Oukitel C5 Pro Review - Cheap and Good?

First impression of the Oukitel C5 Pro

What's in the box

The smartphone is delivered in a typical Oukitel cardboard box. This includes, in addition to the smartphone, a micro-USB charging cable, a charger (5V 1A), a silicone protective cover and a user manual including a warranty card. A screen protector is already applied to the display.

Design and workmanship

Despite the small display diagonal, the smartphone looks comparatively bulky. Above all, the enormous - 4 mm - distance between the display edge and the housing frame immediately catches the eye. The housing frame itself is made of metal, while the removable back is made of plastic. The pattern on the back is interesting, as it shimmers differently depending on the incidence of light. The Oukitel C5 Pro is operated via three capacitive buttons below the display. There is also a volume rocker and the power button on the right side of the case. The loudspeaker was attached to the rear. The charging socket is also not located on the lower edge of the housing, but on the upper edge, next to the headphone jack. A notification LED is missing.

The processing is nothing to complain about. The control buttons are firmly seated in the housing. The CNC milled metal frame has no manufacturing defects and the removable back sits firmly on the frame without any gaps.

Display

The display of the Oukitel C5 Pro is both surprising and disappointing at the same time. With a diagonal of 5 inches, the display has a resolution of HD (1280 x 720 pixels). The display is extremely sharp and the colors appear saturated. The viewing angle stability is also nothing to complain about. The color intensity does not decrease even at extreme viewing angles. The sharpness and contrast are largely retained. On the other hand, the maximum display brightness is more average. In strong sunshine it is quite problematic to be able to read the display well, which is mainly due to the highly reflective screen protector.

The touch capability of the smartphone is critical. Multi-touch is supported with a maximum of two simultaneous inputs. In addition, the touchscreen is very messy when operated with two fingers. Entries are sometimes not recognized and are literally blurred.

Performance

The MediaTek MTK70 processor, which is also used in the Oukitel C6737 Pro, is typical for China smartphones under € 5. The processor has a total of 4 processor cores that clock with a maximum of 1.3 GHz. In line with the price, the storage equipment is also comparatively small. The internal memory measures just 16GB, but can be expanded with a microSD memory card. 2GB of RAM are available.

The Oukitel C5 Pro's performance is passable. The user interface can be operated as smoothly as possible, with only slight delays. However, apps start quite slowly. Performance drops are particularly noticeable when multitasking. If you have several apps open at the same time and run in the background, the weak processor and the scarce and slow RAM quickly reach their limits. The Mali-T720 GPU is responsible for games. Games like Fruit Ninja, i.e. games that are not too graphically demanding, can be played smoothly. However, this smartphone is unsuitable for more demanding games!

user interface

The smartphone is delivered with Android 6.0. The user interface was only slightly changed in direct comparison with Stock Android. The custom app icons are a major change. In the settings, functions such as gesture recognition or MiraVision have been added in some cases.

The so-called “Bagan Keyboard” was preinstalled on third-party apps as an alternative to Google GBoard. Unfortunately, this keyboard app is firmly integrated into the system and cannot be subsequently uninstalled. Updates are received OTA - i.e. over-the-air. An update to Android 7 is not yet expected.

Camera

The demands on the recording quality of the cameras of a low budget smartphone should not be too high. In fact, the image quality of the native 5 megapixel main camera (interpolated 8 megapixels) is the worst that we have seen with a smartphone for less than 70 €.

Image captures are very noisy even in good light conditions and artifacts are clearly perceptible. Due to the enormous triggering time of 2 seconds, it is very difficult to make freehand shake-free shots. In addition, the autofocus is sluggish and does not focus properly most of the time. In addition, the shots often appear overexposed and comparatively pale. In low light conditions, the images are - to put it bluntly - muddy.

The front camera, which has a native resolution of 2 megapixels (interpolated 5 megapixels), won’t win a prize either. You don't even have to think about selfies with this front camera.

connectivity

Telephony

The Oukitel C5 Pro supports all currently usable cellular standards from GSM to LTE. The LTE bands 3, 7 and 20 common in Germany are available. A maximum of two micro SIM cards can be used at the same time. The use of the dual SIM function is independent of the memory expansion. Telephoning and mobile surfing work without any problems with the Oukitel C5 Pro. The signal strength is good and the reception quality is also impressive.

Wi-Fi and Bluetooth

Also in the WLAN and with Bluetooth the smartphone copes well. The stable signal range and the data throughput rate are in good average. Only the connection to the WLAN, after the smartphone was in sleep mode for a long time, takes some time. Dual Band WiFi is not supported, but was not expected in this price range.

GPS and sensors

The smartphone finds a GPS fix quite quickly. However, the signal strength is disappointing. In several navigation tests, sometimes only 7 to a maximum of 11 satellites were received at the same time, which meant that the position was often inaccurately determined. The signal strength fluctuates enormously, especially in cities or in areas with canyons.

The sensory equipment is more than manageable. In addition to a brightness sensor, there is only a proximity sensor and an acceleration sensor. A gyroscope is missing.

Speakers and headphones

The playback quality through the loudspeaker is mediocre. The overall sound is flat. The mids are represented well, but the speaker clearly lacks the bass and the highs are also lost. The maximum volume is decent. No unpleasant scratching is noticeable at the highest volume. What was noticed in the test is a crackling noise from the speaker as soon as the smartphone is connected to the power.

The sound quality is much more convincing with the 3.5mm headphone jack. Here is the Oukitel C5 Pro at an above-average level. The sound is clean and a background noise barely audible.

Battery

This smartphone cannot collect any positive points in terms of battery life either. With a capacity of just 2.000 mAh, the battery is extremely small. A screen on time of just 5 hours is conceivable on a medium display brightness. In practice, with normal use, the battery was used up after just over 3 hours of active use. One battery charge is just enough to get through the day. The smartphone had to be charged in the early evening.

The charging time of the battery is also less pleasant. With the supplied charger, a full charge takes more than 2 ½ hours.