Vivo V3Max Review: Fast Fingerprint Scanner With Premium Looks

A midrange phablet with high-end configuration and fabulous performance at a competitive price

It is one of the few devices in the sub Rs 25,000 price bracket to offer 4GB RAM. Vivo has tried its best to make this device look totally upmarket and is marketing the device with the tag-line 'Faster than Faster'. Let’s see how much fast it is.

V3Max Design and Features

On the first look, this phone resembles the iPhone6, with the 2.5 D curved Corning Gorilla glass rising just a bit above the frame, with smooth and curved edges, and a strong metal frame. The phone does feel sturdy but a little bit heavy for its slim 7.6mm frame. It has an aluminum alloy back cover with a zircon sand coating which is anodized to create an elegant shimmering effect with a smooth tactile finish. The back panel of the phone looks elegant, free from dust & fingerprint. The power button and volume rocker are placed ergonomically on the right side whereas the left side has a hybrid sim tray that can hold two SIM cards, one Micro, and the other Nano. You can use Nano-SIM card as a microSD card slot but that means you can't use two SIMs at one time if you want to add storage space. The camera, flash, fingerprint sensor, and VIVO logo are beautifully carved over the back panel. There is a thin silver color metal strip which runs along the curved edges of the phone to give it a more appealing look.

The front panel of Vivo V3Max is almost similar to the rest of VIVO’s models. It has a 5.5 inch large full HD IPS display with three capacitive buttons below the screen for navigating through the OS. Vivo has placed the front-facing camera at the right side of the earpiece whereas proximity sensor and the notification LED is on the left side, above the screen. The Micro USB port, mic, and speaker holes are elegantly carved at the bottom.

V3Max Camera

The Vivo V3Max has 13MP PDAF rear camera with flash. The camera can be activated in as little as 0.7 seconds which is really true, thanks to its 4GB RAM. Due to PDAF technology, the camera of this device is able to autofocus on the objects faster than the smartphone cameras without PDAF technology. The pictures captured by the camera are bright with good detailing and there is no shutter lag. The camera app comes with different shooting modes such as Face Beauty, Panorama, HDR, Night, Motion Track, Gender Detection, Filter, Watermark and more. For selfies and video calls it has an 8-megapixel resolution which is awesome.

Photos Captured by Vivo V3Max

V3Max Software

Vivo's FunTouch 2 OS skin is wrapped around Android 5.1 Lollipop. There are few elements in the FunToch OS which are similar to iPhone like lower panel, spotlight search, and no app drawer.

Spotlight search

The new feature which Vivo has introduced in Vivo V3Max is a split-screen mode which allows you to use different apps simultaneously. This feature works fine without any glitches but it does not seem much beneficial to us. Vivo also sends continuous updates to rectify any bugs or issues with the OS. While using this phone we have received updates about 4 to 5 times. The frequent updates are a good thing but may also consume your data a lot.

Split screen

V3Max Performance

Under metal casing, the Vivo V3 is powered by a Qualcomm S652 1.8GHz Octa-core 64bit processor. On the other hand, for doing multitasking it has a 4GB RAM with 32GB internal memory that can be expanded up to 128GB. We used this phone for more than a week and played lots of videos and games on it. We tried some common games to heavy graphics consuming games such as Asphalt 8, but we didn’t find any lag or glitches while running them with almost all apps running in the background.
The Vivo V3Max 360-degree fingerprint scanner works better than expected and actually unlocks the device instantly in about 0.5 sec. You can add multiple fingerprints if your device is being used by more than one person. The fingerprint sensor can be used to click selfies but you can’t lock your apps using it.

With the Smart Amp technology, it gives you clear and boosted audio in both headphones and speakers. With a 3,000mAh battery, Vivo  has integrated a Qualcomm’s Quick Charge 2.0 technology for faster charging  and we tested its fast charging feature by plugging it for 50 minutes and it charged about 50% of battery. However, you have to carry its own charger all the time around with you to gets its fast charging benefit. In our battery test, we ran a 1080P video and it provides us 5 hours 15 minutes at full volume & brightness. So, at fair usage, it gives you a day back up.