vivo X50 hands-on review

Design

The vivo X50 is an attractive phone with a premium look and feel. The front of the phone isn't particularly noteworthy, aside from the single hole punch camera in the top left corner. Some of you may have noticed that the vivo X50 does not have the curved display of the vivo X50 Pro, and we prefer it this way even if the phone doesn't look less fancy as a result.

The sides of the phone are made out of aluminum polished to a glossy finish. The right side has the volume and power buttons. The buttons are oddly loose and you can hear them rattle when you shake the phone. It's an odd bit of oversight on an otherwise well-built phone.

Volume and power buttons are a bit wobbly

The top and bottom are a bit more interesting. The top is flattened with a clear plastic plaque that has 'Professional Photography' written on the left. You can very well stand the phone on this edge if you find a flat, level surface.

The bottom is also interesting as it, too, has been flattened. Here, you can find the solo loudspeaker on the phone along with a USB-C 2.0 port and the dual SIM tray. The tray has a rubber gasket even though the phone isn't rated for ingress protection. You can also stand the phone on the bottom edge.

The bottom is as flat as the top

The back is easily the most interesting and attractive side of the vivo X50. Our review unit came in the Frost Blue shade, which features frosted matte glass with a stunning blue-green gradient underneath. The glass has a silky smooth texture that is delightful to the touch and the way the light shines off the back never stops being a joy to look at. We have seen plenty of gradient backs over the last couple of years but the vivo X50 has one of the best we have ever seen.

Situated in the top left corner of the glass back is the all-important camera assembly. It's a quad-camera system that consists of a primary wide, ultra-wide, telephoto and a macro camera. Alongside it is the triple LED strip for flash. The camera doesn't seem to stick out too much but it still makes the phone incredibly wobbly when placed on a flat surface.

The overall fit and finish of the vivo X50 is excellent and the phone reeks of quality. The only fly in the ointment is the lack of any ingress protection. It would also be nice if vivo could tighten up those volume and power buttons. Aside from that, this is a very well designed phone.

Display

The vivo X50 has a 6.56-inch, 2376x1080 resolution AMOLED display. The display supports 90Hz refresh rates but both DRM Info and our custom refresh rate utility reported the display refreshing at a slightly odd 92Hz max frequency.

The screen can be set to 90Hz, 60Hz, or a smart switch mode. The smart switch mode will drop down to 60Hz in certain apps like Maps, Camera, Gallery, Compass, Music, Video, etc. It will also drop down to 60Hz if you don't interact with the screen for a few seconds. When you set the screen to 90Hz, it will still drop down to 60Hz in most of those aforementioned applications but will stay at 90Hz even when idle.

The display has three color presets, Standard, Normal, and Bright. Both Standard and Bright have a cooler white point and oversaturated colors while Normal targets sRGB standard. You can also manually adjust the color temperature on all three presets.

The display on the X50 is largely excellent. The color accuracy on the standard mode is really good, with great saturation and a reasonably close standard white point. The display also gets fairly bright outdoors under sunlight. The only issue with the panel is the viewing angles. The screen gets a very noticeable red color shift when viewed even slightly off-axis. This is most noticeable on light-colored images and is hard to ignore once you see it. It doesn't detract significantly from the quality of the screen but is a downside of this panel.

vivo claims the display supports HDR10+. However, DRM Info only reports HDR10 and HLG support. Meanwhile, both Netflix and Prime Video do not support HDR on the X50. YouTube is the only service that can stream HDR content on this phone.