The vivo Y33s "Mirror Black" and its box.
The vivo Y33s is a smartphone that boasts a high-resolution 50-megapixel triple rear camera system, a large 6.58-inch FHD+ display, and a long-lasting 5000mAh battery for an official price of ₱12,999.00.
Let’s take a close look at the device starting with the design followed by its performance, camera quality, and battery life. This is my vivo Y33s full review!
Unboxing the vivo Y33s with its free phone case and earphones.
Mirror-finished back of the vivo Y33s.
I have the Mirror Black vivo Y33s but it also comes in a brighter Midday Dream color variant. It has a glossy back that can be useful when quickly checking out how you look but may also accumulate unwanted smudges and fingerprints.
It feels bulky due to its flat frame and large screen. However, it only tips the scale lightly at 182 grams. The feeling of bulkiness is reduced with the help of the free phone case included in the package. It makes the phone feel handy and improves the grip.
On the right side of the phone are its volume buttons and power button. The latter also serves as a fingerprint scanner. Meanwhile, its SIM card tray is accessible at the top with dedicated slots for two nano-SIM cards and one microSD card.
Notifications on the lockscreen of the vivo Y33s.
On the front of the vivo Y33s is its 6.58-inch FHD+ display which looks bright and crisp with decent colors. It doesn’t look quite as bright when used outdoors though.
The screen takes up almost the entire front panel leaving narrow bezels all around and a small notch for the selfie camera on top.
vivo Y33s screenshots.
It runs on Funtouch OS 11 software which is based on Android 11 OS. It has deep customizations especially in the design of the icons and pre-installed apps.
After a few tweaks, the device can look neat and clean with common apps on the home screen like Facebook, Spotify, and Gmail instead of the pre-installed V-Appstore, Z Manager, and Themes. However, notifications from these apps can still be quite irritating and need to be disabled.
Mobile Legends on the vivo Y33s.
Powered by a MediaTek Helio G80, the vivo Y33s has decent performance. It launches apps quickly while scrolling across different newsfeeds is generally lag-free. However, it easily becomes sluggish when a lot of apps are running in the background and when notifications have accumulated.
In terms of benchmark scores, it achieved a score of 331 points on Geekbench 5 (single-core), 1,030 points on Geekbench 5 (multi-core), and computes 1 million digits of Pi (𝝅) using RealPi Benchmark in 3.51 seconds. These scores are slightly above the entry-level range but not on par with mid-range phones.
The gaming performance of the vivo Y33s is also limited to casual games and heavier games set at the lowest graphics quality. I played Mobile Legends on the device at High graphics quality and the performance felt smooth but with some frame drops during team fights.
The phone can also run Call of Duty Mobile but the graphics quality is limited to Medium. It already looks good but there are several frame drops. I had to reduce the graphics quality to Low after a single multiplayer match.
It performs best when Mobile Legends is set to Medium and Call of Duty Mobile at Low graphics quality. I also tried playing Genshin Impact but it’s too laggy even in the lowest graphics settings.
Camera app of the vivo Y33s.
The 50 Megapixel main camera of the vivo Y33s is its main selling feature. It uses a Samsung CMOS image sensor with a 1/2.76″ sensor size, 0.64μm pixel size, and a wide f/1.8 aperture lens.
It automatically combines four pixels into one resulting in 12.5 Megapixel pictures but a 50MP mode is available. It also has AI scene recognition that applies the best settings and turns on or off the HDR feature.
Here are some sample pictures from this camera:
Flower with morning dew | vivo Y33s
Tree with backlight HDR effect | vivo Y33s
Walkway on a sunny day | vivo Y33s
Flower with swimming pool in the background | vivo Y33s
Water lettuce | vivo Y33s
Reindeer in a mall | vivo Y33s
Water fountain with lights at night | vivo Y33s
Water fountain with lights at night captured using Night Mode | vivo Y33s
The vivo Y33s can produce good-looking pictures of people, sceneries, flowers, food, and other subjects in well-lit situations. It can capture scenes with sharp details, vibrant colors, and balanced brightness.
However, it has a tendency to overexpose bright spots in the image if the HDR effect isn’t triggered. This is obvious in the clouds in the second sample picture above.
It’s also not as impressive when it comes to low-light photography. It has a dedicated Night Mode that takes slightly brighter pictures but the details are still grainy.
Sample selfie | vivo Y33s
Portrait selfie | vivo Y33s
Meanwhile, the 16MP selfie camera of the vivo Y33s takes impressive selfies in well-lit scenes. It can even emulate bokeh effects and blur the background for portrait selfies.
When it comes to low-light selfies, the phone’s camera app uses the screen as a fill light. This improves night selfies with decent results.
USB Type-C port, 3.5mm audio jack, and the loudspeaker grille.
The vivo Y33s is a 4G LTE smartphone and provides fast mobile internet speed in areas with great LTE coverage. It also supports 5GHz Wi-Fi networks and has a USB Type-C port for wired connectivity.
Voice calls sound clear on its earpiece but the loudspeaker doesn’t sound that great. Music listening is better with earphones.
The device is equipped with a side-mounted fingerprint scanner for security. It has decent speed and great accuracy. Face recognition is also supported and uses the selfie camera.
Battery life test score of the vivo Y33s.
The vivo Y33s has a large 5,000mAh battery that lasts almost two days on a single charge with normal usage.
It achieved an impressive battery life of 16 hours and 43 minutes on the PCMark Battery Life Test 2.0. It measures the longevity of the battery while simulating real-world tasks like browsing the web, playing videos, and applying filters to pictures.
Meanwhile, recharging the device from 0% to 100% battery capacity takes 2 hours and 35 minutes using the bundled 18W charger.
I recommend the vivo Y33s smartphone for its photography features, large display, and long-lasting battery.
The vivo Y33s is a good smartphone for photography, watching videos, and browsing social media feeds. It has capable cameras for daytime photography or taking selfies, a large display, and a long-lasting battery.
However, its gaming performance is subpar considering the alternatives in its price range. It can run popular games smoothly but at low graphics quality only.
Smartphones are optimized differently based on the target market. The vivo Y33s is optimized for photography, media consumption, and battery life.
