Sony Xperia C5 Ultra review: Crowd selfie

Crowd selfie

GSMArena team, 25 September, 2015.

Performance

The Sony Xperia C5 Ultra is powered by the Mediatek MT6752 SoC - the same one ticking inside the Xperia C4. It pack eight Cortex-A53 CPU cores clocked at 1.7GHz and capable of working simultaneously.

The octa-core processor is coupled with a Mali-T760MP2 GPU and 2GB of RAM, and since those handle 1080p apps, the C5 Ultra should offer the same synthetic performance as the previous C4 model.

Sony Xperia C5 Ultra

The battery of tests starts as usual with Geekbench 3.0, which measures RAW CPU performance. Mediatek's True octa-core concept is a real beast and C5 Ultra posts a beastly score - the same as its C4 predecessor, but unmatched among its rivals in the midrange.

GeekBench 3

Higher is better

  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    4242
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    4226
  • LG G Flex2
    3604
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    3375
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    3285
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    3204
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    3094
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    2709
  • Sony Xperia Z Ultra
    2670
  • Sony Xperia T2 Ultra
    1359

The popular Antutu benchmark has become an industry standard for overall performance, and it evaluates CPU, graphics, memory and storage, the lot. Another great performance here, the Xperia C5 Ultra smokes the S615-powered Oppo R7 Plus and is on par with the S810-equipped LG G Flex2. Its GPU isn't shining, but it compensates with its powerful processor.

AnTuTu 5

Higher is better

  • Motorola Nexus 6
    49803
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    49554
  • LG G Flex2
    47680
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    46502
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    46307
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    45632
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    42460
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    37750

The Xperia C5 Ultra fails to impress in Basemark OS II 2.0, but does as much as a Snapdragon 615 device would do (Galaxy A8, Oppo R7 Plus).

Basemark OS 2.0

Higher is better

  • LG G Flex2
    1726
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    1353
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    1267
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    1089
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    968
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    939
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    931

Single core-performance is led by the Snapdragon 801s, though they rely on an entirely different quad-core architecture and thus obviously pack more punch per core.

Basemark OS 2.0 (single-core)

Higher is better

  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    6068
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    5624
  • LG G Flex2
    5597
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    4338
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    2900
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    2872
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    2707

Unsurprisingly, the Xperia C5 Ultra and its C4 sibling lead the way in the multi-core test, with S615 Oppo R7 Plus a mile behind, and noticeably faster than the top-dog Snapdragon 810.

Basemark OS 2.0 (multi-core)

Higher is better

  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    24035
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    21809
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    21753
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    21026
  • LG G Flex2
    18856
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    17882
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    16784

Graphics performance is less exciting but mostly adequate for the mid-range class. The results are not what they initially appear though, as the top spots are occupied mostly by the 2014/2015 flagships, which benefit from their superior GPUs.

GFX 2.7 T-Rex (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

  • LG G Flex2
    49
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    38.9
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    31
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    28
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    27.2
  • Sony Xperia Z Ultra
    23
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    16
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    15
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    15
  • Sony Xperia T2 Ultra
    5.8

GFX 3.0 Manhattan (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

  • LG G Flex2
    22
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    18.6
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    13
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    11.3
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    11
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    6
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    6
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    6

GFX 2.7 T-Rex (onscreen)

Higher is better

  • LG G Flex2
    48
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    30
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    28
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    27.4
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    19.5
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    16
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    15
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    15
  • Sony Xperia T2 Ultra
    10.9

GFX 3.0 Manhattan (onscreen)

Higher is better

  • LG G Flex2
    22
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    14
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    11.9
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    11
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    6.9
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    6.4
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    6.4
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    6.3
  • Sony Xperia T2 Ultra
    4.1

Basemark X

Higher is better

  • Motorola Nexus 6
    20901
  • LG G Flex2
    19360
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    13075
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    11875
  • Sony Xperia Z Ultra
    11606
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    8838
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    5695
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    5349

Moving on to browser benchmarks, things don't look all that well for the Xperia C5 Ultra. Even though it's running nothing but Chrome, thus supposedly avoiding blunders by the manufacturer's software engineers, the C5 Ultra is consistently trailing, both in the JavaScript-focused Kraken 1.1 and the broader BrowserMark 2.1.

Kraken 1.1

Lower is better

  • LG G Flex2
    4621
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    5094
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    6072
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    6088
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    6382
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    11908
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    15815
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    17157

BrowserMark 2.1

Higher is better

  • LG G Flex2
    2086
  • Samsung Galaxy A8
    1992
  • Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro
    1543
  • Motorola Nexus 6
    1447
  • Oppo R7 Plus
    1224
  • Sony Xperia C5 Ultra
    860
  • Sony Xperia C4 Dual
    793
  • Xiaomi Mi Note
    748

All in all, the Sony Xperia C5 Ultra proves to be a capable performer, with strong results in processor benchmarks and average graphics for its class. It does have its weak spot, and that's browser performance, though.

Reader comments

  • Jey de Belen
  • 18 May 2020
  • wiW

I'm still using it as of today and it became slow, the capacity of the phone is not suitable fo today's apps

  • Anonymous
  • 17 Apr 2020
  • IW@

Try to replace the battery

  • Salman
  • 04 Feb 2019
  • KSi

Sony is always best