Sony Xperia XZ review: Fast, gorgeous – and flawed

So much for the 4K smartphone. After painstakingly squeezing a 4K screen onto its previous flagship – the Xperia Z5 Premium – Sony’s latest top-of-the-range handset, the Xperia XZ, has reverted to a standard Full HD display.

Far from a sign of retreat, though, the Xperia XZ is in many ways a sign of re-consolidation for Sony, and a return to its strengths. It might have a different name, but the Xperia XZ is very much the true successor to the Xperia Z5, and much more so than the underwhelming Xperia X that was launched earlier in the year.

Sony Xperia XZ review: Design

Even though the screen resolution has changed, the Xperia XZ retains the same 5.2in display as previous models, and the familiar ultra-slim power button-cum-fingerprint sensor once again adorns the side of the handset. You’ll need to press the sensor before it can recognise your fingerprint, but on the whole, it’s pretty quick and accurate. Likewise, with built-in NFC on board, it’s primed and ready for Android Pay, so you can use it to make contactless payments.

Despite sharing the same screen size as its predecessors, the Xperia XZ’s design is rather different from its Z-series brethren: it ditches Sony’s traditional glass back for something altogether more plasticky. In a way, it’s the right move; the frosted glass back of the Z5 was rather prone to shattering. However, it isn’t an aesthetic improvement, and it’s particularly good at collecting messy-looking fingerprints.

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The line break on the lower section of the phone’s rear also looks like it’s been tacked on at the last minute, breaking the XZ’s otherwise clean, minimalist design. At least the nano-SIM and microSD card tray are no longer covered by a cheap-looking flap. Instead, it’s a simple pull-out tray – but you’ll still need to make sure it’s sealed properly to retain the XZ’s IP65/68 water-resistance. Contrary to previous Z phones, Sony now doesn’t recommend submerging the phone for any length of time, but the XZ should be able to handle heavy rain showers and short-lived aquatic mishaps.

Sony Xperia XZ review: Display

The design might not be to everyone’s tastes, but the good news is that Sony’s IPS screen technology remains first-class. To the naked eye, it looks beautiful, and our X-Rite colorimeter certainly thought so too. The 5.2in Full HD display reproduces a nigh-on perfect 99.3% of the sRGB colour gamut, hits a peak brightness of 609.7cd/m2, and has a huge contrast ratio of 1,365:1.

All that adds up to one of the best IPS displays available on any smartphone currently. It might not look quite as saturated as Samsung’s Super AMOLED screens on the S7 and S7 Edge, but colours are beautifully rich and vibrant. Videos, in particular, look fantastic.

Sony Xperia XZ review: Performance

The XZ’s quad-core 2.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 and 3GB of RAM are a lightning-quick combination – even if the benchmarks don’t always show it. For instance, its Geekbench 4 scores weren’t all that impressive, achieving 1,337 in the single-core test and just 3,326 in the multi-core test, which puts it more or less on a par with the Snapdragon 650-powered Xperia X Compact. However, having used both phones side by side, the difference is night and day, with the XZ pulling ahead every time.

Indeed, Sony’s version of Android 6.0.1 felt silky smooth on the XZ, and web browsing was equally quick, showing few signs of stutter – even on pages laden with dozens of images. Gaming performance was impressive, too: it managed an average of 48fps in GFXBench GL’s onscreen Manhattan 3.0 test, and 46fps in the offscreen version. This is faster than Samsung’s S7 and S7 Edge as well as the LG G5.

Of course, being a Sony phone, the Xperia XZ can also be used in conjunction with the company’s PS4 Remote Play app, which lets you use the XZ as a second screen for streaming games around your home. This makes it a particularly promising prospect for PS4 owners, since PS4 Remote Play isn’t currently supported by any other phone manufacturer.

Sony Xperia XZ review: Battery Life

The Xperia XZ has enough stamina to go the distance. Its 2,900mAh battery lasted an impressive 14hrs 32mins in our continuous video playback test with the screen set to our predefined brightness level of 170cd/m2. That puts it ahead of the LG G5 and HTC 10, but it’s still some way behind the S7, S7 Edge and OnePlus 3, all of which last several hours longer.

That said, this is still a very good result and the Xperia XZ should regularly last at least a day, if not a little into the next depending on usage. Just remember to take your USB Type-C cable with you: the XZ has swapped the micro-USB port from previous models for the more up-to-date USB Type-C standard.

Sony Xperia XZ review: Camera

There’s a rather large cloud hanging over the XZ, however: Sony’s overly aggressive image processing continues to spoil the pictures taken by its rear sensor. The Xperia Z5 suffered from this problem as well, and it puts a real downer on the whole phone, since its 23-megapixel camera just can’t match the same quality produced by its rivals.

It’s a shame, really, since the hardware onboard – 1/2.3in Exmor RS sensor, 24mm wide-angle G Lens, predictive hybrid autofocus and ISO levels that go up to 12,800 – would otherwise imply. However, when I looked at my test photos, everything was exceedingly grainy and lacking in fine detail. It also had a habit of taking quite dark shots, making scenes feel rather gloomy as a result. Switching to Manual mode and turning on HDR improved things very slightly, but not significantly.

This trend continued indoors as well, where fine detail was soft and smeary. Admittedly, colours looked fantastic, but closer inspection revealed some hazy outlines, particularly in lower lighting conditions. However, none of this will prove an issue if you generally take pictures for only uploading to social media, but the camera isn’t a patch on the models included in the OnePlus 3, LG G5, Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge.

Sony Xperia XZ review: Verdict

Ultimately, though, it’s the Xperia XZ’s price that is its main undoing, since it fails to undercut its key rivals. Now available for under £400, it still sits in a very competitive space, with the likes of the S7, LG G5 and even the newer LG G6 to compete with.

Then there’s the OnePlus 3, which trumps them all with its excellent value for money. With such competition, the Xperia XZ fails to make much of an impression, even if its speed, screen and battery life are all excellent in their own right.

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Sony just hasn’t done enough to trouble the frontrunners in today’s market. It’s a nice enough phone, but until Sony sorts out its camera issues and adds a whole lot more pizzazz to the overall package, the Xperia XZ will just have to be content with mid-table obscurity.