The Lenovo ZUK Z1 was recently launched in China for the Chinese market, and now the ZUK Z1 global version is also available. This handset is using Snapdragon 801 quad core processor and its running Cyanogen OS 12.1 out of the box. This phone was launched in India today for Rs. 13,499.
ZUK Z1 Unboxing
Inside the box you will find the Z1, data cable (USB Type C), travel charger (5V ~ 2A), user guide and warranty card.
Design and Display
The Lenovo owned ZUK Z1 is using aircraft grade metal frame – made of Aluminum. Build quality and finishing is really good, handset gives a premium look and feel. The Aluminum sides are silver coloured with matte finishing and the top plus bottom borders have got shinny silver finishing that enhances the overall look. Weight with battery is 170 grams and dimensions are 77.08 x slightly over 154 x 8.97 (mm).
SIM tray is on the left, power button and volume rocker is on the right, audio jack is on the top side and at the bottom you will find the primary mic, USB Type C 3.0 port and speaker out vent.
On a micro USB port you need to inset the cable in a proper way, but on the USB Type C port, you can insert the pin anyway you want.
This is a dual SIM handset, there are two nano SIM slots and both support 4G LTE.
Z1 sports a 5.5 inch screen with 1920 x 1080 pixels resolution. Colour reproduction, viewing angles and touch response are very good. In display settings there is the LiveDisplay option that is a really awesome feature. Now LiveDisplay is different, it does not adjust the brightness instead it will adjust the colour temperature based on the surrounding lighting conditions – this means no matter what the lighting conditions may be the screen will adjust and make it easy of your eye.
There is LED notification and you can change the colour. Native video calling is not supported. There are dual Mics for noise cancellation. Z1 is packed with accelerometer, proximity, gyro, light, magnetic and hall sensors.
Memory, Storage and OS
This handset comes with 3GB RAM and 64GB of internal storage space. There is no micro SD card slot. On the first boot you will get about 1.7GB free RAM and about 54GB free internal storage space.
I was not able to check if OTG worked or not cause this handset is using USB Type C port and as of now I don’t have a Type C to micro USB / USB connector.
ZUK Z1 is running Cyanogen OS 12.1 that is based on Android Lollipop 5.1.1.
Performance
As mentioned the Lenovo ZUK Z1 is powered by outdated but well known / powerful qualcomm snapdragon 801 MSM8974PRO AC quad core processor clocked at 2.5GHz coupled with Adreno 330 GPU. Performance is very smooth and lag free. Handset heats up with heavy usage but temp was under 43 degrees during the whole period I tested.
Benchmark
| Benchmark App | Score |
| Quadrant | 22833 |
| Antutu (32 bit) | 1st – 45163, 2nd – 44560 |
| Antutu (32 bit) 6.1.4 | 58843 and 3D score 4792 |
| Nenamark 2 | 59.2fps |
| Multi touch | 5 point |
Gaming
I played Asphalt 8 in high visual quality mode and it played really well, no lags, very smooth. You can check the gaming action in the video review.
Camera
There is 13MP AF camera with dual LED flash on the rear and an 8MP camera on the front. Rear camera can shoot Full HD videos. Camera quality is excellent; do check the sample images and videos at the end of this review. This handset can also shoot slow motion videos at 60fps. The hardware can play 4K videos.
Others
Truecaller comes integrated with the phone dialler app. Sound output is very loud. No issues found with 4G, 3G, WiFi, GPS and Bluetooth.
Band supported :
TDD-LTE 38/39/40/41
FDD-LTE 1/3/7
TF-SCDMA 34/39
WCDMA 85/900/1900/2100 MHz
GSM/EDGE 850/900/1900 MHz
VolTE is not supported for now.
There is touch ID based finger print scanner (the menu button). The finger print detection is accurate and processing speed is very good. You can also unlock the phone by pressing the home button with the registered finger print, it takes just about 1 second / less than 1 second to switch on and unlock.
Battery
This handset comes with 4100 mAh non-removable battery that also does a pretty impressive job. I am using this as my primary phone and been getting over 2 days of mixed usage. For heavy users the handset will easily give 1 day of battery backup. You can expect 5 to 6 hours of continuous moderate to heavy usage.
| Performance | Time | Battery drop % | Battery Max Temp |
| Benchmark | 12 Minutes | 3% | 38 degree |
| Gaming (Asphalt 8) | 18 Minutes | 5% | 41 degree |
| 4K movie play with full brightness + Wi-Fi on | 24 minutes | 8% | 41 degree |
| Wall Charge (on standby) | 1 hours 44 minutes | 19% to 100% (wall charge) | 36 degree |
Verdict
Though the handset is using outdated hardware, the combination of USB Type C, finger print scanner, 4100 mAh battery and the price makes this a very good buy.
Rating 4 out of 5.
Lenovo ZUK Z1 price in India is Rs. 13,499 will go on sale on Amazon on 19th may 2016.