Nokia 6.1 Plus First Impressions: It’s a Classy Mid-Range Phone

Nokia 6.1 Plus with notch launched in India. Here’s our first impressions of the phone.

Nokia 6.1 Plus launching in India. 

(Photo: The Quint)

Ever since Apple adopted the notch with the iPhone X last year, the Android wagon, after ridiculing the idea, has accepted the trend. HMD Global has been late to the party, but it is finally launching the Nokia 6.1 Plus in India.

Priced at Rs 15,999 this phone will compete against a host of mid-range phones and it is packing a lot for its sticker price. Having said that, Nokia devices, as part of the Android One brigade, come with the promise of regular Android updates, much faster than most other OEMs.

But is that enough for buyers who are spoilt for choice right now? Here’s our first impression of the Nokia 6.1 Plus.

Design

The Nokia 6.1 Plus carries everything that we’ve come to expect from HMD Global. The design and construction of the phone betrays its price tag, and we’ve got no complaints whatsoever in this department from this device. It’s got a notch on the front, at the top of the display, housing the front camera.

The phone is 8.5mm thick and weighs just 151 grams, making it easier to carry and use with a single hand. It gets a 5.8-inch form size, but you’ll probably feel it is much closer to being a 5.5-inch device. This is the benefit that phone makers get by going for a 19:9 ratio screen.

The phone gets a 19:9 ratio display on a 5.8-inch form factor. (Photo: The Quint)

Coming to the back, the Nokia 6.1 Plus gets a glass and metal body treatment, which looks elegant and premium. However, the glossy nature ensures it can catch fingerprint smudges with ease, much to our irritation. Also, we’re not sure about the durability of the panel at the back.

The rear cameras are placed vertically at the center, below which you have the fingerprint scanner. It’s a clean design outlook for the phone, barring its obvious weakness with the glass body in tow.

The combo of glass and metal at the back, but is it durable?(Photo: The Quint)

The chin size at the bottom of the phone has been finely measured, leaving adequate space for the touch buttons to function without any false touches.

Small chin size at the bottom of the screen. (Photo: The Quint)

Display

The Nokia 6.1 Plus gets a 5.8-inch screen with a resolution of 2280x1080 pixels. It gets Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection according to HMD Global with a screen-to-body ratio of 93 percent mooted. We found that the display projects sharp colours, and is high on brightness with decent outdoor visibility.

Nokia 6.1 Plus gets a 5.8-inch screen with FHD+ resolution. (Photo: The Quint)

The 19:9 ratio screen ensures that content streamed via YouTube can be viewed on the screen, covered from all corners. Most devices in this segment have adopted the FHD+ screen panel with this resolution and Nokia 6.1 Plus merely follows the gang, keeping it simple.

The screen is bright, sharp and good with outdoor visibility. (Photo: The Quint)

Hardware

It gets a USB Type C port. (Photo: The Quint)

This is where the Nokia 6.1 Plus looks to offset the impression that entry-level hardware cannot deliver performance. It packs an octa-core Snapdragon 636 processor, with 4GB RAM and 64GB storage, which is further expandable.

The Nokia 6.1 Plus gets 64GB of storage, which is further expandable. (Photo: The Quint)

There’s a single speaker unit at the bottom, 3.5mm audio jack has been retained and you get basic connectivity features like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and USB Type C for charging and data transfers. Owing to its size and dimensions, the Nokia 6.1 Plus comes loaded with a 3060mAh battery, much smaller than its rival devices.

Camera

Dual rear cameras, but can it match the competition?(Photo: The Quint)

The first set of mid-range phones from Nokia didn’t exactly deliver with its imaging prowess. So much has been said about Zeiss Optics, but the results have flattered to deceive.

Even in this case, the Nokia 6.1 Plus gets dual rear cameras with 16 and 5 megapixel sensors but we’re talking about apertures of f/2.0 and f/2.4 on each of them respectively. Compare this to the Xiaomi Mi A2, with dual rear snappers and aperture of f/1.7 (best in the segment), the contrast in quality becomes evident. We’ll further test it out to give you a detailed review.

Screen with a notch that sports the front-facing camera. (Photo: The Quint)

Even on the front you’re getting a 16-megapixel shooter and hopefully it’ll support software-based flash for shooting when the light is low.

What We Think

Nokia 6.1 Plus will compete with Mi A2 and Honor Play. (Photo: The Quint)

The Nokia 6.1 Plus is HMD Global going up against the might of Xiaomi and the emerging Honor. For its price tag, the phone caters to basic needs, with stock Android experience and cameras that’ll just about meet your regular social media requirements.