POCO C85 Review - Standard for affordable value?
We've been using the POCO C85 for a month now, and below is our experience with the value-focused entry-level smartphone.
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| POCO C85's two-tone design |
The POCO features a unique and eye-catching two-tone rear design with curved rear panels, a flat polycarbonate frame, and a flat screen. Inside is the immortal 12nm MediaTek Helio G81-Ultra, LPDDR4X RAM, eMMC 5.1 storage, microSD card expansion, and a 6,000mAh battery with 33W fast charging.
In the Philippines, the POCO C85 starts at PHP 5,499 for the 6GB/128GB variant.
For our review, part 1: POCO C85 Unboxing and First Impressions
Multimedia Experience
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| POCO C85's screen with a notch and bezels |
In front is a 6.9-inch LCD screen with a 1600 x 720 resolution, a 120Hz refresh rate, a 240Hz touch sampling rate, and a 260 ppi.
The panel is decent and surprisingly bright. It is bright enough to be readable under direct sunlight. The text and image produce acceptable crispness, while the color and contrast are decent.
It supports 10 multi-touch points, making it good for multitasking or games that support multiple simultaneous touch inputs. It responds quickly and accurately, but do not expect flagship-level response time.
The bezels around the panel area are asymmetrical, with the chin bezel noticeably thicker. On the top bezel is a notch and a well-hidden slim earpiece.
720p only, but with decent crispness and color
The display is okay. 720p is showing its age, but at this price point, we can't complain, especially when the panel can switch can get up to 120Hz refresh rates. We hope that next time we get a 1080p panel.
The phone is equipped with a single speaker that can be pushed up to 200 percent. At 85 percent, we were getting the best sound quality a mono speaker can offer at this price. When pushed to 200 percent, the distortion is more noticeable and can be an issue for some.
The microphone does a decent job of picking up sounds from a meter away, while the noise-cancellation for calls is somewhat acceptable.
Cameras
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| POCO C85 Rear camera |
The back features a 50MP f/1.8 main camera and an auxiliary camera with an LED flash.
The included modes of the stock camera app include Photo, Video, Portrait, Night, Time-lapse, and Ultra-HD.
Unfortunately, it does not have a Pro mode.
The Portrait Mode only allows bokeh customization from f/1.0 to f/16.
Rear Camera Samples
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| POCO C85's rear camera daylight 1x |
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The images from the main camera at 1x are decent. The sharpness and detail are decent, while the colors pop. When zooming in to the 2x crop mode, the details, colors, and contrast are retained.
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| POCO C85 rear camera portrait |
The phone can take portrait shots with decent edge detection. It only struggled with fine hair fibers. The bokeh looks slightly artificial but it does the job of isolating the subject.
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Indoors, the images from the 1x crop are consistent in daylight, where the sharpness and details are decent, while the colors pop. We did notice that light sources such as lamps tend to overexpose easily.
While the 2x crop image indoors is softer and the colors are inaccurate because of noise reduction.
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For low light, the 1x and 2x cameras produced an image with vibrant color but with significantly less detail, and it is soft. The light sources were overexposed as well. We also notice a noticeable increase in grain in the shadow areas.
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There is a night mode, but we only recommend it if the main subject is not moving. It improved the sharpness and reduced some of the noise on the 1x and 2x images.
Overall, the rear main camera has produced consistently okay images. In daylight, the 1x images are decently sharp and detailed, while the color is vibrant. The indoors and low-light images remained soft because of the buildup of noise and grain, and because of the noise reduction. The night mode helps, but only when the subject is not moving.
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| POCO C85 Selfie Camera |
The 8MP f/2.0 selfie camera is on the notch.
Surprisingly, the camera modes of the rear camera are the same as the selfie camera. It includes Photo, Video, Portrait, Night, Time-lapse, and Ultra-HD.
Selfie Camera Samples
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The edge detection in portrait mode is decent, but it struggles with capturing single strands of hair. The bokeh has a nice blur, but it feels unnatural. Like the daylight selfie, the colors are accurate.
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Indoor selfies have more noise and grain, but only soften the sharpness and detail by a little bit.
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Like indoor selfies, the low-light selfies have more grain and noise, which has affected not only the sharpness and detail but also the colors. But it is way better than we expected.
Overall, the front cameras produced selfies with okay quality. The sharpness and detail are good in daylight, but the skin tones and white balance are skewed. It also struggled in low-light selfies.
The rear and front cameras can record up to 1080p at 30fps. The footage is soft and shaky with noticeable grain and noise, while the color accuracy is a mixed bag. This phone wouldn't be our first choice for video recording, but it is there when you need it.
Performance
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| POCO C85 AnTuTu and GeekBench results |
Inside the POCO C85 is the 12nm MediaTek Helio G81 octa-core processor, Mali-G52 MC2 GPU, 6GB/8GB LPDDR4X RAM, and 128GB/256GB eMMC 5.1 storage. It managed to score 272,913 in AnTuTu, 408 in GeekBench Single-core, and 1,375 in GeekBench Multi-Core tests.
During the AnTuTu test, the phone's temperature increased by 4 degrees Celsius while the battery lost 4 percent power. The phone managed to temperature rise well with the minimal increase,
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In 3DMark, it scored 635 overall with an average of 3.81 fps. This is expected in the price range.
POCO C85 benchmarks:
- AnTuTu - 272,913
- Geekbench 6 - 408 (single-core), 1,375 (multi-core)
- CPDT - 200.48 MB/s sequential read speeds and 170.64 MB/s sequential write speeds
- 3DMark - 635 overall score with an average FPS of 3.81
The benchmark scores are within the range of what is expected in its price range. However, the chipset has been around for years and could easily be outdated once a better chip arrives.
Decent, but don't expect too much
The new 12nm CPU and GPU performance offer decent burst performance, and the phone's ability to dissipate heat well allowed for longer play sessions with consistent frame rates.
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| POCO C85 Call of Duty: Mobile Graphics |
Our takeaway is that when playing games, the POCO C85 can handle lightweight games well but will struggle with more demanding games.
In Call of Duty: Mobile, the POCO C85 managed to unlock the low graphics settings and medium frame rate. In our experience, it remained consistently playable for the first few hours of gameplay. It warmed up, but by a few degrees only. Never alarmingly hot.
In our experience, the phone can handle basic features such as navigating through the UI, opening and playing music, and switching between apps. It struggles with higher bit-rate media viewing or video capture.
The phone has a side-mounted fingerprint sensor and face unlock for security. The initial setup and subsequent uses are quick, and it detects our biometrics instantaneously. It works even if your finger is a little sweaty.
The face unlock only struggles when the camera is dirty. The screen brightens up when used in the dark. It detects the face and unlocks the phone super fast, too.
Regarding connectivity, we have the following: WiFi, 4G, Bluetooth, NFC, OTG, GPS, and dualSIM.
Connections are usually stable for WiFi, and we get 4 to 5 bars of mobile data signal most of the time.
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| POCO C85 PCMark Battery test result |
Inside the phone is a larger 6,000 mAh battery, and in our usual PCMark Battery Benchmark, it lasted for 19 hours and 28 minutes. This is inconsistent with our actual use, where we managed to get under 8 hours of on-screen time after being connected to WiFi and 4G data all day. We would unplug the phone at 8AM and end the day at 10PM with 30 to 35 percent battery each day.
The battery charges via USB-C with the 33W wall charger, which charges the phone 100 percent in an hour. It does not have wireless charging.
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| POCO C85's HyperOS 2.0 home screen and app drawer |
It is running on HyperOS 2.0, based on Android 15. It comes preloaded with first-party and third-party apps that may or may not include ads.
Visually, it is one of the best from HyperOS yet, but there are a lot of pre-installed apps, including third-party apps. Some can be uninstalled, but some can only be disabled.
Pros - Eye-catching design, lightweight, large 120Hz 6.9-inch screen, 3.5mm audio jack, long battery life
Cons - Low light camera performance, mono speaker, HyperOS 2.0 is sluggish on this phone
POCO C85 Specs
Display: 6.9-inch LCD screen w/ 120Hz refresh rate, 240Hz touch sampling rate, HD+ 1600 x 720 resolution at 260 ppi
CPU: 2.0GHz 12nm MediaTek Helio G81-Ultra octa-core processor
GPU: Mali-G52 MC2
RAM: 6GB/8GB LPDDR4X
ROM: 128GB/256GB eMMC 5.1 expandable via microSD card slot
Back Camera: 50MP f/1.8 + auxiliary lens + LED flash
Selfie Camera: 8MP f/2.0
Battery: 6,000mAh w/ 33W fast charging
OS: Android 15 w/ HyperOS 2.0
Connectivity: WiFi (2.4GHz/5GHz), 4G LTE, Bluetooth, NFC, GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, BeiDou, dual SIM (hybrid)
Sensors: Accelerometer, light, proximity, compass
Others: Side fingerprint sensor, face unlock, USB-C, Colors: Black, Purple, Green
Dimensions: 171.56 x 79.47 x 7.99 mm
Weight: 205 g
Price: PHP 5,499 (6GB/128GB), PHP 6,499 (8GB/256GB)
Verdict
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| POCO C85 websurfing |
We are happy with the two-tone design, build materials, and the battery life of the POCO C85.
The display may be just 720p, but the fast 120Hz refresh rate, the vibrant colors, and the bright screen make up for it.
It uses a 12nm SoC that makes it good for what it was designed for: calls, texts, messaging, web surfing, music, and video consumption. It also has a 3.5mm audio jack and a single speaker.
We managed to play for a decently long time with Call of Duty Mobile on the POCO C85. It was very playable and stable. If the game were more demanding, the phone struggles.
The battery life is the major highlight, lasting more than 19 hours in PCMark Battery Benchmark and consistently getting under 8 hours of onscreen time per charge.
Our main concerns with the phone such as the middling camera performance, 4G only, and the mono speaker.
The camera performance of both the rear camera and front-facing camera is consistent, where it takes decent daylight photos but struggles in low light. Night mode helps, but only to non-moving subjects.
We recommend the POCO C85 for people who want an eye-catching phone that has long battery life and decent performance for non-demanding tasks without breaking the bank.
But if you can spend a bit more, you can opt for the POCO M7 with an even bigger 7,000mAh battery and faster Snapdragon 685 SoC for better overall performance.
What do you think, guys?
Build/Design - 3.75
Multimedia Experience - 4.0
Cameras - 3.0
Performance - 3.75
Average - 3.625/5
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