Beebom
Rating9
Lava Virat Curve 5G knows how to work the pitch. It stands out with a sleek curved design, a practical rear mini screen, bloatware-free software, and a battery like Dravid that plays a long game. Sure, it needs some polishing in the camera department, and the charging speed leaves you waiting in the pavilion. In a market where good mid-rangers are getting harder to find, Lava has played a stellar inning and punched above its weight.
Pros
- Attractive design
- Sharp and responsive display
- Decent performance for the price
- Clean Android experience
- Long-lasting battery life
- Useful secondary display
Cons
- Camera processing needs improvements
- Low brightness for outdoor use
Lava Virat Curve 5G feels like another strong player in Lava's lineup. This one impresses with sleek looks, and its mini rear display is an attention-grabber. But is that enough to warrant its price? I have been testing the phone for a week now to find out the truth, and after throwing many curveballs at it, I will answer whether or not the Virat series has a hat trick up its sleeve in this Lava Virat Curve 5G review.
Lava Virat Curve 5G Unboxing
Lava Virat Curve 5G will put a smile on your face with the included accessories, as it covers all essentials. Here's what you get in the box:
- Lava Virat Curve 5G smartphone
- Textured colour-matched case
- Pre-applied screen protector
- USB Type C to C cable
- 33W charging adapter
- SIM ejector tool
- Paperwork
Before moving on with the review, I recommend checking out the key specs of the Virat Curve.
Lava Virat Curve 5G Key Details
Note: Our testing, opinion, and rating for this review are based on the phone's launch price. We recommend checking the current price before making a purchase decision.
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Design and Build
- 8.55 mm thickness, 184 grams weight
- Plastic build, vegan leather back
- IP 64 dust and water protection, MIL-STD-810H certification
I have been using the Heritage Indigo colour variant of the Lava Virat Curve 5G for this review, and like the batsman it shares a name with, the phone sports an attractive design. It has a curved front and back, which gives the illusion of a very slim design even though it is 8.5 mm thick.
Plus, the curvature also makes the phone very easy to hold, and I am loving the in-hand feel. Some of it is because of the design, and some credit goes to the vegan leather back, which makes the Virat Curve very grippy and doesn't attract any fingerprints either.
I've taken the phone with me on late-night walks, and even after hours of clutching the device, I didn't have a single reason to complain about its design or build. I can't ignore that the phone bears some resemblance to the Moto Edge 60 Pro, a device I showered with compliments for its look and feel, and the same applies to the Lava Virat Curve too.
The phone has a plastic construction, but I never felt insecure about its build quality. It has military-grade certification, which means it can survive minor drops. It is IP64-rated for protection against dust and accidental splashes of water.
If you haven't noticed already, there's a mini display right beneath the cameras, which is one of the better placements for a screen on the back. It can show time, charge level and even a custom message that you can set in the software. It can even light up to show notifications from other apps.
I found it more helpful than I expected going in, since it could show which apps I received an alert from without picking up the phone. And certainly it is more customisable than Pixel's HiLight feature. But as of now, it only shows the icon of the app you are receiving a notification from, not the entire message itself.
I also liked that the power and volume buttons are easily accessible and not one with the frame like the Lava Virat V1 5G. But sadly, there's no headphone jack here like the previous models in the series.
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Display and Audio Quality
- 6.67-inch (1080 x 2400) FHD+ Curved AMOLED Display
- Dragontrail Glass protection, 120 Hz refresh rate
- 1100 nits of peak brightness (claimed by the brand)
The display is the X factor of the phone, featuring a curved Full HD+ AMOLED screen. And like the design, it is a sharp screen with vivid colour output and true black tones. It has a slight blue tint, but I could easily fix it in the display colour settings.
During my Lava Virat Curve 5G review period, I binged a couple of my old favourite movies like Knives Out, The Prestige and Transformers, and I found that it not only supports HDR but also 10-bit colour output. So the picture quality was very enjoyable. Especially comparing it to some other devices I have reviewed in the segment, like the OnePlus CE 6 Lite or Poco X8, which didn't have HDR support.
And since it is a 120 Hz screen, swiping and scrolling felt smooth throughout my usage. However, the curved screen did create a hassle for me, as my hand would accidentally make contact with the screen, and I would need to tiptoe around the corners to make sure it didn't happen again. Using the supplied case fixed the issue, but it is worth knowing about.
The outdoor brightness is a little too low for AMOLED standards. I regularly found myself trying to slide the brightness only to find that it had been maxed out. So, I had to shade it with my hands to check the display when I was outdoors in sunlight.
Finally, the speakers are pleasantly loud enough to fill up a small room without any issues. But even though it is a stereo setup, the bottom speaker is doing 90% of the work.
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Performance Tested
- MediaTek Dimensity 7100 processor
- 6 GB LPDDR5 RAM, 128 GB UFS 2.2 storage
The Lava Virat Curve 5G comes with a MediaTek Dimensity 7100 processor, also seen on the Infinix Note Edge 5G. It is a capable mid-range chipset. It is bundled with 6 GB of RAM and 128 GB of storage. For everyday tasks, it serves well, and here are its benchmark results.
I couldn't test 3DMark, as it would fail to run on the phone. That could be because I am using pre-release software as of writing this review, and later updates may fix that issue.
That said, I don't have a lot of talking points for the everyday performance, as it was generally very stable. Be it my regular suite of apps like Instagram, Slack, Notion, WhatsApp, YouTube, and Spotify, everything ran smoothly, with only minor hiccups here and there.
I did notice that the memory management is somewhat aggressive, given background apps would often restart from scratch, and games would reload almost instantly if you go to the home screen and back.
Talking about games, I played BGMI and Call of Duty: Mobile during my Lava Virat Curve 5G review period, and both games support 60 FPS on the lowest graphics settings. This is on par with most phones in this segment. Gameplay was decent, with a few noticeable frame drops during intense situations, yet I managed to score three chicken dinners in a row.
The phone also didn't show any excessive signs of heating, even after an hour of being glued to the screen while gaming. I have added the gameplay settings I used during my review period.
| Game | Settings |
|---|---|
| BGMI | Smooth + Extreme (60 FPS) |
| CoD Mobile | Low + Max (60 FPS) |
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Software and Updates
- Running on Android 16
- 2 years of OS updates + 3 years of security patches
Lava always hits it out of the boundary with its software experience, and the same applies to the Virat Curve. It runs on a nearly stock Android 16 experience, with a few tastefully added customisations. Like the ability to change the fingerprint animations, enlarge folders, charging animations and more.
The software is free of bloatware apps or pre-installed junk, which is not a common sight on phones these days. This time, Lava has turned to the AI route and added its own suite of AI features, called Vayu AI. It is essentially a chatbot which you can use for language translation or to ask questions.
It's not the most original idea in 2026. But if you don't feel like talking to AI, you can play with a cute puppy in the Vayu AI app. It's Lava's version of Talking Tom, where you can pet, feed, or make it dance. I played around with it a lot during my Virat Curve 5G review period. And the best part: you can even add the cute doggo as a widget on your homescreen to cheer you up.
Lava is also promising 2 years of Android updates and 3 years of security patches, so the phone will be supported till Android 18.
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Cameras Reviewed
- 50 MP Main (Sony IMX752 Sensor), f/1.8, recording up to 2K @ 30 FPS
- 13 MP Selfie, f/2.45, video up to 1080p @ 30 FPS
Coming to the cameras, the Virat Cuvre features a single 50 MP main shooter and a 13 MP selfie camera on the front. The lack of an ultrawide lens is dearly missed, but let's see how the camera performs on the pitch.
Main Camera
The primary camera does an admirable job in daylight photos. The images I have clicked carry a natural tone and keep the highlights in check. Shadows aren't shabby either in some low-light environments, but there is too much oversharpening across multiple shots.
This is evident in the shot of the dog, the landscape shot of Connaught Place, or the Statesman building. It's especially prevalent in 2x images, as if the processing is trying to compensate for the lack of details, even when it does not need to.
I also gave a shot to the AI mode, and it adds the missing pop in colours but goes overboard with it. So, I mostly kept it off throughout my Lava Virat Curve review period.
Nighttime pictures can come out well from time to time. The shot of a cafe's outdoor seating area turned out better than I expected. There's also this shot of the lamp next to a tree where the Virat Curve did a decent job handling clarity by highlighting the leaves and the tree but overblew the exposure of the lamp. The oversharpening problem I discussed above also continues here.
Front-Facing Camera
Selfies are par for the course and produce generally good results. The portrait mode effect isn't as strong as I would have liked, but the skin tones appear natural and clean for the most part. Again, since this is tested on pre-release software, the image quality could improve with an update.
Video Quality
Video tops out at 2K @ 30 FPS, while you can record 60 FPS videos at 1080p only, like the Virat V1 Pro 5G. The front-facing camera also supports 1080p @ 30 FPS recording, and there is no OIS here, so the footage from the main camera does come off a bit shaky.
Battery Life and Charging
- 6,000mAh battery capacity
- 45W wired charging supported
- 1–100% in 1 hour and 40 minutes
The battery life lasts throughout a full day of usage, providing around 8 hours of screen-on time on average during my Lava Virat Curve 5G review period. This included mixed usage of watching movies and YouTube, taking calls and video calls, constant Slack alerts and gaming for an hour or two on the side.
I typically ended my day with 10-15% charge left in the device. So on a light usage, you can even stretch it to the next day. As for charging, the phone supports 45W charging but comes with a 33W adapter only. And with said adapter, it takes around 1 hour 40 minutes to go from 0–100%.
Lava Virat Curve 5G Review Verdict: Should You Buy It?
After putting my entire week of experience with the Lava Virat Curve 5G into this review, I can say it's a solid option in today's smartphone market. It offers solid battery life, an attractive, premium-looking design, a helpful mini display on the back, a stunning display, and a clean software experience, all of which are increasingly rare at this price point.
Lava can improve its software processing for the cameras, and the lack of OIS hurts, especially in night shots. Plus, curved phones are a debatable choice, as some prefer flat displays. But for a starting price of Rs 19,999, the Lava Virat Curve deserves the man of the match title for the value it is offering, and it is an easy recommendation from me.
