vivo V27 Pro review

High-res cameras on both sides

The vivo V27 Pro has three cameras on its back and one at the front. The rear setup contains a 50MP OIS primary, an 8MP ultrawide, and a 2MP macro cams. There is also a ring-LED flash around. Meanwhile, there is a 50MP AF selfie camera, but unlike on other vivo phones, there is no LED flash here.

The primary camera relies on a 50MP primary camera with Sony IMX 766 1/1.56" Quad-Bayer sensor with 23mm f/1.88 optically stabilized lens (OIS), 1.0µm pixels, and PDAF. There is support for 2x lossless zoom.

The ultrawide camera uses an 8MP OV8D1 sensor coupled with a 16mm f/2.2 lens. The focus is fixed.

The macro camera uses a 2MP OmniVision OV02B1 sensor behind a 24mm f/2.4 lens and a fixed focus at 4cm away.

The front camera utilizes а 50MP Samsung ISOCELL S5KJN1 1/2.76" sensor with Tetracell filter and 0.64µm pixels. The sensor is coupled with a 24mm f/2.45 lens and supports PDAF.

Camera app

The camera app is quite familiar as it is similar to the one presented on the V and X series. There's a straightforward zoom selector with 0.6x, 1x and 2x steps. Accessing the Macro mode is done from the flower icon next to the hamburger menu.

The main modes are arranged in a carousel formation, and you can switch between them by swiping or tapping on one of the visible modes. The More tab lists the rest of the modes, and from there, you can also customize the modes you have available in the viewfinder.

The Pro mode gives you all the freedom to adjust the autofocus, white balance, shutter speed, ISO and exposure. You can do so on the primary and ultrawide cameras. There's helpful information explaining all of the options above in case you are just getting into photography. Shooting in RAW is also an option.

Camera app

One of the highlights of the vivo X90 Pro flagship is present here even if it doesn't bear the Zeiss branding. We are talking about the Natural color mode - it should make for realistic colors, in contrast of the more saturated default look vivo's processing is offering.

The Portrait mode also includes various effects and styles and it shoots at 2x zoom by default, but you can switch to 1x, of course.

Finally, Night Mode is present, and it supports Auto Tripod Night Mode and Panorama Night Mode. There are also different Long Exposure presets.

Camera app

Daylight photo quality

The main camera saves 12.5MP photos of impressive quality, class-leading if you will. All photos are incredibly detailed, free of noise, with well-developed areas of random detail and likable processing. The dynamic range is plenty wide and the contrast is pretty good.

The photos offer crips and punchy colors - there is an obvious saturation boost, though it's not over the top.

Overall, these are some solid photos, one of the best in this class, with flagship-grade quality.

Main camera, 12.5MP

If you are not fond of the saturation boost, you can switch to Natural Color mode and it will deliver. All photos we took with these mode have the same exceptional quality as the standard one, plus perfectly accurate colors and spot-on white balance.

Main camera Natural, 12.5MP

The main camera offers 2x lossless zoom thanks to the high-res sensor and some stacking and cropping magic being the scenes.

The 2x zoomed photos offer an acceptable level of detail, about double of what you'd usually get from a simple crop and upscale. The rest is on par with the standard zoom - excellent contrast, dynamic, noise reduction, punchy colors and nice rendition.

Main cam 2x zoom, 12.5MP

The Natural Color once again offers incredibly realistic colors.

2x zoom Natural, 12.5MP

There is support for high-res 50MP mode and the full-res photos are quite good - they have a decent amount of detail, about the same as the zoomed photos, and solid processing when it comes to dynamic range, contrast, low noise and likable colors.

Main camera, 50MP

The 8MP ultrawide photos offer high contrast and enough dynamic range. The noise is kept low, while the colors are as punchy as on the main camera.

The ultrawide photos are of average detail, but we are glad the sharpening isn't overboard as it often happens. The corners are proficiently straightened out.

Ultrawide camera, 8MP

And here are a few ultrawide samples shot with the Natural Color option. They indeed offer accurate color saturation and true-to-life white balance.

Ultrawide cam Natural, 8MP

The 2MP macro camera does a good job at taking closeup shots once you learn to hit the sweet spot at about 4-5cm away. There is enough detail, low noise, good dynamic range and contrast, but the colors are not always accurate, sometimes they may even appear desaturated.

Macro camera, 2MP

The Portrait mode offers 2x and 1x zoom options and the 2x is the default one. It uses the lossless processing we've already mentioned and the photos we took at 2x magnification are rather great even if they don't exactly excel in detail. The subject is well-exposed, with lively colors, the noise is low, and the dynamic range is outstanding. The background separation is proficient, and the simulated blur is quote appealing.

Portraits 2x zoom

The 1x photos are not the most detailed either, and they are as good as the 2x zoomed ones - with good-looking subjects, background blur, and subject separation.

Portraits 1x zoom

The front camera supports autofocus and uses a high-res 50MP sensor. And the 12.5MP selfies it saves are magnificent! The level of detail and sharpness are amazing, the noise is pretty much absent, and the dynamic range is outstanding. We think the contrast is spot-on, the colors are quite pleasing, and the overall processing is mature and natural-looking.

Selfies, 12.5MP

You can also shoot in 50MP, but it won't yield more detail if downsized to 12.5MP. There is some sort of smart processing used, so the photos are not a simple upscale from the default output, but still - we see no benefits in using the high-res mode.

Selfies, 50MP

Low-light photo quality

The low-light photos taken with the main camera are superb - there is more than enough resolved detail, osutanding exposure, the noise is kept incredibly low, and the colors are impressive.

The dynamic range is great, far greater than on many other phones and there are just few blown highlights visible.

Where there is no Auto Night Mode kicking in (only a pop-up suggestion), some sort of Night Mode-like smart stacking is still applied evident by the animation on the virtual shutter and about 1s requirement to hold still.

Main cam Auto, 12.5MP

And here are the actual Night Mode samples. They also required about a second to shoot, another proof that the regular mode uses similar processing. Forcing Night Mode will brighten up the skies further and may slightly lower the sharpness in some scenes.

Main cam Night mode, 12.5MP

There is no lossless zoom when shooting in low-light conditions. The zoomed photos are cropped and upscaled from the standard output and the detail is pretty low. The Night Mode once again offers brighter skies, and it may also clean up some not that obvious noise.

2x Auto • 2x Night • 2x Auto • 2x Night

Oh, and we decided to snap a couple of photos with the dual-LED ring flash. They are pretty good.

Main cam with flash

The low-light photos from the ultrawide camera are good - the detail sure isn't excellent, but everything else is great - exposure, dynamic range, color rendition and saturation, even the noise reduction seems proficient for such type of camera. While these are far from impressive photos, they are better than most 8MP ultrawide cams usually offer these days.

Ultrawide cam Auto, 8MP

The Night Mode is almost identical to the default one - it sometimes brightens up the skies even more, but it may also introduce more noise.

Ultrawide cam Night mode, 8MP

There is also an Automatic Tripod Detection in Night Mode. When enabled, the camera will know when the phone is steady enough for a long exposure shot and will use shutter speeds between 5s and 10s.

Quite expectedly, the Tripod Long Exposure photos are amazing. They are noise free, with stunning detail, excellent dynamic range and lovely colors.

Tripod Night Main • Tripod Night UW • Tripod Night 2x

The selfie camera saves acceptable selfies if there are at least a few even if distant light sources around you. Without Night Mode the photos come soft and noisy, but still usable as they are well-exposed and with enough dynamic range and good colors.

The Night Mode offers brighter exposure, improved dynamic range, and the photos appear a bit more detailed and less noisy. The colors remain with good saturation.

Selfie • Selfie Night Mode • Selfie • Selfie Night Mode

And here are photos of our usual posters taken with the vivo V27 Pro. You can see how it stacks up against the competition. Feel free to browse around and pit it against other phones from our extensive database.

vivo V27 Pro against the Xiaomi 13 Lite and the Realme 10 Pro+ in our Photo compare tool

Video capturing

The vivo V27 Pro supports up to 4K60 video capturing with its primary and selfie cameras. The ultrawide camera maxes out at 1080p@30fps, while the macro camera cannot be used for video capturing.

The primary and ultrawide cameras support stabilization, whether it's OIS or EIS+OIS. This is what vivo calls Standard Stabilization and it's optional. There is also an Ultra Stabilization option for action-like videos. The selfie camera has this Steady Face shortcut on the viewfinder, which offers a stabilized 1080p@30fps video and that's the only way you get stabilized footage from the front camera.

The main camera captures impressive 4K videos. There is a ton of resolved detail, adequate sharpening, and there is no visible noise. The colors are spot-on, the contrast high, and the dynamic range is good, but not over the top.

The 4K 2x zoomed footage from the main camera is just cropped and upscaled, which means its detail is much lower.

The default 4K low-light videos from the main camera are absolutely lovely, too. They offer incredibly high detail and impressively low noise. The exposure is excellent and true-to-life, and so is the color rendition and saturation. The dynamic range is quite alright, too, despite the obvious blown highlights.

The vivo V27 Pro also supports Night Mode and the camera app may suggest it at nighttime. It is shot at 1080p at 30fps. The sample we took with Night Mode on is amazing - the detail is top-notch, there is no noise, the exposure is superb, and so is the dynamic range. We also loved the punchy colors, the brightened sky and even the pleasantly looking foliage.

You can also take a 2x zoomed video at night mode and it's as good as the regular one, but a bit noisy.

Moving on to the ultrawide camera. The 1080p videos offer plenty wide field of view, good colors, great dynamic range and they are clean of noise. The resolved detail is average, though, and the clips look a bit soft.

The low-light ultrawide videos are usable and that's the best we can say about them. They are dark and noisy, but you can see what's on them.

Finally, we also shot some videos with the selfie camera. The 4K video quality is great with proficient subject rendition, great detail, accurate colors, and good dynamic. There is no stabilization for the 4K video mode, though, and the footage is quite shaky.

If you want a stabilized selfie video, you will need to use SteadyFace mode. It saves a bit cropped but stable 1080p video with similarly good quality as the 4K one.

And speaking of stabilization, here are two samples from the main and ultrawide cameras taken with the Standard Stabilization turned on.

Finally, the vivo V27 Pro in our video comparison database.

2160p: vivo V27 Pro against the Xiaomi 13 Lite and the Realme 10 Pro+ in our Video compare tool