Elephone M1 Review


elephone m1 review

Elephone got all upmarket and made a unibody metal device when they launch the Elephone M1. Has the premium design and material rubbed off on the rest of the phone? Find out in my full Elephone M1 review.

Elephone have a history of knocking one phone out after the other. Some devices get months of build up (the Elephone P7000 and Vowney for example) while other Elephone devices appear out of nowhere (P8000). The Elephone M1 comes under the latter and launched with barely the fanfare and hype other ELE devices receive, strange as this is one of the better looking and the first to feature a metal design.

Elephone M1 Review – Design

Take a brief look at the design of the Elephone M1 and you will instantly recognise it as being similar to current Oppo phones. The slim metal body, rear fingerprint scanner and gold colour options all scream Oppo R7 Plus. Even Elephone’s marketing team see the M1 as an upmarket device and say the phone gives a “M1 premium user experience”.

elephone m1 review

With an upmarket build and the use of a mostly alloy rear shell (plastic is used at the top and bottom to prevent antenna interference), the Elephone M1 is a stand out model in the Elephone line-up.

elephone m1 review

Premium features continue with a 2.5D glass display, unibody design, integrated fingerprint scanner on the rear side and a dual LED flash.

elephone m1 review

The 7.6mm phone packs a 2780mAh battery, which for it’s specifications is a nice chunky cell and a little surprising for a phone marketed at the “business user”, who generally won’t be asking too much of the phone from day to day.

My review sample of the Elephone M1 is the sliver and black version, which is by no means as stylish looking as the all gold version of the phone, but it is a device I imagine someone tucking away in to the pocket of a suit while they head off to an important meeting.

elephone m1 review

Taking a more detailed looking around the Elephone M1 you will come across icons for Android navigation hardware buttons, but they aren’t back-lit. The front 2 mega-pixel camera is accompanied by a front facing flash and the 5.5-inch HD display runs right up to the edges of the bezel (i.e no hidden borders).

As the 2.5D glass display curves it meets a rounded border which helps smooth the transition on the the bevel of the alloy/plastic rear construction. The main construction is a metal body but this is alloy sheet that is cut, folded and stamped to create the 3D structure. More expensive phones have a machined alloy body that creates a better finish, and lighter, sturdier feel but ultimately costs a lot more.

The sides of the phone have a SIM tray on the left for SIM and SD cards, 3.5mm headphone jack in the top, speaker vents and standard USB in the base plus physical buttons on the right.

elephone m1 review

Physical buttons are for power and volume, the power button having a slight machined finish to it. Both buttons have a nice satisfying action to them, but are not made to high tolerances and do wobble a little.

elephone m1 review

Elephone haven’t covered the Elephone M1 in logo’s all you get on the phone is the ELE logo in a subtly, slightly darker, grey against the metal body. Above the main logo is the rather small fingerprint scanner. Generally the smaller the scanner the less accurate they tend to be, but so far so good with the Elephone M1. Finally, at the very top is a blacked out area with dual LED flash and 13 mega-pixel F2.0 rear camera.

Other than the slightly lose fitting buttons the only other quality concern I have is with the fit of the metal and plastic parts on the rear of the phone. The plastic cap on the base fits fine on my sample, but the upper cap is slightly off.

Elephone M1 Review – Hardware

We have a nice quality design, and alloy rear with 2.5D glass front, this is already pretty good for a phone that costs $149.99, so is there any money left in the budget for the rest of the specs?

elephone m1 review

As already mentioned we have a 2 mega-pixel camera up front with a 5.5-inch 1280 x 720 resolution display beneath. The main rear camera is a 13 mega-pixel unit with F2.0 aperture and dual LED flash.

elephone m1 review

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Also on the back of the phone is the fingerprint scanner. The model on the Elephone M1 features 360 degree fingerprint recognition, so all you need to do is set up your fingerprint then no matter which way around you touch the sensor the phone should unlock. I was worried by the slightly smaller sensor size at the start of the review, but overall the scanner has worked really well.

elephone m1 review

Working our way down to the bottom edge of the phone we reach the holes for the external speakers and USB. It’s a standard USB rather then a Type C plug which is perfectly fine, what isn’t fine though is the audio quality through the speakers. It’s been a while since I physically cringed at the sound of a phone, the M1 had me grating my teeth each time a sound comes through. Music, games, movies and even system sounds are just dreadful. Earphones is the only way to go with the Elephone M1, then you can at least enjoy the sound.

elephone m1 review

On to the front the 5.5-inch HD display is fine. It’s nothing special but there are no alarm bells are ringing either. Touch response is fine and viewing angles are good, with decent brightness for sunny days.

Now for the internal specs. With a Quad-core Mediatek MT6735A chipset running at 1.3Ghz and a basic Mali T720 you cannot expect this device to handle hardcore gaming, and it can’t. Benchmarks for the phone aren’t spectacular, but then again this phone is for customers wanting style rather than horsepower.

The rest of the hardware is on par with similar phones. 2GB RAM is fine, there is dual SIM support and you have the option for installing 128GB SD card should the 16GB internal memory not be enough.

Finally, the 2780mAh battery isn’t bad. With LTE connected you can easily get through a full day of use and have enough power for the following morning. Remember though this is not a hardcore device so you won’t be gaming on it much.

Elephone M1 Review – Performance

If you only care about benchmarks then you are not going to be very impressed with the Elephone M1. The scores are really very low for a 2015 device, but in all honesty I never felt that the Elephone M1 struggled with the day to day tasks I asked of it.

Elephone M1 Review – Camera

elephone m1 review

On paper the Elephone M1 has great camera. A 13 mega-pixel main camera with F2.0 aperture and dual LED flash all sounds fantastic. In use the camera is actually quite a surprise and it is clear that Elephone have really done their best to improve the image quality. For a $150 phone the Elephone M1 really surpassed my expectations and images look great once you get to view them on your computer’s screen.

elephone m1 photo sample

In low light conditions the F2.0 aperture does a good job of eating up any extra light that is available and creates a nice clear image. Only taking a closer look will show up any noise.

The 2 mega-pixel on the front is a little low on spec compared to 5 mega-pixel which is the norm now, but it does have a front facing flash which should improve low-light selfies. In actual fact the front facing flash isn’t powerful enough and makes no difference to image quality or brightness at all.

Elephone M1 Review – ROM

Android 5.1 Lollipop comes on the Elephone M1 as standard, and again we get the ELE ROM installed out of the box. As I mentioned in the Elephone Trunk review, the ELE ROM has some nice features and runs well.

As I also mentioned in the Trunk review, the Ele ROM comes with some junk, bloat and most worrying of all adware. Choosing certain apps or features will bring up a list of sponsored applications. This really shouldn’t be allowed in a commercial ROM.

Elephone M1 Review – Gallery

Elephone M1 Review – Specifications

Model: Elephone M1
Sim Card:
  • Dual Sim (SIM1 Nano, SIM2 Nano/TF)
Color:  Gold | Gray
Capacity 16GB
Chipset CPU: MTK6735A 1.3GHz 64-bit Quad Core

GPU :Mali-T720

RAM: 2GB

System ELE OS based on Android 5.1
Screen Display Size: 5.5-inch 2.5D Screen

Resolution: 1280 x 720

Camera Rear Camera
13 megapixel, ƒ/2.0Front Camera
2 megapixel with front facing flash
Network and Wireless Connectivity TDD-LTE:band 40 (2300)

FDD-LTE:band 1/3/7/20 (800/1800/2100/2600)

WCDMA:band 1/5/8(850/900/2100)

GSM:band 2/3/5/8 (850/900/1800/1900)

Wifi frequency:802.11b/g/n

Bluetooth:4.0

FM:Support

Battery capacity  Non-removable 2780mAh
Size Dimensions: 150.9 x 78 x 7.6mm

Elephone M1 Review – Conclusion

At $150 the Elephone M1 looks pretty good on paper. The metal chassis, fingerprint scanner, large display and large battery are all plus’, but then again there is a hell of a lot of capable competition at this price point too.

elephone m1 review

For the same money there are plenty of Xiaomi such as the Xiaomi Redmi Note 2 and there are Meizu devices you can pick up. If you wanted something that has style and good build there is always the Gionee Elife S5.5 which can be found for less than $150.

The Elephone M1 is a great attempt by Elephone you decent hardware, fingerprint scanner and metal body, but they also have a ton of excellent competition to go up against too. The Elephone M1 is a good phone for the money, but their competition has the slight edge.

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46 Comments

  1. Tajwar
    November 3, 2015

    Wait… If I hadn’t read title I would have thought it to be a Huawei p8 Lite lol.

  2. Steve B
    November 3, 2015

    Nice one Elephone. Liking the bokeh on that lens.

    • November 3, 2015

      That’s a pretty good price actually

      • Joel Adames
        November 3, 2015

        I confirm that in my personal search every now and then I find great offers for M1and M2 and the S1 and S2 most below $125…
        At least they are trying…
        Hope some of that afford could go to backing up the release of P9000 and Vowney

        • Muhammad Yasir
          November 3, 2015

          one can ONLY hope !

      • Steve B
        November 4, 2015

        M2 is $145 at Efox today, 80 odd remaining.

      • Nahúm Pérez Mesa
        November 5, 2015

        What do you tink about this one vs the ELE trunk? Can you say anything about, a little ver sus please Andi Sykes

  3. DC
    November 3, 2015

    Same shit different day… run of the mill, specs look a okay but what got me worry is are they giving updates as quick as they are releasing these phones?

    • November 3, 2015

      Agree, it also needs a stock ROM without that adware

      • balcobomber25
        November 3, 2015

        If there is adware I can only imagine what else is hidden.

      • Muhammad Yasir
        November 3, 2015

        what adware ? 😀

      • Muhammad Yasir
        November 3, 2015

        hey Andi , why dont u do some INTENSIVE cam tests with devices u review ?!

        there’s no low-light photography test … there’s no flash intensity test

        quite disappointing if u ask me … i expect your team to ABSOLUTELY run riot with EVERY phone u test ! Act like ur interrogating the poor Rapscallion 😀 !

      • crappkid
        November 4, 2015

        Wow. Adware on a $150 phone. That’s a new low!

    • balcobomber25
      November 3, 2015

      Depends on the model, some they support regularly others are never supported.

  4. balcobomber25
    November 3, 2015

    I’m usually one who can justify phones looking similar to another model but this looks like a direct rip off of the Huawei P8. An aside on your review as someone who uses a phone for business, bettery time is the single most important spec to me. This one shouldn’t be too bad tho with this setup as long as the software isn’t a mess.

  5. Muhammad Yasir
    November 3, 2015

    hmmm….

    camera rated a SOLID 8 OUTTA 10 … , nothing wrong with that
    BUT ON A ELEPHONE ! oh boy , the natural order has been disturbed !

    and the final straw …

    NO HIDDEN BORDERS !

    End times , brothers. Brace yourselves 😀 !

  6. Tajwar
    November 3, 2015

    Wait… If I hadn’t read title I would have thought it to be a Huawei p8 Lite lol.

  7. Steve B
    November 3, 2015

    Nice one Elephone. Liking the bokeh on that lens. Camera is an interpolated 8MP OV according to Elephone, so they’ve done a very good job.

    Not sure on numbers, but everbuying have this for $119 at 13:00 GMT on Wednesday.

    • Andi Sykes
      November 3, 2015

      That’s a pretty good price actually

    • Joel Adames
      November 3, 2015

      I confirm that in my personal search every now and then I find great offers for M1and M2 and the S1 and S2 most below $125…
      At least they are trying…
      Hope some of that afford could go to backing up the release of P9000 and Vowney

    • Guest
      November 3, 2015

      one can ONLY hope !

    • Steve B
      November 4, 2015

      M2 is $145 at Efox today, 80 odd remaining.

    • Nahúm Pérez Mesa
      November 5, 2015

      What do you tink about this one vs the ELE trunk? Can you say anything about, a little ver sus please Andi Sykes

  8. DC
    November 3, 2015

    Same shit different day… run of the mill, specs look a okay but what got me worry is are they giving updates as quick as they are releasing these phones?

    • Andi Sykes
      November 3, 2015

      Agree, it also needs a stock ROM without that adware

    • balcobomber25
      November 3, 2015

      Depends on the model, some they support regularly others are never supported.

    • balcobomber25
      November 3, 2015

      If there is adware I can only imagine what else is hidden.

    • Guest
      November 3, 2015

      what adware ? 😀

    • Guest
      November 3, 2015

      hey Andi , why dont u do some INTENSIVE cam tests with devices u review ?!

      there’s no low-light photography test … there’s no flash intensity test

      quite disappointing if u ask me … i expect your team to ABSOLUTELY run riot with EVERY phone u test ! Act like ur interrogating the poor Rapscallion 😀 !

    • afghanPower
      November 4, 2015

      Wow. Adware on a $150 phone. That’s a new low!

  9. balcobomber25
    November 3, 2015

    I’m usually one who can justify phones looking similar to another model but this looks like a direct rip off of the Huawei P8. An aside on your review as someone who uses a phone for business, bettery time is the single most important spec to me. This one shouldn’t be too bad tho with this setup as long as the software isn’t a mess.

  10. Guest
    November 3, 2015

    hmmm….

    camera rated a SOLID 8 OUTTA 10 … , nothing wrong with that
    BUT ON A ELEPHONE ! oh boy , the natural order has been disturbed !

    and the final straw …

    NO HIDDEN BORDERS !

    End times , brothers. Brace yourselves 😀 !

  11. Najib Ar-Rahman
    November 3, 2015

    Wow, the first Elephone without any major deal breaker. I just ordered one from coolicool last month for US$115. Still waiting for my delivery though.

    I wanted to see a review for the gold version but nevertheless, this is a good indication. I’m interested to know more about the fingerprint scanner and the battery life on this phone.

  12. Najib Ar-Rahman
    November 4, 2015

    Wow, the first Elephone without any major deal breaker. I just ordered one from coolicool last month for US$115. Still waiting for my delivery though.

    I wanted to see a review for the gold version but nevertheless, this is a good indication. I’m interested to know more about the fingerprint scanner and the battery life on this phone.

  13. Allanitomwesh
    November 4, 2015

    >2015
    >no backlight on capacitive buttons
    We can’t be friends elephone

  14. Max
    November 4, 2015

    the fingerprint scanner seems a bit off or ascew. and the camera has a huge gap between it and the metal body. that looks like bad craftmanship…

  15. Allanitomwesh
    November 4, 2015

    >2015
    >no backlight on capacitive buttons
    We can’t be friends elephone
    At least they stopped faking thin bezels

  16. Max
    November 4, 2015

    the fingerprint scanner seems a bit off or ascew. and the camera has a huge gap between it and the metal body. that looks like bad craftmanship…

  17. Mesterio
    November 4, 2015

    How could they mess the speakers though? So close yet????

  18. Mesterio
    November 5, 2015

    How could they mess the speakers though? So close yet????

  19. Josef Izchaki
    November 6, 2015

    When are you going to do the M2? andi

  20. Josef Izchaki
    November 6, 2015

    When are you going to do the M2? andi

  21. Steve B
    November 8, 2015

    Read elsewhere that this was being advertised as having second gen finger print scanner that wakes and unlocks phone; except in best China phone tradition it doesn’t actually work. Can you confirm?

  22. Steve B
    November 8, 2015

    Read elsewhere that this was being advertised as having second gen finger print scanner that wakes and unlocks phone; except in best China phone tradition it doesn’t actually work. Can you confirm?

    • s7yler
      November 8, 2015

      The fingerprint scanner can wake & unlock in one go. And yes it works!
      tested at 4:44 here