The competition is tough and companies like Xiaomi and Lenovo are offering powerful smartphones in this segment. Coolpad Note 5 Lite has a lot to challenge these devices. Will this phone be successful in the market? Let’s find out in the review.
Coolpad Note 5 Lite Design
The Coolpad Note 5 Lite is a good looking device and is available in Space Grey colour. The company claims that it is made of metal unibody, but it doesn’t feel premium. The frame and buttons feel like plastic to touch.
There are power and volume buttons on the other side of the body. The power button is well placed and easy to use. This phone comes with a hybrid dual SIM tray, which means two SIM cards or one SIM card and one microSD card can be used simultaneously.
The display of the Coolpad Note 5 Lite has a 2.5D glass. We would recommend you to use an adapter for screen protection on the phone. There are three capacitive buttons below the display which are arranged in the reverse order of Google’s stock layout. These buttons are not backlit and are difficult to use in the dark.
The rear of the phone is curved at the edges, making it comfortable to hold. The camera is placed at the centre of the rear with an LED flash next to it. The Note 5 Lite has a fingerprint sensor below the camera and a loudspeaker. There is a small plastic tab below the loudspeaker so that the sound is not muffled when the phone is placed on a flat surface.
Coolpad Note 5 Lite specifications and software
The Coolpad Note 5 Lite has a 5-inch display that comes with a resolution of 720×1280 pixels and looks crisp. The resolution of the display is good but the colour reproduction is not very accurate. Everything looks washed out. If you have ever used an AMOLED display, it will take you some time to get used to this display.
This phone has budget level specifications. The Coolpad Note 5 Lite is powered by a MediaTek 6735 processor that runs at 1.4GHz. The processor is a bit old and the Note 5 Lite lags behind the rival phones that have Qualcomm Snapdragon 425 and 430 processors. Coolpad could have used the newer MT6737 processor, which is used in the more expensive Asus Zenfone 3S Max.
This phone has 3GB of RAM and we always found more than 1GB of RAM free in the phone. The inbuilt storage is 16GB which can be expanded up to 64GB via microSD card. Keep in mind that in case of using a second SIM, you will have to make do with limited storage.
On the software front, the Coolpad Note 5 Lite runs on Android Marshmallow based Cool UI. The UI is quite different when compared to the popular stock Android. There are quick toggles in a separate panel. Just like iOS, swiping up from the bottom of the screen will open a separate panel while the notification shade can be accessed by swiping down from the top in the usual way. There is no app drawer and all the apps installed are visible on the home screen. The smartphone comes with Xuemei Weather, Xplore Keyboard and TouchPal Keyboard.
The command center of the device is the Cool Manager app and it lets you set the functions according to your needs. It provides RAM, permissions and battery management in one interface which is very useful. For battery management, there are pre-set modes of Normal, Outdoor and Ultra. Apart from this, there is also a Cool Store where users will find deals from e-commerce sites and you can also download popular games and apps from here. The good thing is that it does not give spam notifications.
Coolpad Note 5 Lite Camera
The Note 5 Lite has a 13-megapixel camera on the rear with an LED flash. It comes with an aperture of f/2.2. The camera app has been customized by Coolpad and has a few other options. The phone has a Pro mode that offers manual controls, a Beautify mode and a separate Night mode.
Beautify can improve photos by removing blemishes. Night mode keeps the shutter open for longer. If you keep your hands steady, photos taken in low light turn out better than normal mode.
The camera app on the Coolpad Note 5 Lite also offers the option to record GIFs and panoramas. The phone has an HDR mode that can be enabled on auto or during each photo capture. The Note 5 can record videos at up to 720p. Focus can be adjusted by tapping the screen during recording.
Photos taken with Coolpad Note 5 Lite are good. You need to keep your hands steady while taking pictures, else they turn out blurry. There is a delay in taking pictures when HDR mode is on. Any movement while taking a picture in HDR mode turns the picture into a ghost image. Close-up shots are good and sharp in good light.
Coolpad Note 5 Lite has an 8-megapixel front camera with flash. Beautify mode is activated by default when using the front camera. It has fixed focus but can be shared directly on social media. Selfie flash helps when taking pictures in low light.
Coolpad Note 5 Lite performance
The Note 5 Lite did not do much better and it lagged behind the Snapdragon 430 processor powered Redmi 3S Prime (Review). Apart from this, the recently launched low-cost Redmi 4A also left the Note 5 behind.
We also played games on the Coolpad Note 5 Lite and the results were satisfactory. We loaded Asphalt 8 and Real Racing 3 and it took longer than usual to load but there was no problem in playing. The phone did not heat up despite playing games for a long time. Although the phone felt warm to the touch, it was not uncomfortable to hold.
The Coolpad Note 5 Lite has a 2500mAh non-removable battery. It is powered by a MediaTek 6735 processor and the phone battery lasts for a day with normal use. In our HD video loop test, the phone’s battery lasted for 9 hours and 7 minutes. During GPS navigation for about an hour, the battery was drained by 20 percent but the phone did not heat up too much, which is a good sign. In case the battery gets discharged, the 7.5 watt charger that comes in the box charges the phone from 0 to 100 percent in about two hours and half an hour.
The fingerprint scanner on the Coolpad Note 5 Lite is well placed and is one of the fastest scanners on a phone of this price range. Different fingerprints can be set for different user accounts, allowing you to unlock the phone with the appropriate fingerprint and switch between work and personal accounts. You can also use the fingerprint sensor to lock apps, answer an incoming call, record a call, turn off the display, and more.
Our verdict
The Coolpad Note 5 Lite is currently in a price segment where a new smartphone enters every week. There are high expectations from the phone and it seems to be a good option compared to some other big brand phones. However, it will still face tough competition from Chinese companies, especially the Xiaomi Redmi 3S.
There are a few things that are really good about the phone. The Note 5 Lite has a good build quality. It has 3GB of RAM and a fingerprint scanner. The only drawback is the MediaTek processor which makes the phone run slow. But if you are tired of trying your luck in Xiaomi’s flash sales, the Note 5 is a good affordable option.