Galaxy J2
  3.235
• Sony Xperia X Performance
  3.234
• Xiaomi Mi Note 2
  3.228
• Motorola Moto X Play
  3.222
• Huawei Mate 9 Pro
  3.206
• Huawei P9
  3.195
• Lenovo Vibe Shot
  3.113
• Motorola Moto X Force
  3.105
• LG Nexus 5X
  3.092
• Huawei Mate S
  3.073
• Microsoft Lumia 640 XL
  3.065
• Sony Xperia X
  2.989
• Huawei Mate 8
  2.949
• Xiaomi Redmi 3S
  2.913
• Sony Xperia XA Ultra
  2.906
• LG G5
  2.905
• HTC One S
  2.901
• Xiaomi Redmi 3s Prime
  2.893
• Xiaomi Mi 5s Plus
  2.884
• Sony Xperia Z5
  2.876
• Microsoft Lumia 550
  2.851
• Lenovo Moto M
  2.813
• Xiaomi Redmi 3 Pro
  2.803
• Sony Xperia Z5 compact
  2.784
• Meizu MX6
  2.751
• LG V10
  2.744
• Xiaomi Redmi 3
  2.735
• Meizu M5
  2.71
• Sony Xperia M5
  2.69
• Huawei P9 Lite
  2.679
• Xiaomi Redmi 4 Prime
  2.679
• Vivo V3Max
  2.659
• Xiaomi Mi Mix
  2.658
• Xiaomi Mi 4i
  2.641
• Sony Xperia XA
  2.609
• Motorola Moto G4 Plus (max auto)
  2.582
• Motorola Moto G4 Plus
  2.582
• Meizu M5s
  2.508
• Xiaomi Mi 4c
  2.574
• LeEco Le Max 2
  2.567
• Asus Zenfone 3 ZE552KL
  2.563
• Microsoft Lumia 640
  2.563
• Lenovo K6 Note
  2.544
• Lenovo Moto G4
  2.544
• Oppo F1
  2.528
• Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
  2.525
• Huawei Honor 7 Lite / Honor 5c
  2.506
• Sony Xperia M4 Aqua
  2.503
• Oppo F1s
  2.481
• Motorola Moto G
  2.477
• Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus
  2.473
• Huawei G8
  2.471
• Huawei nova
  2.467
• Sony Xperia Z
  2.462
• Lenovo Vibe K5
  2.459
• Meizu m3 max
  2.447
• HTC 10 evo
  2.407
• Huawei Honor 7
  2.406
• Sony Xperia E5
  2.386
• ZUK Z1 by Lenovo
  2.382
• HTC 10
  2.378
• Samsung Galaxy J5 (2016)
  2.378
• vivo V5 Plus
  2.371
• Meizu m1 note
  2.362
• Huawei nova plus
  2.329
• HTC One E9+
  2.305
• Alcatel One Touch Hero
  2.272
• Lenovo Vibe K4 Note
  2.254
• Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
  2.253
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 (MediaTek)
  2.249
• Sony Xperia C4 Dual
  2.235
• Xiaomi Mi Note
  2.234
• Motorola Moto G (2014)
  2.233
• Huawei P8
  2.196
• Meizu M5 Note
  2.189
• Huawei Honor 6
  2.169
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 2
  2.166
• OnePlus Two
  2.165
• HTC One X
  2.158
• Xiaomi Redmi Note 4
  2.145
• LG Aka
  2.145
• Archos 50 Diamond
  2.134
• Xiaomi Redmi Note
  2.119
• Xiaomi Mi 4S
  2.095
• Acer Liquid X2
  2.084
• Huawei P8lite
  2.078
• vivo V5
  2.059
• Moto G 3rd gen max manual
  2.026
• Xiaomi Mi Max
  1.996
• Sony Xperia E4g
  1.972
• OnePlus One
  1.961
• Meizu m3 note
  1.923
• BlackBerry Leap
  1.892
• Meizu m2 note
  1.892
• ZTE Nubia Z9 mini
  1.759
• Sony Xperia U
  1.758
• Asus Zenfone Selfie
  1.68
• Motorola Moto E (2nd Gen)
  1.675
• ZTE Nubia Z9
  1.659
• Jolla Jolla
  1.605
• Motorola Moto E
  1.545
• Sony Xperia M
  1.473
• HTC Desire C
  1.3
• Sony Xperia C
  1.283
• Meizu MX
  1.221
• Sony Xperia E
  1.215

The 5.2" display has a maximum brightness of 407nits and an average contrast of 1:955. The color rendering is mediocre - the average deviation in color accuracy is DeltaE 7.3 and playing with the color settings won't help you achieve much better.

The mTouch key is what easily becomes a favorite feature in any recent Meizu smartphone. It's an all-in-one button with three functions - tap for Back, click for Home, and there is an embedded fingerprint scanner for when the screen is locked. Even though the biometric sensor isn't on when the screen is off, it's very fast, accurate, and is capable of recognizing your fingerprint from any direction.

Meizu M5s

The M5s is powered by a 3,000 mAh battery - about the same capacity as the cell inside the Meizu M5. The M5s scored a mediocre 56-hour endurance rating in our battery test, considerably down from the 76h score we recorded with the M5 and the relatively poor performance in standby is to blame.

Unlike the regular model, the new "s" comes with Meizu's mCharge solution, which in our tests filled up 45% of the battery capacity in 30 minutes even though Meizu claims a slightly faster charging speed. The supplied charger is a 24W one, but Meizu claims the phone can only charge with up to 18W of power.

Meizu M5s is a dual-SIM phone, but it uses a hybrid slot so you would have to make the choice of using either a second SIM or a microSD card.

The phone can come with either 16GB or 32GB storage capacity - getting the higher capacity would allow you to skip using the microSD card so you can slot in a second SIM card without any worries.

The SIM tray is on the left • the SIM/microSD hybrid slot • the bottom • the microUSB port

Finally, the bottom of the M5s is where the audio jack, the microUSB connectivity port, and the loudspeaker are. The primary mic is also around.

The M5s speaker scored a Good mark in our loudness test, less than a decibel short of the Very Good achievement. Subjectively, it doesn’t sound particularly good at all - it's better than the M5 but worse than the M5 Note.