Top 10 Must-Have Features of the Best Smartphone

"Cheap smartphones are getting good, and good smartphones are getting cheap." 

- Marques Brownlee

With most flagships soaring in price and bordering the smartphone 1000$ mark, it is easy to overlook the smartphone under 10000 that gives you bang for your bucks! Most of the new, exciting and best flagship smartphones have trickled down to the more affordable phones. These phones deliver flagship-like performance and premium quality and feel at a comparatively low price. Features like 5G, High Refresh Rate, Amoled Screens and much more are imperative in any smartphone in 2021. Here is a list of the must-have features of a smartphone.

5G, 5G, 5G, .....5G!

5G is the fifth generation of mobile internet speeds. It can show unfathomable speeds of about 50Mbps to over 1Gbps on the mmWave band when it works. These incredible speeds make possible a host of different things like cloud gaming, VR conferencing and many more next-generation experiences. This speed will also influence IoT and other connected devices that will utilise it to provide better connections, real-time syncing and more. Although all the best smartphone in India have 5G, we as a country do not have the infrastructure to utilize it to the fullest. 

High Refresh Rate TPO Display

LTPO is a technology that enables variable refresh rate in an OLED display on smartphones and handheld devices. This allows high refresh rates like 90 Hz, 120Hz and 144Hz displays. These numbers mean that the display is refreshing at 90, 120, or 144 times a second, making the viewing experience much smoother. High refresh rate displays make the general user experience much more enjoyable and are especially useful while gaming. Games like Fortnite and Call of Duty utilise this feature and many more are updating their applications and games. 

Great Battery Solution

Both the features mentioned above are resource heavy and battery hogs! To make the best of your experience and still provide enough juice to run all day is a problem, all major manufacturers are working on. A comprehensive battery solution is imperative for any good smartphone to be a daily driver. Fast Charging, a good standby time, resource allocation, and smart battery saving are just a few ways manufacturers try to keep your phone's battery in check and make sure you don't run behind a charger every time. 

Software Update Promises

If you buy any phone these days, you will keep it three years on overage! Most relevant manufacturers promise and deliver on the promise of software updates for 2-3 years and security updates for much longer. Software updates enable your older device to get the latest features and cosmetic updates that an operating system receives once a year. The security updates are monthly patches and bug fixes shielding you from hacking and other attacks. Receiving these at regular intervals increases the lifespan of your device.

How many cameras are enough cameras?

Smartphones have started shipping with three, four, even five, six cameras on them. If you’re looking for the best camera smartphone, make sure that they range from wide, ultrawide, telephotos, another telephoto, macro lenses and even sensors such as LIDARs or laser autofocus. Most smartphone hardware is similar at least when it comes to camera systems, what makes the difference is how these smartphones interpret the images that form on the sensors. Both Google and Apple have very sophisticated image signal processing, and it comes down to which interpretation you prefer more! All android phones can download the image signal processor of Google and see an immediate improvement in image quality. Even the best budget smartphone in 2021 has an array of cameras!

Performance

We are at a point in mobile computing that any of the latest chipsets can perform even the heaviest tasks. The difference arises in sustained performances where some chips throttle their speed to counteract the heat being produced. Snapdragon chips and Apple's A-series chips handle thermals pretty well and have no problem in sustained performance. Obviously, a 888 series chip will perform better than a 700 series chip, but both will be able to do the task at hand. Some performance phones have taken it a step further with liquid metal cooling to keep the chip from throttling by managing the thermals.