This is quite an exciting hands on as its the first Nubia phone we’ve had at GizChina and what’s more it came from Nubia themselves. Keep reading to see our first hands on and impressions of this mid range 5-incher.
Nubia launched the Z11 Mini earlier this year at an event in China. The launch was a little different to what most other phone makers are doing as this isn’t a flagship phone, instead it’s their mid-ranger with flagship features.
The Z11 Mini measures 5-inch with a FHD display, dual 2.5D curved glass panels, a CNC alloy chassis, and rear touch fingerprint scanner. Like other phones in the Nubia range the Z11 Mini runs its own Nubia UI ROM on a Qualcomm chipset, in this instance a Snapdragon 617. Other hardware features include 3GB RAM, 32GB memory, and space for either dual SIM’s or a single SIM and micro SD card.
As with other Nubia phones there is a slight focus on camera hardware and performance with the Nubia Z11 Mini, and specs include a rear 16 mega-pixel camera with F2.0 aperture and single LED flash, while selfies are taken care of with an 8 mega-pixel camera.
At 5-inches and a glass and metal construction the Nubia Z11 Mini could easily been seen as a rival to the OnePlus X, but the Nubia has a higher spec camera set up, USB Type C, rear fingerprint scanner, and a much more feature packed ROM than any OnePlus to date.
This is my first Nubia phone and the only one I’ve had any real time to play around with but so far I’ve found plenty of rather useful features in the Nubia UI ROM. Edge Gestures is the first listed in the settings and allows you to set up edge swipes to open apps, adjust the volume, or flip between backgrounds apps. It’s a very useful method of getting from app to app, and the settings allow it to be very customisable.
Other interesting Nubia UI features on the Z11 Mini include a split screen option for running dual apps at the same time, options for changing the lay out of the hardware buttons, DTS sound, and options to take photos using the finger print scanner.
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The system also includes one of the most advanced camera apps I’ve seen on a phone so far. The Nubia UI camera app has options to take auto photos, or go in to the settings with the Pro feature. There are also options for slow motion video, time lapse, and from the ‘Camera Family’ option you can take multi exposure photos, start tracks and more, much much more.
As this is the international version of the Nubia Z11 Mini Google is incorporated in to the system and everything seems to be working as it should (well except Android Auto, but very few Chinese phones have this right yet).
So far the Nubia Z11 Mini is living up to it’s mid range flagship promises with decent performance, a rather sleek design (finally I’ve got an all black phone) and very promising camera performance.
If I had to niggle then the finger print scanner isn’t super duper fast, but then again I am used to those scanners on the Vivo range of phones and they are blazing fast, and the body picks up fingerprints really easily. I know you are all going to ask what Audio, Battery Life etc is like but I’ve had the phone for only a few hours so I just don’t know.
Nubia Z11 mini hands on gallery
I’m going to be snapping a few photos with the Z11 Mini over the coming days so watch out for my Nubia Z11 Mini Camera review in the next few days. If you have any questions about this phone or any other please let me know.
This isn’t exactly new Nubia always launches the mini and max versions before the actual flagship.
Overall it’s a very good looking device.
doesn’t it looks exactly like OPX, in comparison to SD801 how does SD617 performs.
This is a design Nubia has been using for some quite sometime now. In day to day use they are about even.
Just one issue. I don’t like red color..that red circle at the bottom.
It is their signature that ZTE won a lawsuit against Meizu. In fact, I kind of like it.
It would be ok if it was any other color. Blue looks great too. But they use i on more budget devices.
wow the ui sounds really nice, hope its not as laggy as touchwiz, but what im super duper cant wait to see is the Lenovo tech world im mega excited to see what project tango has to offer, seems like lenovo is pushing serious innovation
NEW WALL
Hahaha, missing the red bricked one already!!!
precisely!
nice … but
@yash3339:disqus and Andi (if he’s listening) … Y U NO REPORT N4’S RELEASE ?!
All black jacket nice looking device.
Now the review for the ELIFE E8, 🙂 (-:
Hahaha, just kidding but be sure to do one for the ELIFE E9 ASAP if it ever comes about.
noted, sir. 🙂
Hahaha, you better. ;-D
Hi Andy, could you take a close-up pic of the corners of the phone, with the screen facing the camera please?
I want to see if it has the same plastic “edging” around the glass and inset into the alloy chassis, that the Z9 range had – which “peeled off” (I will send photos of what happened to my Z9 Max if it helps). In my opinion that was the only weakness of the phone.
I suspect the Z11 and Z11 Max will have superior audio hardware than the Z11 Mini – the Z9 range did anyway.
Camera performance on the Z9 range was better than the iPhone 6s in my tests – low light shots surprisingly clear, although the Mini was a bit slower when HDR was on (I have a 6s for my company phone, a Z9 Max as my personal and the missus had two Z9 Mini – both of which got killed , one in the loo and one in the washing machine – she has now been demoted to a redmi note 2 prime, which has a terrible camera). I hope the Z11 continues in that vein.
This isn’t exactly new Nubia always launches the mini and max versions before the actual flagship.
Overall it’s a very good looking device.
doesn’t it looks exactly like OPX, in comparison to SD801 how does SD617 performs.
This is a design Nubia has been using for some quite sometime now. In day to day use they are about even.
Just one issue. I don’t like red color..that red circle at the bottom.
It is their signature that ZTE won a lawsuit against Meizu. In fact, I kind of like it.
It would be ok if it was any other color. Blue looks great too. But they use i on more budget devices.
Is this with the same sensor as the vivo xplay 5 – the IMX298?
I haven’t seen anything official on it but I have seen that the sensor is 1/2.8″, the only 16mp sensor Sony has with that size is the IMX 298.
wow the ui sounds really nice, hope its not as laggy as touchwiz, but what im super duper cant wait to see is the Lenovo tech world im mega excited to see what project tango has to offer, seems like lenovo is pushing serious innovation
NEW WALL
Hahaha, missing the red bricked one already!!!
precisely!
nice … but
@yash3339:disqus and Andi (if he’s listening) … Y U NO REPORT N4’S RELEASE ?!
I becoming like MiFavor UI (Nubia UI) more and more for its features packed. Only thing we miss with Z11 mini are android 6.0 and SD at least 650,652 because I have handed on V3 Max with SD652 and it is blazing fast even the most demand 3D mobile games.
All black jacket nice looking device.
Now the review for the ELIFE E8, 🙂 (-:
Hahaha, just kidding but be sure to do one for the ELIFE E9 ASAP if it ever comes about.
noted, sir. 🙂
Hahaha, you better. ;-D
Hi Andi, could you take a close-up pic of the corners of the phone, with the screen facing the camera please?
I want to see if it has the same plastic “edging” around the glass and inset into the alloy chassis, that the Z9 range had – which “peeled off” (I will send photos of what happened to my Z9 Max if it helps). In my opinion that was the only weakness of the phone.
I suspect the Z11 and Z11 Max will have superior audio hardware than the Z11 Mini – the Z9 range did anyway.
Camera performance on the Z9 range was better than the iPhone 6s in my tests – low light shots surprisingly clear, although the Mini was a bit slower when HDR was on (I have a 6s for my company phone, a Z9 Max as my personal and the missus had two Z9 Mini – both of which got killed , one in the loo and one in the washing machine – she has now been demoted to a redmi note 2 prime, which has a terrible camera). I hope the Z11 continues in that vein.
Edit – on closer inspection of the existing pics, it looks the same – hopefully it won’t have the same issue……
Does it have onscreen virtual buttons?
Does it have notification led and is it multicolored?
Does both SIM cards support 4G?
Does it support WiFi 2,4 and 5 GHz?
Does it support NFC?
Does the screen have Gorilla Glass or some other protection?
Does it have DAC/op-amp?
I don’t know whether the mini version will, but I am sure the max version will – the previous gen had an AKM AK4375 DAC and AW8736 amp.
nuoio? XD
Is this with the same sensor as the vivo xplay 5 – the IMX298?
I haven’t seen anything official on it but I have seen that the sensor is 1/2.8″, the only 16mp sensor Sony has with that size is the IMX 298.
I becoming like MiFavor UI (Nubia UI) more and more for its features packed. Only thing we miss with Z11 mini are android 6.0 and SD at least 650,652 because I have handed on V3 Max with SD652 and it is blazing fast even the most demand 3D mobile games.
Does it have DAC/op-amp?
I don’t know whether the mini version will, but I am sure the max version will – the previous gen had an AKM AK4375 DAC and AW8736 amp.
nuoio? XD
Looks absolutely gorgeous…………..5 inchers is the most i am willing to to buy. Any thing above that i am not interested in so this is perfection.
Have you ever tried a 5.5 inch phone? I used to be concerned it was too big for me too until I used one. Took less than a day to get used to the size difference and now I prefer it.
Looks absolutely gorgeous…………..5 inchers is the most i am willing to to buy. Any thing above that i am not interested in so this is perfection.
Have you ever tried a 5.5 inch phone? I used to be concerned it was too big for me too until I used one. Took less than a day to get used to the size difference and now I prefer it.
Beautiful!!! I want.
Beautiful!!! I want.
Where can I get this phone? With Google play
Where can I get this phone? With Google play