Vivo T4 5G Review: So Close to Excellence!

If you're reading this, chances are you are hunting for the best value for money phone under Rs 20,000, and the Vivo T4 5G has come under your radar. You're not wrong, it's been a popular choice thanks to its massive 7300 mAh battery, wrapped in a thin body with a fabulous display to complement it. But underneath all that glimmer, there are some issues that I have come to realise after using the phone for a week. So let me take you through the pros and cons of the Vivo T4 5G in this review. 

Vivo T4 5G: Unboxing 

Even though it is a budget smartphone, I am glad that the Vivo T4 5G comes with all the necessities in the box itself. Here's a list of everything you get: 

Vivo T4 5G: Design and Build 

The engineers at Vivo might have been alumni of Hogwarts, because there is some wizardry going on with its design. When I picked up the phone, I could not believe for a second that it packs a 7,300 mAh battery inside. It weighs just as much as similarly-sized phones like the Redmi Note 14 Pro Plus or OnePlus Nord CE5.

It's not even that thick, and the curved frame is easy to grip despite the phone's large footprint. I had no issues keeping it in my jeans pocket or carrying it around in the stress of the last-minute Diwali shopping. It's also well-built, not just because of the IP65 rating, but the build feels really solid to me, and no part of the phone seems hollow or creaky.  

But I also can't deny that this design looks premium, like the flagship Vivo X100, and I guess that is what the company was going for. However, I am not a fan of the glossy polycarbonate back that Vivo has gone with on the T4 5G. It makes the phone slightly slippery, and the huge circular camera bump feels completely unnecessary since it only features one main and one depth camera. I wish Vivo T4 5G had a more practical design, like the Oppo K13 I reviewed recently. 

Vivo T4 5G: Display Quality 

Apart from the battery, I must say that the display of the Vivo T4 5G is one of its biggest highlights. This is a quad-curved 1.5K AMOLED panel, which produces vibrant, sharp and punchy colours. The large panel is great for watching movies on OTT platforms, scrolling Instagram for hours, playing games, or anything else in between. 

I've been enjoying this screen a lot during my review period, binging shows like Dan Da Dan and Detective Conan. The colours are slightly saturated, but they pop well on the screen. If you want a natural look, you can pick the Standard option in the Display settings. Netflix's Dark, which is mostly set at night, looks great on the 10-bit panel. It's one of the best phones under Rs 25,000 with such good display quality. 

Even in brightness, I would rate this screen pretty, as the screen was easily readable as I took it out in the sun. That being said, the single speaker cripples the entertainment experience on the Vivo T4 5G. It can go up to 200% volume, but still sounds flat, and creaks at loud levels. 

The most annoying part is the in-display fingerprint scanner, which is tiny and has issues reading fingerprints. More often than not, I have to try multiple times to scan my finger, and it still fails. Finally getting fed up with this, I resorted to Face scan, which is less secure but works almost every time.  

Vivo T4 5G: Performance Tested 

The Vivo T4 5G comes with the tried and tested Snapdragon 7s Gen 3, which we also saw on the Nothing Phone (3a). Before getting to my experience, here are the benchmark numbers of the Vivo T4.

It is by no means a performance-centric chipset, but it still helps me get by day-to-day tasks without any issues at a constant 120 Hz refresh rate. Whether it's checking emails, browsing X, texting on WhatsApp or Instagram, or even casual gaming, it handles most of the stuff like a champ. 

In gaming, it is somewhat competent. Genshin Impact, on the lowest graphics and 30 FPS, plays pretty well, but pushing it to 60 FPS starts showing stutters and frame drops. BGMI only supports "Smooth graphics" at 60 FPS, which can be a dealbreaker for dedicated players. But Call of Duty: Mobile supports 90 FPS in multiplayer and battle royale. 

I played 4-5 team deathmatches every day during the review period, and the phone handled the gaming quite well. I thank Vivo's optimisations and the game acceleration for this experience. 

Vivo T4: Software and Updates 

The Vivo T4 5G comes with Funtouch OS 15. The same UI that the entire tech Twitter loves to hate. But hear me out, it is a functional user interface with pretty much everything you can ask for. It's easy to use, has a ton of customisation options to tweak the fingerprint, charging and even USB insertion animations. 

Yes, it doesn't have fancy animations, blur effects or anything that Apple is doing, but it gets the job done. And if you are not biased to any OS, then you won't have any issues using it. And even if you hate Funtouch OS, you just have to wait for a few months to get all the new OriginOS 6 features on the Vivo T4.

The only issue I have is with the adware and bloatware. There's a lot of it, and you will have to delete it if you want a clean, no-nonsense experience. 

Vivo T4: Camera Tested

While on paper it says 2, there's only a single camera at the back of the Vivo T4 5G. This 50 MP shooter was my main camera phone during this Diwali season, and after using it for a week, I think it gets the job done. The shots I have taken come out decent, with a good amount of detail and vibrant colours. That's another way of saying that they look artificially boosted. So the results are great if you want to share the shots on social media. 

There's also a Natural Colour option at the top of the camera viewfinder, which you can toggle to get more accurate, true-to-life images. Even zooming into 2x can offer some good close-up results.

Nighttime shots also come out pretty good-looking. The results have ample details, and the light sources aren't overblown, something that devices like the CMF Phone 2 Pro tend to do. The selfie scene isn't too shabby either. The photos come out well-lit and sharp, but skin smoothing is applied by default. It is not very aggressive but still noticeable.  

In videos, the Vivo T4 5G can shoot up to 4K videos at 30 FPS and 1080p at 60 FPS from the main shooter. The front camera is stuck at 30 FPS in both resolutions. 

Vivo T4 5G: Battery Life and Charging 

The star of the show is, of course, the behemoth 7,300 mAh battery that resides inside this phone. And like an Elder Ring enemy, it refuses to die. Throughout my review period, I consistently got two days of battery life. Even on the heaviest of days, when I was running benchmarks, playing games, and watching movies, I got a screen time of 9 hours. 

In our ultimate battery test, the Vivo T4 5G was the last standing device with over 14 hours of screen time. It only lost 6% battery while watching a movie from start to finish, and 11% on a one-hour-long video call with the relatives. Because of this excellent battery life, the Vivo T4 5G ranks high as the best battery phone under Rs 25,000. 

It also charges superfast with the included 90W charger. going from 0-100% in just 60 minutes. So if battery is the only aspect you care about, then you have a winner.

Bottom Line: Should You Get the Vivo T4?

Buying a phone around Rs 20,000 is always a pick-and-choose game, and that's the case with the Vivo T4 5G. After using this phone for a week, I can see why it is so popular in the segment. The battery life is so good that it spoils you, the design is neat, and the display is excellent. But the flat-sounding speaker, fingerprint scanner issues, and a single camera are problems I can't gloss over. 

I am not asking for the best camera phone, but Vivo could have at least included an 8MP ultrawide lens. At Rs 20,999, the Vivo T4 5G is a good pick if you want the best battery phone and can settle for the single camera experience. But if you want more and can compromise on the battery life, then there are other good options like the Redmi Note 14 Pro Plus, the OnePlus Nord CE 3, that you can look into.