The vivo Y02s is a budget-friendly smartphone that boasts a trendy design, 5MP selfie camera, 6.51-inch display, and large 5000mAh battery for ₱6,499 SRP.
I spent a couple of weeks with the device and examined its advantages and disadvantages. This includes testing its performance, battery life, charging time, camera quality, user interface, and more.
What’s inside the box?
Contents of the vivo Y02s box.
The vivo Y02s comes in a normal white box. Inside it are the smartphone itself, a 10W charger, USB type-C cable for charging & data transfer, SIM ejector pin, and quick start guide.
It doesn’t have a FREE phone case nor earphones in the box. Make sure to check with the store where you plan on buying the device for bundled free items.
Related: vivo Y02s Unboxing!
Design and Aesthetics
vivo Y02s side view buttons
The vivo Y02s follows the design trend set by more premium smartphones. It has a boxy design with flat sides and back panel. This makes it look modern while the edges are angled with 2.5D curves on the front panel’s edges for ergonomics.
It comes in two color options – Fluorite Black and Vibrant Blue. Both have a glittery effect and a matte texture which reduces smudges and fingerprints.
The camera module at the back of the vivo Y02s looks cool with a seemingly dual-camera design. The second camera ring only houses the LED flash but it looks better this way.
The ports of the vivo Y02s.
Its volume and power buttons are on the right side while the SIM card tray is accessible at the top. A 3.5mm audio jack, pin-hole microphone, USB type-C port, and loudspeaker grille line the bottom of the device.
It feels slim and light when held and there are no creaks indicating a sturdy build quality.
Overall, the vivo Y02s is a good-looking smartphone with a trendy design, thin profile, and modern vibe.
Display and UI
vivo Y02s display.
Screenshots of apps and storage.
The vivo Y02s has a 6.51-inch HD+ display with a small notch for the selfie camera. It’s bright enough for indoor use and the 270 ppi pixel density is good enough to prevent too much pixelation but it’s not as vibrant as I hoped.
It comes with Android 12-based FuntouchOS 12 software. There are some pre-installed apps like the Google apps, V-appstore, Lazada, TikTok, Facebook, and more. Some of these can be uninstalled to reclaim storage space.
The user interface looks neat and clean. There are several customization options and additional features like themes, fonts, animations, double-tap to wake, and more.
Performance and Gaming Experience
vivo Y02s 3DMark benchmark score.
The vivo Y02s runs on a MediaTek Helio P35 chipset with 3GB of RAM, and 32GB of expandable storage.
As a budget smartphone, it has decent performance during basic tasks like switching between apps and scrolling on social media apps.
However, there are some lags when quickly performing some tasks or using several apps in quick succession. It can also be overwhelmed by too many notifications making it feel sluggish.
Here are the phone’s benchmark scores that you may compare with your current smartphone for a more objective comparison of raw performance. Download the linked benchmark app from the Google Playstore and see if you get lower or higher scores than the vivo Y02s.
GeekBench 5 (single core) – 117 points
Geekbench 5 (multi core) – 936 points
3DMark Slingshot Extreme – 386 points
RealPi Benchmark (1M) – 14.57 seconds (faster means better)
Mobile Legends on the vivo Y02s.
In terms of gaming performance, the vivo Y02s runs Mobile Legends at medium graphics quality by default. It’s laggy so I reduced the graphics quality to low. This made the game playable with some lags during clashes.
More resource-intensive games like Call of Duty Mobile and Genshin Impact are too laggy to be played on the device.
Storage can be also be an issue since it only has 32GB of internal storage. It does have a microSD card slot for up to 256GB of additional storage.
Camera Quality (Sample Pictures and Videos)
vivo Y02s | f/2.0 1/6000s ISO107
vivo Y02s | f/2.0 1/2000s ISO104
The vivo Y02s is equipped with an 8 Megapixel rear camera with autofocus and a 5 Megapixel selfie camera.
Pictures taken using the 8MP camera in well-lit situations have good details but colors and skin-tone look pale. The dynamic range is also limited because there’s no HDR making shadowed areas appear too dark.
vivo Y02s | f/2.0 1/20s ISO815
vivo Y02s | f/2.0 1/30s ISO394
vivo Y02s | f/2.0 1/25s ISO521
vivo Y02s | f/2.0 1/20s ISO1397
vivo Y02s | f/2.0 1/20s ISO1114
Close-up pictures look good but you have to tap to make sure the subject is in focus. Graininess also starts to creep up especially when taking pictures just before sunset.
Low-light shots are grainy and there’s no dedicated night mode in the default camera app.
vivo Y02s selfie | f/2.2 1/25s ISO382
Meanwhile, the 5MP selfie camera can produce sharp outdoor selfies with faithful skin-tone and colors. Selfies can actually look better than pictures taken by the rear camera.
Indoor selfies tend to look good too but with lesser details. It’s still fine for uploading on social media.
vivo Y02s selfie | f/2.2 1/250s ISO112
In terms of video quality, the vivo Y02s can record up to 1080p resolution for both the front and rear cameras. Once again, the selfie camera produces better looking videos than the rear camera.
Maybe this smartphone was built for TikToks and selfies.
Remember to change the video capture quality in the camera settings. It’s set to 720p only by default.
Connectivity, Audio Quality, and Security
The vivo Y02s is a dual-SIM 4G LTE smartphone. It can provide decent mobile data speeds in areas with good LTE signals.
Voice calls sound clear on its earpiece and the loudspeaker can get sufficiently loud. However, it sounds tinny for music but the 3.5mm audio jack is ready for any analog earphones you have lying around.
For security, it only relies on the selfie camera for face recognition with no fingerprint scanner for more secure biometric unlocking.
Battery Life and Charging Time
vivo Y02s charger
The vivo Y02s is powered by a large 5,000mAh battery. It can last almost two days on a single charge with my normal usage and 8 hours of continuous gaming.
It scored 12 hours and 13 minutes on the PCMark battery life test with the screen brightness set at around 50%. This is an average score among smartphones I have tested.
However, re-charging the device takes a long time. It needs two hours of charging using its 10W bundled charger to reach 75% or three hours to reach 100% battery capacity.
Conclusion
Is the vivo Y02s smartphone for you?
The vivo Y02s is a beautiful smartphone. It’s thin, light, and has a trendy design. Its selfie camera can produce sharp selfies in well-lit situations while its battery can last a long time.
However, it’s performance is underwhelming. There are lags in gaming and even when simply browsing social media apps.
Hence, I can only recommend the vivo Y02s if you are after the design and selfies. For gamers, I suggest the vivo T1x which is a good budget gaming smartphone from the brand.
vivo Y02s Review Summary
The vivo Y02s is a thin, light, and trendy smartphone that can produce clear selfies and has a long-lasting battery.
- 6.51-inch HD+ IPS LCD Display (720 x 1600 Pixels), 270 ppi
- Android 12 Operating System
- MediaTek Helio P35 Chipset
- 3GB of RAM
- 8 Megapixel Rear Camera with LED Flash
- 5 Megapixel Front Camera
- Dual SIM
- 32GB Internal Storage
- Expandable Up to 256 via microSD
- 4G LTE, 3G HSPA+, 2G EDGE & GPRS Networks
- Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n
- Bluetooth 5.0
- USB Type-C
- 3.5mm Audio Jack
- 5000mAh Battery
- 10W Charging Rate
- ₱6,499.00 Official Price in the Philippines
- ₱5,999.00 - Price drop on November 9, 2022
