Swipe Elite Note Review: Most affordable 5.5-inch display phone, but worth?

Swipe Elite Note (8)

Swipe Elite Note was made official in India in April 2016. Swipe, the California-based company, entered in the smartphone market when it was already highly saturated. In a bid to carve out a niche for itself, Swipe is focused on offering quality products at combative prices. Elite Note is presumed to be the most ambitious smartphone from Swipe.

This week I got to play around with its newbie Note that is priced at 7,999 INR and is available exclusively on Flipkart. Let’s check out in our detailed analysis whether it can stand out in the overflowing budget smartphone market or not.

Swipe Elite Note (2)

Box Contents:

  • Handset
  • Battery
  • User Manual
  • Warranty Card
  • Headset
  • Power Adapter (1A output)
  • USB Cable

Design & Build

The front has a 5.5-inch display and unlike other phablet smartphones, this phone is 8.4mm thick and weighs 194g which is way too much to operate device single-handed. Then back panel comes to rescue as it is made of sandstone which ensures that the phone feels comfortable to hold and gives perfect grip. Chassis is surrounded with golden rims made from magnesium alloy which gives it the metallic look.

 

The top bezel features an earpiece adjoined by a 5Mp camera module and LED flash while capacitive navigation button at the bottom. The left side of the phone remains clean, power key and power button can be seen on right chassis.

Standard 3.5mm audio jack, IR Blaster and MicroUSB 2.0 port are located at the top while the bottom is home for microphone only. A 13MP camera module followed by single tone LED flash sits towards the top while speaker grill with Elite branding at the bottom.

The removable back cover lets you access two Micro SIM slots and microSD card slot for expansion. It features 16GB ROM that can be further expandable up to 32 GB.

Display: 5.5-inch 720p IPS HD 

The smartphone packs a 5.5-inch 720p HD IPS Dragontrail glass display which comes with a 2.5D Arc Touch Screen just like we have seen in LG K series line-up. It supports Vi-Di technology for a brighter, bolder, sharper and bigger visual experience.

Swipe Elite Note (12)

Viewing angles are fine and sunlight legibility also remains good. The display is reasonably bright for both indoor and outdoor usage. Overall, a decent screen to look at.

Hardware & Performance: MediaTek quad-core 1.3 GHz processor

When it comes to scrutinising the performance of Swipe Elite Note, it leaves no ground for complaints on a day to day usage. It is powered by MediaTek quad-core 1.3 GHz processor, coupled with 3GB RAM and Mali-T720 GPU. Hardware combination is good enough to handle everything you throw at it. The gaming performance was acceptable and no major frame drop or lag was observed while testing.

However, a major heating issue remains to be tackled. The phone gets quite hot as if this is going to explode during gaming, and in fact, I received several warnings to shut it due to over battery temperature. Touch is also not very much smooth and responsive.

Software: Android 5.1 Lollipop, Freedom OS

The Swipe Elite Note 3 runs Android 5.1 Lollipop based Freedom OS out of the box. Freedom OS is one of the heavy UIs we have seen recently which slowed down the experience due to software bugs and built-in app crash.

Swipe Elite Note (9)

On functionality front, it supports gesture mode where you can draw predefined letters to open a particular app. Swiping either from bottom left or bottom right pops up the option for Toolbox, where you can adjust brightness, control volume and can access your favourite and recent apps. Rest everything else remains pretty much basic Android.

Camera: 13MP rear and 5MP front camera

I was a bit apprehensive about the camera but when used it turned out not so great but yes good in this price segment. It boasts 13MP rear and 5MP front camera. Rear shooter comes with auto focus, continuous shot, smile shot, and face detection.

Swipe Elite Note (13)

In terms of quality of pictures produced from the rear shooter is no way near the13 MP. Shots captured outdoors and in daylight could do justice with numbers. However, low light shots were the disappointment even after enabling HDR mode. Front camera works fine; it has beautification mode as well. Overall, not the best camera available in the market.

Swipe Elite Note (14)

Battery & Connectivity features

Connectivity front has regular features such as; Bluetooth 4.0, WiFi, 4G LTE connectivity and WiFi Hotspot. Accelerometer, Proximity Sensor, Light Sensor, G-Sensor are on board too and works efficiently. The Swipe Elite Note is a dual SIM (GSM and GSM) smartphone and Yes, OTG is compatible.

The company has done a great job in this particular department. The phone is powered by a 3000mAh battery which is good enough to deliver up to 14 hours of backup on moderate usage including browsing, making calls and checking emails. 30 minutes of gaming could consume around 10% of the battery which is a pretty decent deal. It took around 2 hours to refill the juice as it doesn’t support fast charging.

Also See: Swipe Elite 2 Entry Level Dual SIM 4G/LTE Smartphone Review

Pros

  • Battery backup is good
  • Build quality is good
  • Good value for money

Cons

  • Heats up with continuous usage
  • Data cable is for charging only
  • Touch responce is laggy

The Verdict

[ps_prices]

Swipe Elite Note has a pinch of premium looks with the sturdy build but is way too heavy. The battery life it offers is good, but performance is just ok and display is conveniently bright and more than what customers could expect with the decent combination in this price segment.

However, the camera remains a point of disappointment for me. Looking at the specifications and features, Swipe Elite Note is all set to face a cut throat competition from the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3, Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus and Coolpad Note 3 Lite.