Sony Xperia Z3 Compact review: Not your usual suspect

4.6-inch IPS panel with ultra-slim bezels

The Sony Xperia Z3 Compact has an IPS LCD just like its predecessor. That's where the similarities end, however, as Sony has not only bumped up the screen diagonal to 4.6 inches, but also squeezed it into the same footprint as the Z1 Compact. What's more, they've improved on it by making the colors more vibrant and brighter, while greatly reducing the contrast degradation when looked at from the sides.

The secret behind these improvements lies in the Live Color LEDs that Sony has incorporated into the TRILUMINOS display technology found in previous Xperia mobiles. Live Color LED combines red and green phosphor with blue LEDs to produce brighter and more uniform light without oversaturating the image.

The Sony Xperia Z3 Compact screen

Here's how the display looks under our digital microscope:

The Sony Xperia S3 Compact posted great scores in our display test. It provided some great contrast for its size.

The screen proved to be not very reflective and resulted in some decent outdoor visibility, beating out its predecessor by almost a full number.

Sunlight contrast ratio

• Nokia 808 PureView
  4.698
• Samsung Galaxy Note 3
  3.997
• Apple iPhone 5
  3.997
• Samsung Galaxy K zoom
  3.675
• Nokia Lumia 930
  3.567
• Apple iPhone 5s
  3.565
• Samsung Galaxy S5
  3.549
• Alcatel Idol X+
  3.527
• Apple iPhone 5c
  3.512
• Samsung Galaxy Alpha
  3.509
• Samsung Galaxy Note 3 Neo
  3.487
• Motorola RAZR MAXX
  3.42
• Samsung I9300 Galaxy S III
  3.419
• Nokia Lumia 925
  3.402
• Gionee Elife S5.5
  3.386
• Samsung I9505 Galaxy S4
  3.352
• Samsung Omnia W
  3.301
• Samsung Galaxy S5 mini
  3.174
• Samsung I9000 Galaxy S
  3.155
• Samsung Ativ S
  3.129
• Samsung I9190 Galaxy S4 mini
  3.127
• Samsung Galaxy S4 zoom
  3.118
• Nokia N9
  3.069
• Samsung Galaxy Note
  2.97
• Samsung Galaxy Premier
  2.958
• Sony Xperia Z1
  2.95
• HTC One S
  2.901
• Samsung I8730 Galaxy Express
  2.861
• BlackBerry Q10
  2.856
• Samsung I9100 Galaxy S II
  2.832
• Samsung Galaxy S II Plus
  2.801
• BlackBerry Z30
  2.79
• Sony Xperia ZR
  2.672
• Huawei Ascend P1
  2.655
• Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
  2.616
• Sony Xperia T3
  2.609
• Nokia Lumia 900
  2.562
• Motorola Moto G 4G
  2.546
• HTC One Max
  2.537
• Nokia Lumia 720
  2.512
• HTC One
  2.504
• Motorola Moto G
  2.477
• Sony Xperia Z
  2.462
• Xiaomi Mi 4
  2.424
• Samsung Galaxy S III mini
  2.422
• LG G Flex
  2.407
• HTC One (M8)
  2.371
• Motorola RAZR i
  2.366
• Sony Xperia ZL
  2.352
• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  2.307
• Oppo Find 7a
  2.279
• Alcatel One Touch Hero
  2.272
• Apple iPhone 4S
  2.269
• HTC Desire 600 dual sim
  2.262
• Nokia Asha 311
  2.25
• LG Nexus 5
  2.228
• Nokia Lumia 820
  2.193
• HTC One (E8)
  2.185
• Nokia Lumia 920
  2.17
• HTC One X
  2.158
• Nokia N8
  2.144
• Nokia Lumia 620
  2.142
• Nokia 515
  2.134
• HTC Desire 500
  2.129
• Sony Xperia acro S
  2.119
• Nokia Lumia 1020
  2.103
• Oppo Find 5
  2.088
• Sony Xperia SL
  2.078
• Nokia Lumia 630
  2.056
• BlackBerry Z10
  2.051
• Samsung I9295 Galaxy S4 Active
  2.022
• Apple iPhone 4
  2.016
• HTC One mini
  2.003
• Xiaomi Mi 3
  2.001
• Huawei Ascend P7
  1.992
• LG G2
  1.976
• OnePlus One
  1.961
• Oppo R819
  1.957
• Sony Ericsson Xperia ray
  1.955
• Sony Xperia Z2
  1.944
• Nokia Lumia 1320
  1.941
• HTC One mini 2
  1.94
• Samsung Galaxy Camera
  1.938
• Sony Xperia J
  1.932
• Acer CloudMobile S500
  1.931
• LG Nexus 4
  1.926
• LG G Pro 2
  1.922
• Samsung Galaxy Mega 6.3
  1.913
• Nokia Asha 308
  1.911
• Sony Xperia T
  1.894
• HTC Desire X
  1.878
• HTC Butterfly
  1.873
• HTC Windows Phone 8X
  1.873
• HTC Butterfly S
  1.867
• Huawei Ascend P6
  1.865
• Huawei Ascend Mate
  1.845
• LG G2 mini
  1.838
• LG G3
  1.82
• Nokia Lumia 1520
  1.813
• HTC Desire 616 dual sim
  1.797
• Sony Xperia V
  1.792
• HTC Desire 816
  1.783
• Sony Xperia Z1 Compact
  1.772
• HTC Desire 700 dual sim
  1.769
• Sony Xperia U
  1.758
• Meizu MX3
  1.754
• LG Optimus G
  1.753
• Sony Xperia T2 Ultra
  1.74
• Sony Xperia SP
  1.733
• LG Optimus 4X HD
  1.691
• Oppo Find 7
  1.691
• HTC One V
  1.685
• BlackBerry Q5
  1.682
• LG Optimus Vu
  1.68
• Xiaomi Mi Pad 7.9
  1.672
• LG Optimus GJ
  1.666
• LG Optimus 3D Max
  1.658
• HTC Desire V
  1.646
• Samsung Galaxy Xcover 2
  1.632
• Samsung Galaxy Ace 3
  1.622
• Jolla Jolla
  1.605
• Sony Xperia Z Ultra
  1.578
• Sony Xperia go
  1.577
• Samsung Galaxy Ace 2 I8160
  1.566
• Samsung Galaxy Core
  1.563
• LG Optimus G Pro
  1.552
• Motorola Moto E
  1.545
• LG Optimus 3D
  1.542
• Nokia Asha 302
  1.537
• BlackBerry Curve 9320
  1.488
• Sony Xperia M
  1.473
• Oppo N1
  1.47
• Meizu MX 4-core
  1.462
• Nokia Lumia 610
  1.432
• Samsung Galaxy S Duos
  1.4
• Samsung Galaxy Grand Neo
  1.393
• Sony Xperia M2
  1.393
• Samsung Galaxy Grand 2
  1.38
• Sony Xperia E1
  1.372
• Nokia Lumia 625
  1.371
• Gigabyte GSmart G1355
  1.361
• Sony Xperia L
  1.351
• Samsung Galaxy Mega 5.8
  1.35
• Sony Xperia M2 Aqua
  1.331
• Sony Xperia miro
  1.324
• Samsung I9082 Galaxy Grand
  1.321
• Samsung I8530 Galaxy Beam
  1.315
• HTC Desire C
  1.3
• Nokia X
  1.291
• Sony Xperia C
  1.283
• Nokia Asha 503
  1.281
• Nokia Asha 501
  1.27
• LG Optimus L7
  1.269
• Nokia Lumia 510
  1.268
• Samsung Galaxy Fame
  1.245
• LG Optimus L9
  1.227
• Meizu MX
  1.221
• Samsung Galaxy Young
  1.22
• Sony Xperia E
  1.215
• Nokia XL
  1.204
• Sony Xperia E dual
  1.203
• Samsung Galaxy Pocket
  1.18
• Nokia Asha 305
  1.178
• Nokia Asha 306
  1.175
• Sony Xperia neo L
  1.169
• Sony Xperia tipo
  1.166
• Nokia Lumia 520
  1.161
• Samsung S6802 Galaxy Ace Duos
  1.148
• Samsung Galaxy mini 2
  1.114

Battery life

The Sony Xperia Z3 Compact saw a healthy increase in battery capacity to 2,600mAh, up from 2,300mAh on the Xperia Z1 Compact. It also comes with the latest Android 4.4.4 KitKat update, which means that you'll get all of the latest performance optimizations baked right in as well.

We were sure that the extra 300mAh would outshine the 65h endurance rating posted by the Z1 Compact, but we had no idea that it would almost double it! The excellent figures posted in web browsing and video playback mean that the Compact has a very power-conscious screen, while the 16 hours of call time aren't bad either. Excellent standby times also contributed to an overall endurance rating of over 100 hours.

This means that the Xperia Z3 Compact will last you for over four days on a single charge if you do an hour each of web browsing, calling, and video watching per day. Truly impressive!

We didn't even go into Stamina mode. It helps extend your battery life by toggling things like Wi-Fi, GPS, Bluetooth screen brightness, auto sync and background data on and off automatically when the battery charge falls below a certain user-defined threshold. You can also turn off the Wi-Fi receiver if there is no saved Wi-Fi network in range or turn off mobile data when the screen is off, among other things.

You can find out how the Sony Xperia Z3 Compact stacks up against the competition in more detail in our blog post. Details on our testing procedures is available here.

Connectivity

The Sony Xperia Z3 Compact comes in a single SIM version only, which has quad-band GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 support. 3G and LTE support depend on the region, with either quad- or penta-band 3G alongside a boatload of LTE networks including LTE TDD 2300.

The rest of the connectivity features include dual-band Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac and Wi-Fi Direct. There is also support for Bluetooth 4.0 with apt-X, GPS and GLONASS, plus an FM radio with RDS. There is also NFC connectivity with support for Android Beam for sending files to other Android devices.

The ultra-low power ANT+ connectivity protocol handles connections to various sports accessories such as heart rate monitors or bicycle speed & cadence meters.

There is a microUSB 2.0 port for charging and data connections. Media transfer mode is supported for accessing the phone's built-in memory and microSD card over USB.

The microUSB 2.0 port can also be used in USB On-the-go mode for connecting USB peripherals such as pen drives, keyboards or real USB hard drives. There is also MHL support for connecting the Z3 Compact with TV-out, and if you own a compatible HDTV, you can output your phone's screen wirelessly via the Miracast protocol.