Micromax was one brand that was projected as the Indian warrior to take on the Chinese invasion. The brand was quite aggressive two or three years back, however, off lately it has lost its charm and become dormant for quite a time.
But, it seems that it is accumulating all its energy to strike back at its competition with a slew of recent launches and many more in the pipeline. And, Micromax Infinity N11 and N12 are its current weapons for this heated battle. The Infinity N12 comes with a price tag of Rs and it will be available for purchase from the offline domain. However, the question here is: Will it save the company’s sinking ship? We got the chance to spent some time with the device and this is what we think of it.
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Design and Display
Starting with the design, Micromax Infinity N12 is surely a distinctive looking smartphone its price point. At a time when most of the phones resemble one way or the other, this phone stands out of the crowd with its dual-tone finish. We got the Blue variant, which has a mix of purple and Blue, giving a premium look to the device. However, the glossy back panel is not made of glass, but polycarbonate. After all not all shiny thing is gold! Right? That said, the phone still finds its inspiration from the Chinese player’s mid-range smartphone (Huawei Nova 3i, ring a bell?).
Quickly briefing about its design aesthetics, the front sports a large screen and there is a notch at the top, which makes it the first phone from Micromax to sport a notched screen. The notch houses usual array of Sensors coupled with an earpiece and front-facing camera. The right side bears power on/off button, while the left features volume controls. We felt that the placement of buttons was a bit higher than our liking as one need to stretch the finger to reach power and volume buttons. The top of the phone houses dual-SIM slot, while at the base, you will find speaker grille, Micro USB port and 3.5mm audio jack.
The back panel of the device features dual-camera setup with one camera sitting at the top-left corner, while the other placed inside a capsule-like design, which sometimes disguises it as a triple-camera setup. There is a fingerprint sensor at the top-centre position, while the Micromax branding is at the bottom left corner. That said, the Micromax Infinity N12 is comfortable to hold and looks beautiful despite facing a eerily similar design language with another phone.
Moving to the display, Micromax Infinity N12 features a 6.18-inch HD+ display with a screen Resolution of 1520 x 720 pixels. The display looks bright, though it lacks some sharpness. The viewing angles are decent, however, we noticed that the screen emits a warmer colour tone and there is no option to change the colour temperature. So, we guess you need to make yourself comfortable with that. We will talk more about this in our upcoming review.
Hardware and Software
On the hardware front, the Micromax Infinity N12 is powered by a MediaTek Helio P22 octa-core Processor clocked at 2.0GHz. The smartphone is backed by a 3GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage. The memory can be further expanded with a help of microSD card slot. Although it is too early to comment on the performance of the device, looking at the sheer specs sheet, it is certain that Infinity N12 will face a tough competition from Xiaomi Redmi 6, Lenovo K9 and Realme 2.
On the software front, the phone runs on Android 8.1 Oreo with the company’s custom user interface running on top of it. The UI comes with latest December security patch, which is a good thing. Coming to the user interface, the company has now opted for a close-to-stock look and feel, which is a good move in our opinion. The UI looks minimalistic and easy to use, though it is not free of bloatware. You get few apps like Facebook, Paytm, M Browser and more with the latest UI. We will discuss in detailed in our upcoming review.
Camera
For optics, the Micromax Infinity N12 employs a dual-camera setup at the rear that comes with a combination of 13-megapixel primary sensor and a 5-megapixel secondary lens. For the front, there is a 16-megapixel shooter for selfies and video calling. Starting with the camera UI, it is neat and just above the shutter button, you will find different modes like Video, Photo, Beauty, Face Cute and Bokeh.
Talking about camera performance, in our initial testing we found out that the phone takes some noticeable amount of time to process the image clicked. The results are also not satisfactory as the images lack some detailing and the colours look dull. In low light condition, the photos came out to be blurry in nature and the detailing went for a complete toss. We will reserve our final judgement as we need to take a couple of more shots under different lighting conditions.
Battery and Connectivity
On the battery front, the phone is backed by a 4000mAh battery, which should ideally last a day or more under normal usage. On the connectivity front, the phone features 4G VoLTE, Bluetooth 4.2, WiFi, GPS, GLONASS, dual-SIM, microSD card slot, 3.5mm Audio Jack and microUSB port.