Cherry Mobile Flare X Review: Is This 2015’s Budget Smartphone to Beat?

Cherry Mobile Flare X

While there has been a crap-ton of Flare variants in the past, there have only been a few that can be called true successors to the Flare name. The recently launched Cherry Mobile Flare X is arguably one of them, sporting a familiar-looking back cover, not to mention bang-for-buck specs that the original Flare was known for. At just Php6,999, it comes in at least Php1k lower than its nearest similarly-specced competitors. Does Cherry Mobile have another hit on its hands? Find out in my full review of the Cherry Mobile Flare X!

What’s in the Box?

Box Contents

The box of the Cherry Mobile Flare X comes in an eye-catching new design that highlights the Flare X brand. Slide the box out of its sleeve though and open it up and it’s still the same standard retail package you can expect from the local brand.

  • Handset
  • Headset with in-line mic
  • Wall charger with 1A output
  • USB transfer cable
  • 3,000mAh battery
  • User manual
  • Introductory card to Cherry Mobile services

Build Quality and Design

The Cherry Mobile Flare X looks every part a Flare, sporting a similar snap on back cover design with a matte finish that made the original Flare easily identifiable. The build quality is okay, but not exceptional. It’s mostly an all-plastic construction save for the screen, which is protected by Gorilla Glass 3. For a 5.5 inch smartphone, it’s pretty light though, and its curved back allows for a more comfortable grip.

Display

Screen Closeup

The bigger the smartphone, the more important the display becomes, and the Flare X is no slouch when it comes to display size and quality. It sports a 5.5 inch Full HD IPS screen with a pixel density of 401ppi, which translates into a pleasurable experience whether you’re viewing photos from your gallery, browsing the web, or watching movies. The viewing angles are also quite exceptional, and it’s like the image is floating on top of the screen when viewed from the side.

Software and UI

The Flare X runs Android 4.4 KitKat out of the box and while it looks a bit like stock Android, there are enough modifications to the UI that make it a slightly different experience.

The most noticeable are probably the dedicated music and camera widgets that each take up an entire homescreen. They both allow you to control their respective apps without leaving the homescreens, although in my opinion they’re a huge waste of homescreen real estate.

Another tweak is a simple theming system that allows you to change the look of the stock icons. You can choose between the stock Android look, along with three other icon themes. Along with that is the stock launcher’s ability to use icon packs, such as the ones that can be used with Apex and Nova Launcher.

My favorite tweak though is that the notification area now shows how much data is being transferred when you’re connected to either WiFi or mobile data. It’s pretty useful particularly in letting you know if a large download has stopped and needs to be restarted, such as those huge pesky game updates.

For the most part, the tweaks are actually useful, although they’ll each have a different appeal to different people.

Benchmarks and Performance

Being equipped with a 1.7GHz MT6752 octa-core processor and 3GB of RAM, the Cherry Mobile Flare X looks promising on paper. I ran it through my favorite benchmarking apps, namely Antutu, Vellamo, 3DMark.

The Flare X compares well against phones like the LG G3 and Nexus 5 in Antutu, which is an all-in-one benchmark that measures single core and multicore performance, not to mention input/output and RAM performance, as well GPU performance. The trend continues in Vellamo’s single core (Metal) and Multicore tests, where you can also see it performing similarly to the OnePlus One and Lenovo A7000.

Camera

Camera

Handling imaging duties is a 13mp back camera with a Sony IMX214 BSI sensor, which is one of the best sensors you can find from our locally available budget brands like Cherry Mobile. Of course, don’t just take my word for it. Check out these sample images I’ve taken while using the Flare X as my daily driver.

Outdoorsy Shots

The Flare X does pretty well outdoor, whether in ample or late afternoon lighting, so I just stuck to Auto. In high noon where you can find yourself stuck between harsh lighting and shadows, HDR works pretty well.

Obligatory Food Shots

The Baklava and Saganaki are from a Greek restaurant in Eastwood called Cyma. The food is awesome, but the lighting is pretty harsh and bluish, so I was rather pleased that switching to HDR resulted in some reasonably good shots. The Ramen and Gyoza shots are from an inexpensive ramen place close to where I live. The lighting there is pretty good so I didn’t really need to use HDR, except for comparison’s sake.

Low Light

The Flare X does well in low light too. Most times, I find that I don’t even need flash as long as there’s just a bit of lighting for the camera’s autofocus to lock on to.

Entertainment and Gaming

Thanks to its 5.5 inch Full HD IPS display and capable MT6752 SoC, the Flare X makes for an excellent multimedia device. The generous screen real estate allows you to view high resolution movies in full detail without having to hold the device closer to your face. You could even prop it up on a table and enjoy watching with a small group of friends.

Loudspeakers, MicroUSB, Mic

I’d recommend hooking it up to a loud set of Bluetooth speakers though. The phone’s own loudspeaker is adequate enough in a quiet space, but if you’re going to watch movies at your favorite campus tambayan spot, they aren’t going to cut it.

Entertainment

If you’re more of a music lover, the MT6752 chip comes with a few options to optimize tour listening experience. You can enhance the bass when you’ve got headphones on, boost the loudspeaker’s loudness, simulate surround sound, or turn on lossless audio when listening via a Bluetooth speaker or headset. Toggling these options can help address any shortcomings in the source file or headset/speaker you might be using.

As a gaming device, the Flare X also outperforms its price point. In Modern Combat 5, framerates and responsiveness are great at Medium graphics settings. It’s even better when playing Real Racing 3, with hardly any lag or loss of framerates at all.

Battery Life

Back Cover Removed

With its Php6,999 price tag, it was a surprise that the Cherry Mobile Flare X managed to pack a 3,000mAh battery aside from its already impressive specs. As my daily driver, I would use the phone mostly at home, checking text messages and emails, reading news feeds, and browsing the web while constantly connected to WiFi. When I’m at home, I make sure I’m only on 2G since its pointless to be on 4G/3G if you’re not using data.

Battery

However, I do have to leave the house every now and then, be it for a quick errand to get food or an event that I have to attend. On those occasions that I do leave the house, I’ll turn on data and enable 4G/LTE so I’m still connected. I usually end up using mobile data and 4G/LTE anywhere from 1 to5 hours a day, and the Flare X still manages to last a day before it needs to be recharged.

Battery Life

In my opinion, a smartphone should last at least 13 hours, allowing for an 8 hour work day plus the lunch hour, as well as 4 hours of commute time back and forth. If a phone can’t last at least that long, that means you need to charge it at least once at work for it to last until you get home. I tracked my Flare X’s battery life using an app that monitors how quickly the battery drops per percentage point. The phone manages to last 28 hours and 53 minutes per full charge. I’d say it passes with flying colors in this regard.

So Should You Buy the Cherry Mobile Flare X?

Flare X Propped Up on Boompods

Year after year since the original Flare, there has been at least one Flare successor that gave the rest of the local competition a run for its money. This year is the year of the Cherry Mobile Flare X. Don’t let its unassuming plastic construction deceive you. This is a phone without weaknesses and there isn’t an area where it under-performs. And at Php6,999, it’s more affordable than competing smartphones with the same specs.

Cherry Mobile Flare X Specs

  • 5.5″ Full HD IPS display (1080 x 1920 resolution, 401ppi), protected by Gorilla Glass 3
  • 64-bit 1.7GHz MediaTek MT6752 octa-core processor
  • Mali T760 GPU
  • Android 4.4 KitKat
  • 3GB RAM
  • 16GB internal storage, expandable via microSD
  • 13mp autofocus rear-facing camera with LED flash and Sony IMX214 BSI sensor
  • 5mp front camera
  • 4G/LTE
  • WiFi
  • Bluetooth
  • GPS
  • 3,000mAh battery
  • Price: Php6,999

9 thoughts on “Cherry Mobile Flare X Review: Is This 2015’s Budget Smartphone to Beat?

  1. nice review. how about taking videos on flare x? hows the quality? waiting for its availability in Cebu. thanks — aj, cebu

    1. Thanks! I’ll try to upload some sample videos,but the video quality is reasonably good as well

    1. nice specs, but after sales and durability issues still holds me back from getting another Cherry again

  2. proud owner of FX…. actually if your using a JAIYU S3 firmware (brand name in other countries) it rates around 45000 in antutu.. on par with note 4

  3. Bakit puro 1.3Ghz nalang ang benta ngayon? wala ng 1.7ghz? sa lazada at itruemart puro 1.3 ang meron

  4. Hi Everyone! I’m planning to buy this phone pero nagwawonder ako if compatible ba sya sa VR(virtual reality)? basically ang question ko is meron ba tong gyroscope ? 🙂 thanks kung may sasagot 😀

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.