vivo V25 Pro Review Philippines: Quite a Flagship

Review Verdict: The vivo V25 Pro is the most premium V-series phone that has become official in the Philippines. It has features that make us think that it is more of an X-series phone, making it an upscale mid-range phone that can easily pass for a flagship device.

Pros

Great and consistent main and selfie camera performance
Flagship-grade curved display
Excellent battery life

Cons

Only a single speaker
Could have used a better ultra-wide-angle camera

vivo V25 Pro Review Philippines specs

Dimensity 1300 Processor
12GB RAM
256GB Internal Storage
6.56-inch Full HD+ Curved AMOLED display, 120hz refresh rate
64-megapixel F/1.9 main camera with OIS, 8-megapixel f/2.2 ultra-wide-angle camera, 2-megapixel f/2.4 macro camera
32-megapixel f/2.0 selfie camera with Eye AF
4G, LTE, 5G
Wifi, Bluetooth 5.1
In-display fingerprint scanner, Hi-Res Audio
4830 mAh
66W wired charging
Android 12, FunTouchOS 12

The V25 Pro marks a big upgrade over the usual Pro models from the V-series in the past. Aside from the usual upgrades with the processors, the V25 Pro could pass as a flagship with its curved display and inclusion of OIS on the main camera. Is the V25 Pro more than just for taking great selfies?

Design

The V25 Pro’s design is similar to the V25e except that it feels slimmer because of the curved edges of both the display and back panel. While the glossy frame looks and feels premium, it’s actually made of plastic. We’d usually complain about the use of plastic instead of metal on a Php 30k phone, but we give vivo some slack since they put in effort in equipping the V25 Pro with a flagship-grade curved AMOLED display–more on that later.

The rear camera module is also similar to the V25e save for the macro camera being relocated right below the two main cameras. The V25 Pro retains the same, unique color-changing glass back panel that we first saw on the V23, and we’re glad that you’re getting a matte finish with it. Compared to glossy finishes, a matte finish makes it more resistant to smudges and more resilient to wear and tear, making it also comfortable to use even without a case.

The button and port layout of the V25 Pro is the same as the V23, so you still don’t get a headphone jack with it. Fortunately, vivo does include a USB-C dongle to let you enjoy your favorite wired cans. Since we’d compare the V25 Pro to an X-series model, we definitely noticed the “professional photography” branding on top–even if the V25 Pro does not have Zeiss involved with it.

Display

We normally see brands put curved displays on flagship phones before, and it seems that the new trend is that even mid-range phones get curved displays as well. It’s an interesting trend we’re seeing nowadays, and the V25 Pro is part of that. As the first V-series phone to have a curved display, vivo equipped the V25 Pro with a flagship-like curved AMOLED panel that has a Full HD+ resolution, an in-display fingerprint scanner, and a 120hz refresh rate.

With all the praise we have for the V25 Pro’s display, we’re dismayed that it only comes with a single speaker. With a number of phones already offering stereo speakers (including entry-level models), we wished that vivo added stereo speakers to the V25 Pro if it was serious in making it a flagship-like device.

Cameras

vivo has been using the same camera setup since the V20, which consists of a 64-megapixel main camera, 8-megapixel ultra-wide-angle, and 2-megapixel macro. The V25 Pro still uses the same setup, but finally adds OIS to the main camera. We’re fine with the V25 Pro still using the same 64-megapixel sensor for the past 4 iterations, but we wished vivo placed in extra effort by upgrading the ultra-wide-angle camera.

The 8-megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera has been used by various brands for several years already, and we think that they should opt for newer and higher-resolution sensors instead.

That aside, the OIS on the main camera does a great job in improving the V25 Pro’s camera performance, especially in low light. Despite using the same main camera sensor, the nice thing about the V25 Pro is it has great color balance and exposure management–even without Zeiss.

Compared to other phone brands, vivo has been doing an excellent job when it comes to imaging performance–especially with its efforts in ensuring that all of the post-processing does not oversaturate images. The same can be said with its selfie camera, as vivo has nailed the formula for taking great selfies in both the software and hardware department.

Another notable upgrade with the V25 Pro is that it can shoot 4K video at 60FPS, which is another first for the V-series. This added support can be credited to the Dimensity 1300’s more capable ISP.

Internals and Battery Life

The V25 Pro gets specced out when it comes to the internals. For the one that’s available in the Philippines, we are getting a Dimensity 1300 processor that’s paired with 12GB RAM and 256GB storage. While the RAM and storage configuration is old news, the processor upgrade is significant compared to the Dimensity 920 used on the V23.

To recall, the Dimensity 1300 is based on the Dimensity 1200 but has higher-clocked CPU and GPU cores. With the Dimensity 1200 already at par with the likes of the Snapdragon 870, the same can be said for the Dimensity 1300: it may be a previous-generation flagship processor (that’s succeeded by the Dimensity 9000), but it does pack a punch when it comes to gaming.

Looking through the results we got from Gamebench, the V25 Pro did quite well in our usual suite of games at the highest possible graphics settings. The performance we got in Genshin Impact was lower than usual, and this is partly due to how FunTouchOS prioritizes battery life over performance. Otherwise, the V25 Pro does fine as far as gaming is concerned.

The V25 Pro comes with a 4830mAh battery, which is a smidge below the usual 5000mAh batteries we normally see on Android phones nowadays. What’s impressive with the V25 Pro is its endurance: with PCMark’s battery benchmark test, we were able to eke out 19 hours and 19 minutes of battery life, which exceeds the figure we normally get on an upper mid-range phone that has a battery capacity of less than 5000mAh.

We can credit the V25 Pro’s battery life to how FunTouchOS prioritizes power management, and how power-efficient is the Dimensity 1300–for the latter, we got a similar battery life figure on another phone that uses the same processor.

Wrap up and Conclusions

The vivo V25 Pro blurs the line between the mid-range V-series and the premium X-series in the Philippines, as it is a top-end V25 variant that has features you’d normally expect on vivo’s X-series phones. It’s the most premium V-series offering we’ve seen so far, and it’s quite deserving of its asking price.