So I have been using the POCO F3 since April last year, which is entering 9 months now, and since we are already in the year 2022, the question that I always get asked is – if the POCO F3 is still WORTH IT in 2022?
So yes, in this video I will be giving you a long term review about the POCO F3 – about what I like, what I don’t like, and also answer some of the complaints and issues that you have written in the comments section during my previous 1-month review of the POCO F3.
Now before I begin, just to let y’all know that this review is based on the latest update of MIUI 12.5.7 as of making this review, where the variant that I have is the 8GB RAM and the 256GB storage version, and let’s first talk about the overall usage using this phone daily from a build quality and hardware’s perspective.
.
Hardware
So ever since the little scratch that I talked about during my 1 month review, I am happy to know that I didn’t have any other scuffs and scratches during my further usage of the phone.
I do still think that apart from the Xiaomi 11 Lite 5G NE, this has to be one of my favorite, thin and light form factor smartphones that I have ever used, period.
While the phone comes with other colors like their latest Moonlight Silver, Night Black and Deep Ocean Blue, this Arctic White color is still my favorite out of the others. Yes I am a huge fan of white if you know me well enough in this channel but I am quite confident that you would also appreciate this matte pearl white finish, which doesn’t attract any fingerprints.
Speaking of colors, there is a comment that came from a person named @Cuerex who mentioned that the sides of the device lost color due to pulling the device in and out of the pocket only, which I didn’t have any issues with. Sorry bro, not sure what your pocket is made of my friend.
In terms of how the physical buttons are, both the volume rockers and the power button that is also a fingerprint sensor still works quickly ever since the first time I unboxed this phone and it still feels pretty nice and clicky after my 9 months of use as well.
There was a comment coming from @ANRUYL Titung, who mentioned that he has had lots of scratches on the screen because of his fingernails and then there was another follow-up comment from @PHONE GAMERZ, who asked if his fingernails were knives……Haha be nice @PHONE GAMERZ, but to answer his issue, I wouldn’t rely on the stock screen protector and even I removed them after the 3rd month and I have been using the phone without any screen protector and I didn’t see any scratches up until now!
And also something I would love to add is that I really felt that the Haptic Feedback Engine is definitely one of the best in Android phones within this range.
.
Display
So now, let’s dive in straight to once again of the BIGGEST complaints or concerns about the phone – the phone’s display, which was also a complaint that I got even during the 1-month review video as well.
So, let’s revisit the whole screen dimming issue, previously I had situations close to about 3 times when I was taking lots of videos and pictures for a really long time during a super hot day and the screen did become dim and I personally think that is totally fine and totally understood because it is a safety precaution to ensure that the phone doesn’t overheat.
This brings to the fact that when I reviewed both the Xiaomi 11 Ultra and the OnePlus 9 where both phones overheated, it was SERIOUSLY hot to the touch with its Snapdragon 888 chipset.
What’s nice to know is that the POCO F3 has been receiving updates over updates pretty frequently since the past 9 months of use and this whole screen dimming thing seems like it is a thing of the past as I don’t have any such issues as of late.
There was a comment coming from @YouTube Psychiatrist, love your username man, who mentions if the screen is saturated enough even though it’s an AMOLED screen.
Now I totally understand why he would ask that because a lot of people do not know and I have mentioned it before that not all AMOLED screens are created equal. And yes, I have seen some not-so-nice-looking AMOLED screens BUT the screen on this POCO F3 is nicely saturated and it’s really bright, with a high peak brightness of 1300 nits and the screen is as vibrant from 9 months ago, until now.
Then speaking of AMOLED, @Sebash asks if there is an Always-On Display mode and how does it look, and yes, there is and there are plenty of themes and designs to choose from and you can get all your notifications over there as well.
Another common comment like from @Nhiv Fam was about if there were AMOLED burns on the screen, which I have yet to come across ANY smartphone which has such issues, TV’s yes, but never on a smartphone as of I know and the other common comment like from Domingo Gonzalez was about a green tint issue, which is something that I didn’t have at all too.
And no, there are no tint issues on a gray background as well, as asked by Drew C.
Next, as for video playback on Netflix, there was a comment from @TDC, who mentions that it has Widevine L3 and I am not sure why you have Widevine L3 when it has always been Widevine L1 and yes @Satya Kishan you can watch Amazon Prime video on HD playback.
So yes, overall, I really loved the POCO F3’s screen, from the overall screen quality to using it every day especially with the 120-hertz refresh rate on the phone.
.
Cameras
Next, as for the camera’s performance, if you have been watching all of my comparison videos, you would know that the cameras on the POCO F3 are really good and hold up way better than other smartphones within this price range.
While many came close to beating the POCO F3 on the rear photos, many didn’t come close to how great the skin tones and dynamic range for the front video footage and even front regular portrait selfie images as well.
And during my last comparison video with the POCO F3 against the Realme GT NEO2, one particular individual, which I don’t plan to mention the name, accused me of not wiping the lens properly before taking the photos, really dude? Who would wanna take bad photos on the phone and “sabotage” the phone? Hmm, probably a sad fanboy, anyways, as mentioned the cameras on the phone were great.
And do check more sample photos and videos if you guys haven’t seen my previous video of the phone, which I will put the entire playlist of all my POCO F3-related videos down below.
My video playlist of POCO F3:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLn02abmm5Ra5HodoKS3FL-PMh_O1KxvQ5
.
Daily Usage
Let’s talk about using the phone from day-to-day usage and how it is with the current MIUI update.
Another very common question that people have asked me similar to @Johny Hyperborean in the comments section is can they get the 6GB version compared to the 8GB version to save a little bit of cash, well, while a typical answer would be is that “oh, if you don’t game a lot or multitask a lot then you are fine” I am going to say that to just go with the 8GB variant just for the sake of future-proofing the phone because who knows some future app updates that you use might require more memory to run compared to now and all of my reviews and comparison videos were based on me using this 8GB RAM variant and I have no issues at all.
Then @Walid Shahriar asks if there are any issues related to Dark Mode, which I get where he is coming from with this because some apps like Messenger, YouTube Studio, and even Shopee didn’t have proper Dark Mode integration, and now it all integrated very well within the Dark Mode.
Then another common issue is with the Proximity Sensor where according to both @Faraz Hassan and @xOuls, there were issues during phone calls including Whatsapp voice messages where the display turns off by itself and that is something that I don’t have any problems with. And I don’t have issues with the Proximity Sensor during phone calls too, @Andy Chau.
There are also many complaints about the Wi-Fi too, where @Bread Man mentions having issues reconnecting to a Wi-Fi source after disconnecting and I don’t have any such issues.
Then @Pochi Hirosam mentioned how sustaining connection when used as a Wi-Fi hotspot is a problem and I believe this is a common problem for some flagship smartphones too. Based on my test, it was fine about 90% of the time but yes there were very few times when the connection did get disconnected.
Then @Pijesz asks about how the GPS signal was totally fine on Google Maps and Waze, so no issues over here, and the call quality performance was also great too.
Then there is a very interesting comment, which I didn’t understand, but allow me to try to answer it, as it is from @MIN zuan where he comments “Adam, my phone kinda yellowish la, already try chrome://flags but doesn’t work. do u have any idea?”….Err….demam kuning kot (Yellow Fever)? Haha, what do you mean bro? The screen is yellow or the phone became yellow??
.
Battery
In terms of the phone’s battery, with the latest update, I have had WAY better battery life on this 4520 milliamps smartphone.
From the beginning, I was initially getting about 5 hours plus, but as of late, I have been getting a pretty consistent battery life close to 7 hours, so kudos to Xiaomi, or in this case POCO for doing such an excellent job in the overall battery life with the software updates.
.
Gaming
So since the first day of using the POCO F3 for gaming, there were nothing but just positive things to say about the phone and with the latest OS update, I have decided to revisit the whole gaming experience on Genshin Impact and on PUBG Mobile as well.
Genshin Impact
For the settings on Genshin Impact, the best settings that I felt to get the nicest experience was at medium settings, 60 fps and with motion blur turned off.
I mean, if you wanna push it more it’s up to you because there were some who commented about how they felt it was the “right” setting and mine was not, so yea, you do you, OK?
So based on the settings mentioned the game ran smooth, with no micro lag or stutter issues, and even with the medium graphics, due to the great screen quality I felt that both the texture and the colors of the game was really nice.
The controls during gameplay were as responsive as always, there was the VERY rare occasional ghost touch, not sure if it’s a bug, but it did happen about twice so I thought it would be worth mentioning.
Similar to before, the phone was getting a bit warmer about 20 minutes into the game, but never too hot to the touch and there was no hand strain at all even playing games up to an hour or so..
PUBG Mobile
Then as for PUBG Mobile, the settings were Ultra HD for the graphics and Ultra for the Frame Rate.
And yes, the gameplay was still amazing because of the phone’s screen, touch responsiveness was really nice and the phone became warm after about 30 minutes of gameplay, but once again not hot to the touch and gaming on the phone even up to 1 and half hours was still very comfortable in the hands.
.
Conclusion
So before we go into the conclusion of this review, allow me to tell you what I did not like about the phone. Yes, this might be a little nitpicking but heck there is no such thing as a perfect smartphone right?
Firstly, call me old school but considering its price and the smartphone tier range, it would have been nice if it had a headphones jack because I personally think that if you really want to enjoy all the Hi-Res audio that POCO has been raving about, the best would still be through a wired headphone option rather than wireless.
And the second thing is that it would be extra sweet to have SD Card expansion since I take lots of videos on the phone and have lots of offline video downloads, where currently my workaround is to plug in an OTG when I am out of space so yea, that’s how I do it. It is still possible to live with it and I’m sure that many people may not need as much storage as I do, but it would be nice if I could just leave a Micro SD card in there.
Then from a software perspective, it would be nice if the 120Hz refresh rate is adaptive in order to have even more battery life than it is right now, and I am absolutely frustrated on how Xiaomi or POCO is totally tight-lipped about if there is going to be a future Android upgrade on the phone and THAT could be a deal-breaker if you want consistent future Android OS updates.
So now, as @Aiman Adlan and many of y’all would ask me if it’s still worth buying right now as of February 2022? I would say a huge YES!
I mean yes there is the possibility of the POCO F4 that might be coming in a few months time, who knows, but with the current price of only RM1699 (as of this review) for the 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, I STILL don’t think you can find a better value for what the phone offers.
Get the POCO F3 at the links below:-
https://invol.co/cl8gh4h (Lazada)
https://invol.co/cl92k7m (Shopee)
But who cares about what I think, what is important is what YOU think! Would you guys get the POCO F3 right now in 2022?
Need more info or photo/video samples of POCO F3? Check out my POCO F3 playlist:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLn02abmm5Ra5HodoKS3FL-PMh_O1KxvQ5
