We’ve seen a lot of entry-level phones claiming to be made for gaming, but not a lot of them come close to the nubia Neo 2 5G.

This latest from Nubia sports a lot of characteristics of an actual gaming smartphone, for a price of only less than Php10,000. Today, we’ll test out if it’s worthy of having that coveted ‘gaming’ title. Here’s our nubia Neo 2 review.

nubia Neo 2 5G Specs

  • Android 13
  • Dual SIM, Dual standby
  • 6.72-inch FHD+ IPS display, 2400 x 1080 pixel resolution, ~391ppi
  • 120Hz adaptive refresh rate
  • 2.7GHz UNISOC T820 octa-core processor
  • 8GB RAM
  • Mali-G57 GPU
  • 256GB UFS 3.1 internal storage
  • 16-megapixel front camera
  • 50-megapixel (f/1.8) + 2-megapixel (depth sensor) rear cameras, LED flash
  • Stereo speakers, DTS:X Ultra
  • Dual shoulder triggers
  • Side-mounted fingerprint scanner, Face unlock
  • HSPA+, 4G LTE, 5G
  • WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, dual-band
  • Bluetooth 5.2
  • GPS
  • USB-C
  • Dimensions: 166 x 76.1 x 8.5mm
  • Weight: 208g
  • Colors: Sunfire Yellow, Storm Gray, Frost Silver
  • 6,000mAh non-removable battery, 33W wired charging

Design and Build Quality

The first nubia Neo had an aggressive mecha design, which they carried over to its successor, only cleaner and stripped off of unnecessary accents.

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It’s still as aggressive looking as its predecessor, no question about that. There’s the “Hero eye” design, which makes the whole rear panel look like a half-face of an actual mecha.

The design already puts this entry-level device on the same level as the higher end gaming device in the market. If you want a subtle, elegant-looking smartphone, this is definitely not it. But if you want something that looks stylish and matches your passion for mobile gaming without breaking the bank, this is it.

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Apart from the design, the rear panel uses a glass-like surface, which is very prone to fingerprint marks. However, the smudges are barely noticeable since your eyes will be primarily focused on the elaborate patterns.

As for the build quality, the website didn’t mention anything about an official IP rating for dust and water resistance. Still, like other modern phones, it should be able to withstand accidental water splashes, as long as it doesn’t reach any of the ports and you wipe it quickly. I don’t recommend trying it, though.

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I also did our usual light bend testing and didn’t hear any squeaks or hints that it would easily fall apart. Although, the device did feel softer than other phones I’ve tested. Still, it wouldn’t break in half unless you’re really trying to damage it.

Nubia has pre-applied a tempered glass screen protector. It also comes with an acrylic clear case, which only does a so-so job of protecting the device. The case attaches to the smartphone through the four corners and protrudes high enough to protect the screen, but the sides are still prone to accidental scratches.

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Taking a tour, we have a 6.72-inch IPS display on the front with surprisingly thin bezels on the top and the sides. The screen-to-body ratio is even more impressive thanks to the punch-hole that holds the 16-megapixel selfie camera.

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On the left side, we have the SIM tray, which can only house two nano SIM cards — no microSD card slot. We also have the volume controls here, which feel incredibly well made as it’s very tactile and clicky. The buttons have the same metallic quality as the whole frame.

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We go to the right side, where we can see the lock/power button that doubles as the fingerprint scanner. The button has been painted red to match the overall gamer look of the device. There are shoulder triggers on each side, marked by the chevron sign.

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On top, we have the noise-isolation microphone. The main microphone is at the bottom, together with the USB-C port and the primary loudspeaker.

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Clearly, nubia nailed the design of the Neo 2, and I won’t be surprised if it’s one of the main reasons people will be getting it.

Display and Sound Quality

The nubia Neo 2 5G has a large 6.72-inch FHD+ IPS display with an apt 2400 x 1080 pixel resolution, resulting to 391 pixels-per-inch. Being a gaming smartphone, it also has a high dynamic refresh rate of 120Hz.

I like how there’s a shortcut in the control center that lets you switch between dynamic, 60Hz, and 120Hz refresh rates. Although, it feels unnecessary to have a 120Hz icon on the notifications bar when it’s enabled.

Like most phones, you can control the screen temperature. There’s also a low-blue light filtering feature to make the screen easier for the eyes at night.

As for the quality, the screen emits a blue-ish tint, especially when compared side-by-side with a different smartphone. You can compensate for this by fine-tuning the color temperature on the settings.

It also lacks Widevine L1 support, so you can’t stream content on platforms like Netflix in HD quality. For the most part, colors are acceptable and the screen brightness is enough for outdoor use. The high refresh rate also works great on select games.

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The nubia Neo 2 makes up for its mediocre display quality by having stereo speakers, which offer loud volume and audible bass. The treble can be muddy at times but still passable.

Gamers, especially those who play shooters, will appreciate the awareness provided by the good stereo separation. It’s not as good as an earphone, but decent enough for its price point.

Hardware and Performance

The nubia Neo 2 5G uses the same UNISOC T820 processor as its predecessor. In fact, it appears that they are the only two devices that have it. It’s a pretty powerful budget chipset that’s clocked at 2.7GHz, has Mali-G57 GPU, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of non-expandable storage.

nubia Neo 2 Benchmark Scores

Gaming performance is fine for the price, but not stellar. I noticed it struggle on Farlight84, which forced us the set the graphics quality to the lowest. We also had to drop the graphics settings of PUBG Mobile, which is lower than the default settings that were set by the game.

Call of Duty Mobile was playable on the highest settings available for this particular unit. Genshin Impact was surprisingly playable under Low, higher than the default setting, which was Lowest. Mobile Legends didn’t stutter under Ultra as well as Asphalt 9 on its highest settings.

I did feel the back of the device heat up easily when running games on graphic settings more than the device can handle. To avoid this, and for a playable experience, make sure you switch it to lower settings. It may not look as pretty, but at least it’s usable.

GameGraphics Settings
Call of Duty: Mobile• Graphics Quality: Medium
• Frame Rate: High
Farlight84• Graphics Quality: Smooth
• Frame Rate: High
• Resolution: Medium
PUBG Mobile• Graphics Quality: Balanced
• Frame Rate: High
Genshin Impact• Graphics Quality: Low
Mobile Legends: Bang Bang• Graphics Quality: Ultra
• Frame Rate: Ultra
• HD Mode: On
Asphalt 9: Legends• Visual Quality: High Quality
• Frame Rate: 60

Software and User Interface

The nubia Neo 2 runs on the outdated Android 13-based MyOS 13 interface. It’s easily one of the worst interfaces I’ve seen recently. To add insult to injury, it’s not even clear if ZTE will update this to a newer Android 14-based UI.

There are a couple of things that immediately annoyed us from the beginning. For one, when looking for an app you want to open quickly, you can’t summon a search bar by swiping up or down from the home screen. Instead, you have to swipe to swipe all the way to the left to access the global search.

You also have to dig into the settings to enable the app drawer, so you can look for and access apps in a more organized manner.

Being a gaming phone, there are UI elements that have been dressed to be aggressive aesthetically. For one, the theme set by default is called Hyper Futurism, which has futuristic-looking icons for native apps.

The charging animation also looks over-the-top, kinda like it came from a 90’s sci-fi movie with a robotic animation sound to match.

There’s also a built-in, uninstallable app called Goper, which lets you pair and control gaming accessories like Red Magic coolers and gaming earphones. The accessories didn’t come included in the package, so I wasn’t able to test them.

It also has the Game Space app, which is a hub for all your games and allows you to optimize them before you start playing.

Game Space can be also accessed while you’re in-game so you can switch between three performance modes: Eco, Balance, and Rise. Plus, it can also show real-time CPU and GPU usage, start recording, begin casting, block notifications, and more.

You can also access the control panel to adjust edge accidental touch protection, use the voice changer, and more.

The Game Space is also used to customize the Shoulder Triggers. You can point exactly to the screen what the left and right triggers will activate when you press them. You can even choose if you want the trigger to act on a single tap, long press, etc. The settings are saved per game.

Shoulder Triggers are particularly helpful in FPS games like PUBG Mobile, Farlight84, and Call of Duty. Sometimes it even feels like cheating, because of how easy it is to maneuver with the added buttons. Unfortunately, the dual triggers can’t fix lack of skill, so gamers should still practice and get good.

Nubia’s Live Island feature, which was inspired by Apple’s Dynamic Island, worked well on the nubia Neo 2 5G. It shows a cool animation around the punch-hole when you start charging the device, gives low battery notifications, and shows the battery status of a connected earbud, when voice recording, running a timer, and for phone calls.

There’s also an app called Cleanup which does a quick scan of your system to check if there are junk files you need to get rid of like unwanted images, videos, and other large files.

A few pre-installed apps are here, but they can be removed. For those who are worried about storage, about 15.94GB of storage is saved for the “Other” and 9.22GB is allocated for the System. With all six triple-A games and a couple of apps and photos taken, we’re still left with 161.11GB/256GB of storage. If that’s not enough, sadly, there’s no microSD card slot to expand storage.

Like most Android phones today, the nubia Neo 2 has a virtual RAM expansion feature, which lets you increase the memory by borrowing from the storage. By default, the Extended RAM is set to 12GB, but you can dial it down to 10GB up to 2GB. If it’s not your cupt of tea, you can turn it off altogether.

The side-mounted fingerprint scanner worked well during our tests, which you can also use to restrict access to apps and lock the Private Space that stores sensitive files. Face unlock was also snappy.

A couple of worth-noting features include one-handed mode, Z-Pop (shortcut buttons that pop-up when you swipe from the edge of the screen), and an app duplicator for easy multi-account management on select social media apps.

Nubia used Emoji Keyboard as the default keyboard here. It’s fine and easy to get used to, but I switched it to my preferred one, which is the more popular Google Keyboard.

The camera app is okay to use and very basic. It doesn’t need anything special in this department, anyway.

Cameras

Despite its gaming status, the nubia Neo 2 still managed to get a decent set of camera hardware. It has a 50-megapixel main shooter with an f/1.8 aperture, a 2-megapixel depth sensor, and a 16-megapixel selfie snapper.

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The 50-megapixel main camera, in good lighting conditions, takes photos with acceptable sharpness and realistic colors. However, the white balance does struggle a lot, resulting in some images having a strong blue tint.

Dynamic range is a mess, too even with the HDR mode enabled. The shutter can be a little slow at times, but that’s to be expected from an affordable smartphone.

Low-light shots are passable. The device did a decent job of retaining details, but make sure you take your time shooting the photos as things can easily get blurry if you move immediately after tapping the shutter button. Again, I wish the color balance could be better, but the shots still look usable for social media.

The 2-megapixel depth sensor did a decent job of separating the foreground unless you check every edge closer. Unfortunately, you can’t fix the focus on Google Photos (the only gallery on the system) after the shot is taken, so make sure you get it right the first time.

The 16-megapixel selfie camera takes good photos for the price. It has a lot of details with accurate skin tones. But like most budget phones, it struggles hard in low-light conditions.

Battery and Charging

One of the biggest features of the nubia Neo 2 is its large battery. But sadly, it failed to meet my expectations for its size.

The 6,000mAh battery only lasted 12 hours and 22 minutes in PCMark’s battery test. To give you an idea, phones with a 5,000mAh capacity I’ve tested averages at around 14 hours. The test loops different workloads until the battery drops to 20%.

I also looped a 1080p YouTube video, to which the device stayed alive for only 13 hours and 37 minutes before dropping to 0% completely. That should suffice for most users, but then again, I’m expecting more from a 6,000mAh battery.

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On the upside, charging time with the 33W adapter has been decent. A 15-minute charge provided 18% of juice with a full charge taking about 1 hour and 23 minutes. See the full result below:

  • 15mins: 0-18%
  • 30mins: 38%
  • 1hr: 82%
  • 1hr 15mins: 97%
  • 1hr 23mins: FULL

Verdict

The combination of an aggressive mecha design, stereo speakers, high refresh rate display, and shoulder triggers makes it a great option for buyers who want to have a gaming-centric smartphone but don’t have the budget for a flagship.

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But suppose you don’t care about the extras and want to prioritize the actual gaming experience, there are definitely other competing devices that offer better performance for the price. I also noticed color issues with the cameras and the display, which suggests the lack of polishing common for a budget handset.

But if that design struck you and you think having shoulder triggers will help you game better, there are no options under Php10,000 other than the nubia Neo 2 5G.

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Nubia Neo 2 5G pricing and availability in the Philippines

You can get the Nubia Neo 2 5G on ZTE stores and Shopee for a price of Php9,999. It is also offered at 0% interest for up to 6 months on SPayLater.

Pros

  • Striking mecha design
  • Shoulder gaming triggers
  • High 120Hz refresh rate
  • Stereo speakers

Cons

  • So-so gaming performance
  • Blue-tint on the display
  • Camera white balance issues
  • Battery performs below expectations

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