Xiaomi Black Shark 2 Pro

The Black Shark 2 Pro is the second phone to be launched in the world with the ultra-high-end processor, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 Plus. The Snapdragon 855 Plus has around 5% faster CPU and a 15% faster GPU. The Snapdragon 855 Plus is paired with ultra-fast 8GB LPDDR4X RAM and fastest storage technology available at launch: 128GB of UFS 3.0 storage. There’s no storage expansion, but 128GB of storage is enough for even heavy smartphone users. The phone runs Android 9 Pie operating system with mostly stock-like Android UI. The phone uses an updated Liquid Cool 3.0 system which features a liquid-cooled plate and tube for reduced thermals, which in turn results in a better-sustained performance.

Being a gaming phone, there’s a lot of importance given the audio-visual performance of the Black Shark 2 Pro. It has a 6.39-inch AMOLED screen with Full HD+ resolution. Unlike most other phones in 2019, this high-end phone lacks any notch or punch hole in the screen. Instead, the phone has an 18:9 screen with a small forehead bezel and a small chin bezel. The screen has a 60Hz refresh rate, which is normal, but it supports 240Hz touchscreen refresh rate and the touch latency has been reduced to 34.7ms, which means faster and smoother touch input and accurate gaming controls. The screen also supports 100% DCI-P3 color gamut and HDR10 video playback. Rounding off with loud, front-facing stereo speakers, the Black Shark 2 Pro becomes a nice multimedia device. The only thing that could’ve been added was a dedicated 3.5mm headphone jack. The Black Shark 2 Pro has an under-display optical fingerprint reader.

The Black Shark 2 Pro is a gaming-focussed phone but that doesn’t mean it skimps on the camera performance. It has two cameras on the rear, one 48MP (1.2-inch Sony IMX586) sensor and one 12MP sensor with 2x optical zoom. Both primary and secondary rear-facing cameras have phase-detection autofocus and 4K video recording with up to 60fps frame rates. At the front, the Black Shark 2 Pro has a 20MP selfie camera that’s placed in the forehead bezel area above the screen. The front-facing camera has F2.0 aperture, 0.9-micron pixels, and Full HD 1080p video recording at 30fps. Of course, the Black Shark 2 Pro can capture images with background blur effect through both front and rear-facing cameras.

The Black Shark 2 Pro is powered by a 4000mAh battery, and it supports 27W proprietary fast battery charging technology. The phone can easily last an entire day of usual smartphone usage or hours-long gaming sessions. The Black Shark 2 Pro has various connectivity features, including GPS, A-GPS, GLONASS, BDS, QZSS, dual-SIM card slot, 4G LTE, VoLTE, dual-band Wi-Fi b/g/n/ac, Wi-Fi Direct, Google Cast, Bluetooth 5.0, and a USB Type-C port.