In this day and age, a lot of people look for a phone that can seemingly last forever. The Cherry Mobile Zoom meets this demand with a fast-charging 4,000 mAh battery.
Upon unboxing the Cherry Mobile Zoom, you will get:
– Cherry Mobile Zoom (1 pc)
– USB Charging Cable
– Fast-Charging Charger
– Earphones
– Zoom User Manual
Cherry Mobile Zoom Review – Design
Side note: I personally liked the packaging of the Cherry Mobile Zoom. The box clearly advertised the 4,000 mAh battery (its biggest feature), and the box itself was compact and easy to open. Packaging departments should take note of this, as sometimes phones can come in unnecessarily large boxes (it’s a waste of space and materials!)
Good metallic finish. The variant of the Zoom we reviewed came in a nice, lustrous silver. The shine on the back impressed me a little, since it rode the fine line between ‘flat’ and ‘too shiny’. It feels nice on the hands, too! The texture on the Zoom’s body is ever-so-slightly rough, making sure it doesn’t just slip off of your hands, but at the same time, not so rough that it feels uncomfortable.
Unnecessary bottom bezel. While the setup for the Cherry Mobile Zoom remains standard, the bezels are a bit questionable. To give context, the Zoom has its rear camera and flash on the top left corner of the back, while the speakers lay on the center bottom. Meanwhile, the front camera is on the top bezel, while the lock button is on the right, and the volume buttons are on the left. The bottom bezel, however, has nothing on it, as the three bottom icons commonly found on most smartphones are instead on the screen itself.
This means that the bottom bezel could have been reduced even further. Admittedly, it seems to be a waste of space if the bezel was used for nothing important.
Cherry Mobile Zoom Review – UI, Performance and Battery Life
Decent specs and overall performance. The Zoom clocks in at 1.0 GHz (Quadcore), with 3GB RAM, running on Android 5.1 Lollipop. The performance would probably satisfy casual phone users, as I didn’t feel any kind of input or scroll lag as I went through the phone’s apps and features. In terms of graphical performance, it played Dead Trigger 2, but from my experience, I could feel a bit of lag when there was a lot of action going on during gameplay. I would definitely recommend that prospective buyers stick to slower, more casual games if you’re looking to squeeze some fun out of the Zoom.
Cherry Mobile Zoom Sample Photos:
100% cropped
Good battery life. Cherry Mobile chose correctly in marketing the Zoom as a long-lasting phone. The 4,000 mAh battery took less than two hours to get to a full charge (from empty), and lasted more than 12 hours with the Wi-Fi on, before it shut down.
Cherry Mobile Zoom Review – Conclusion
People who want a phone that they can rely on as they go through their day should take a serious look at the Cherry Mobile Zoom. The cameras aren’t too shabby either, with a solid 13MP rear camera and 8MP front cam. Sure, it’s not a selfie game-changer like certain other brands, but that’s not what the Zoom is about. To be specific, the pictures taken with the main camera of the Zoom look great. In particular, the main camera’s ability to do decent color reproduction while offering good detail surprised me, as this is considered a budget phone. Most budget phones these days usually make their cameras an afterthought, but not the Zoom.
At the end of the day, the Cherry Mobile Zoom strikes me as a phone that’s built for utility. You’ll get a lot of usage time with the 4,000 mAh battery, and it can pretty much handle your basic smartphone needs like internet, calls, messaging, and photos. While it certainly sits comfortably in the ‘midrange’ category, for the price (PHP 4,999 SRP), it’s a good deal overall.
Cherry Mobile Zoom Specs
OS | Android 5.1 Lollipop |
Processor | MediaTek MT6753 1.3GHz Octa Core Cortex-A53 |
GPU | Mali-T720 MP2 |
Memory | 3GB RAM |
Display | 5.0-Inch HD IPS Display (720 x 1280 Pixels, 294 ppi) |
Storage | 16GB, expandable via microSD |
Camera | Rear: 13MP Front: 8MP |
SIM | Dual Micro SIM |
Battery | 4,000 mAh |
Others | 4G LTE, 3G HSPA+, 2G EDGE and GPRS Networks, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0 |