vivo launched its V40e smartphone in India last month, as the successor to V30e which was launched a few months back. This retains the curved AMOLED screen with a 50MP eye AF camera inside the punch-hole, and a 5500mAh battery, but replaces the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 SoC with Dimensity 7300 SoC. Is this the worthy upgrade to the V30e? Let use dive into the review to find out.
| Box Contents |
| Camera |
| Battery Life |
| Conclusion |
Box Contents
- vivo V40e 8GB + 256GB version in Mint Green colour
- Clear Silicon case
- USB Type-C Cable
- 80W FlashCharge wall adapter
- SIM ejector tool
- Quick start guide and Warranty information
Display, Hardware and Design
The vivo V40e sports a 6.77-inch (2392 x 1080 pixels) FHD+ 20:9 aspect ratio, 393 PPI curved AMOLED display and 120Hz refresh rate. The display is bright even outdoors under sunlight, up to 4500 nits peak brightness, compared to 2800 nits in the predecessor. The colour output good as well since it has 1.07 billion colors.
You can select from standard (default), professional and bright screen colour modes. You can select smart switch that can switch between 60 Hz/90 Hz/120 Hz, 30 Hz or force it to 60Hz or 120Hz. It has 300Hz touch sampling rate and 1000Hz instant touch sampling rate. The phone has up to 2160Hz High-frequency PWM dimming. Visual enhancement optimizes the color and contrast in apps like YouTube, Netflix and Prime Video for more vivid display effects. It has Schott Xensation α glass on the front for protection.
It also has HDR 10+ support, which works for YouTube and Netflix. The phone doesn’t have a notification LED, but this has an always-on-display that shows contextual info and notifications all day or as per schedule.
The phone has a 50MP front camera inside the punch-hole. There is an earpiece on the top edge which works as a secondary speaker. There is a small chin below the screen. It has an in-display optical fingerprint scanner. The haptic feedback is decent.
Coming to the button placements and ports, the phone has a power button and volume rockers on the right. The bottom part is crammed with a dual SIM slot, primary microphone, USB Type-C port and a speaker grill. The secondary microphone is present on the top. The phone is just 7.49mm thick, making it thinner than the 7.75mm V30e.
The Mint Green colour that we have is inspired by the nature. Since it has a glossy glass back, it attracts fingerprints, but it didn’t feel slippery.
The phone also comes in Royal Bronze colour that has a warm metallic huge. It has IP64 ratings for dust and splash resistance, compared to IP68 ratings in the V40.
Camera
- 50MP camera with Sony IMX882 sensor, OIS, f/1.79 aperture
- 8MP ultra-wide camera with f/2.2 aperture
- 50MP eye auto focus front camera with Samsung JN1 sensor, f/2.0 aperture
Unlike the V40, the V40e has both the normal flash and the Aura Light, which is brighter than the previous generation.
The camera UI is the same as other phones running Funtouch OS. It includes several features such as AR stickers, Pro mode, long exposure, 50MP mode, supermoon, and more. Even though the phone has a 50MP rear camera, the final output is 12.5MP in size after pixel binning.
Coming to the camera quality, the daylight shots are good, and it is recommended to enable HDR option which automatically switches on HDR according to the shot, so that the dynamic range is good. The camera can focus quickly.
The 8MP ultra-wide camera is decent. Even though this doesn’t have a dedicated portrait camera, it does a decent job when it comes to edge detection.
Low light shots are decent, and the OIS helps as well to stabilize the images. The night mode automatically enables ultra dark mode if there is very less light, and that makes it better, but it takes a few seconds to process. There is also supermoon mode, which is a good addition, but you can’t compare it to flagships.
The 50MP AF front camera is also good in daylight. The portrait shots from the front camera were also good with a good edge detection, even though it uses software. There is screen flash for low light shots, which the company calls aura screen light.
Check out some camera samples below
It can record videos at 4k resolution at up to 30 fps from the front and rear cameras. It has standard and ultra stabilization, but the resolution is down to 1080p in standard and ultra options since it crops the content. OIS does a good job in stabilization.
Software, UI and Apps
Coming to the software, the phone runs on Android 14 with Funtouch OS 14 on top. It runs Android security patch for June 2024. The phone will get 3 Android OS updates and 4 years of security updates.
Funtouch OS 14 brings Smooth Experience, Visual Smoothness, Enhanced Multitasking, improved Personalization, including custom Kinetic wallpapers, custom lock screen clock style with three layout styles and eight font styles. vivo has already confirmed that Funtouch OS 15 beta will be available for the phone in December 2024.
There is a new AI eraser feature that we had seen in other phones. Out of 8GB of LPDDR4X RAM, about 7.48GB is usable, out of which 3GB is free when the default apps are running in the background. There is additional 8GB RAM expansion feature. Out of 256GB of UFS 2.2 storage, 223GB is free out of the box.
Apart from the usual set of utility and Google apps, it comes preloaded with a lot of apps such as Facebook, Amazon, LinkedIn, PhonePe, Netflix and Snapchat. These apps can be uninstalled, but they come back after reset.
Fingerprint sensor and Face unlock
The phone has an optical in-display fingerprint sensor which immediately unlocks the phone just by keeping your finger on the sensor. You can add up to 5 fingerprints. There are different animation styles that display when you unlock, which you can disable. The phone also has face unlock that can unlock the phone in seconds, but it is not as secure as fingerprint.
Music and Multimedia
The default Music Player also has equalizer and DeepField sound effects. It doesn’t have FM Radio support. There is audio super resolution, and super audio features. Audio through the stereo speakers and through the headphones are good.
This has Widevine L1 so that you can play HD content on Amazon Prime Video, Netflix and other streaming apps. It also supports HDR playback on Netflix and YouTube.
Dual SIM and Connectivity
It has the usual set of connectivity features such as 5G with support for n1/n3/n5/n8/n28B/n40/n77/n78 bands. Jio and Airtel 5G work out of the box. It also has dual 4G VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 ac (2.4 + 5GHz), Bluetooth 5.4, GPS + GLONASS, but doesn’t have NFC support. It also has USB OTG support. The phone also has carrier aggregation. We did not face any call drops and the earpiece volume is good, even though it is present on the top edge.
The vivo V40e’s body SAR is 0.842 W/Kg and head SAR is at 0.879 /Kg which is well under the limit in India which is 1.6 W/kg (over 1 g).
Performance and Benchmarks
This is powered by MediaTek Dimensity 7300 4nm SoC that packs 4X Arm Cortex-A78 cores at up to 2.5GHz paired with 4X Arm Cortex-A55 cores. There is MediaTek NPU 655.
It has Arm Mali-G615 GPU and MediaTek HyperEngine for gaming. It can handle graphic-intensive games like COD, BGMI and Genshin Impact, but not in max graphics.
In 3D Mark wild life stress test, it scored 98% which is good, and the temperature shot up from 33 to 39 degrees. That said, check out some synthetic benchmark scores below.
As you can see in the benchmarks, the V40e powered by the Dimensity 7300 chip is average compared to phones with Snapdragon 7 Gen 3 that are available at a cheaper rate, if you need a phone for the performance.
Battery life
Coming to the battery life, the phone packs a 5500mAh (typical) battery, same as the V30e. It can easily last for a day with heavy use and for more than a day with typical use with 5G enabled and multimedia, thanks to the optimization. I got 6 hours of screen on time, with close to 2 days of mixed Wi-Fi and 5G use.
Since the phone has support for 80W fast charging, it can charge up to 50% in about half an hour, and 100% takes less than an hour. The company says that it can retain 80% battery health even after 1600 charge-discharge cycles with the smart charging algorithm.
Conclusion
At a starting price of Rs. 28,999, the vivo V40e excels in camera, display and battery, but it is a minor upgrade compared to the V30e. The performance has improved compared to V30e, but is not the best compared to other phones in the price range.
Pricing and availability
The vivo V40e is priced at Rs. 28,999 for the 8GB + 128GB model and the 8GB + 256GB model costs Rs. 30,999. It is available from Flipkart, vivo India online store, and offline stores.
Alternatives
The HONOR 200 is a good alternative in the price range, and it has a telephoto camera, and a faster SoC. There is POCO F6, and realme GT 6T for performance.
Pros
- 120Hz curved AMOLED HDR display is good
- Good cameras
- Sleek design
- Good battery life, 80W fast charging
Cons
- Average performance for the price
- A lot of preloaded apps