Sony Xperia Z3 review
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Our Verdict
An improvement over the Z2, but not a huge one. It does pack a great, bright screen but needs to be better packaged to fight the best on the market.
- For
Brilliant battery
PS4 Remote Play is brilliant
Premium build
- Against
Bugs in the operating system
4K still doesn't work properly
The Sony Xperia Z3 isn't a phone that you'd have thought would make a lot of sense. After all, the Xperia Z2 was a nifty little handset and yet it's now been replaced barely six months later.
The
new phone, from the outside at least, doesn't seem to add much more
into the mix, merely improving things a little more and tweaking
elements that were already pretty good. So has Sony really done enough?
The Xperia Z3, which lands alongside a new tablet and mini phone to complete the family (the Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact and the Xperia Z3 Compact), is a really good phone that does it all, on paper at least.
Sony
told me that the reason these flagships are coming thick and fast is
simply because it wants to start making waves in the high-end smartphone
market, and the way to do that is always offer the best innovation.
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That's
perhaps true, and perhaps customers won't get too confused by seeing a
new phone on the shelves and advertised all the time, but there's no
doubt it kills the lustre that might have been built by users having to
wait a year to get the best of Sony in a smartphone.
It needs to
work as well - while Sony does OK in some markets (it's still got a lot
of fans in the UK, for example) the profits are dipping in the
smartphone business, and something needs to be done to arrest the slide.
So
is the Xperia Z3 that phone? It does come in attractive colours (white,
black, copper gold and 'silver green') and has a shrunken frame,
improved camera and that all important Sony PS4 Remote Play
compatibility.
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Those
things alone would be good enough for most, and the IP68 rating (which
might not really change the way 99% of people use their phone) is at
least a good 'peace of mind' marketing tool.
But what about when the new Xperia Z4 lands on shelves? Surely this model will be seen as clumsy and outdated too, despite a lower price point?
The
rumours of the Xperia Z4 have been heating up really quick and we'll
likely see the handset on shelves by the end of the year.
The
latest rumours suggest it'll be a much bigger update than between the
Xperia Z2 and Xperia Z3, especially if it comes toward the end of the
year as that'll be almost a year after the Xperia Z3 was released.
Design
The design of the Sony Xperia Z3 is something that surprised me from the word go - I didn't expect to be as impressed as I am.
This
is a phone that has dimensions of 146 x 72 x 7.3 mm, which compared to
the Sony Xperia Z2 (146.8 x 73.3 x 8.2 mm) doesn't seem all that
different.
But the slightly shrunken nature of the chassis is very
nice indeed (especially the millimeter thickness shaved off the phone),
and something that I really want to laud the brand for.
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The
ergonomics still don't quite impress - this is, after all, a slab of
light-feeling glass encased in a metal band, and the flat edges make it
slightly harder to hold and grip (and easier to drop, as I did a couple
of times).
But in terms of aesthetics, it somehow impresses me
every time I look at it. Yes, the bezels above and below the display
aren't anything to get excited about (they're just too large to look
nice, but presumably pack some important components) but the overall
package looks premium.
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The
copper colour I had on test is also something I didn't expect to like -
after all, this is really a brown phone - but it again seems to exude a
quality that belies the slightly lower price tag.
On top of that,
the edges have been rounded to make holding the phone an altogether
more pleasant experience. I wasn't expecting to feel much difference
between this and the Z2 given the similarity in dimensions, so this was a
nice surprise.
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Why the dock connector?
The
rest of the phone is largely as expected: the Omnibalance key at the
side is pretty easy to strike, and although the volume key is positioned
just below and theoretically too close, the larger size of the phone
makes it easy enough to differentiate in the hand.
I do hate that
Sony keeps putting a dock connector on the left-hand side of the device -
this confuses in the hand, feeling a bit like the volume key, and I
can't see that it's something many people would actually use given the
smaller sales of such aftermarket accessories.
Then there are the
port covers. We clearly need these to make sure the phone is fully
waterproof of course, but the problem here is that they ever so slightly
stick out, even when pressed in as hard as possible.
The main
culprit is the cover for the microSD and SIM card (which is now a nano
option, showing Sony is starting to fall in line with the rest of the
industry) which just protrudes slightly and therefore ruins the sleek,
premium air the Sony Xperia Z3 has.
The port covers just don't stay flush
The
other change to the design is the nylon covers in the corners of the
phone - apparently these are cleverly added to stop the phone looking so
damaged. According to Sony, most phones land on these corners when
dropped, so putting the covers on helps stop the tarnished metal.
Except,
well, it doesn't. The corners on my review device are fine, but even
before dropping the phone later in the test, there were already two
small nicks in the metal band in just over a week.
This is the same thing we saw with the iPhone 5,
and anyone that's owned one of those and kept it out of a case will see
the scratched up monstrosities that some people are walking around
with.
I don't think the Xperia Z3 will suffer to quite that degree, but it's interesting to see the effect happening so quickly.
The
front facing speakers are worth a mention here too. Not only do they
help to justify the oversized bezels, they also provide some pretty good
and rich sound.
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While not in the same league as the HTC One M8, the smaller and more discreet design will appeal to those that want good quality audio without the compromise in aesthetics.
And
Sony, of course, continues with the dedicated camera button. I mention
it last as its presence is always something to be celebrated: an easier
way to fire up one of the most-used applications on the phone and a more
stable method of snapping away.
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Thank you Sony, long may the camera key continue.
Some of you may be wondering if it's now worth waiting for the Xperia Z4 and if the rumours turn out to be true, it will be.
According
to various sources the design will be of the same language as previous
Sony Xperia products but this time around it's going to have much
thinner top and bottom bezels with the iconic square corners rounded
off.
None of the rumours are anywhere near confirmed yet but it's
worth bearing in mind the Xperia Z4 may be a drastically different
looking smartphone when considering what Sony offering you want to pick.
Apple
claimed for years that users didn’t want big-screen smartphones and
there was no need for a handset to have a display any bigger than
4inches. However, given the popularity of big screens in other
ecosystems, such as Android and Windows Phone, it’s become increasingly
clear this is a false hypothesis.
Sony continued its rapid-release strategy at the IFA trade show in Berlin at the start of September when it unveiled its latest Xperia Z3 flagship smartphone.
Amazon ended speculation that it was going to enter the handset market all the way back in June, when it unveiled its new Fire Phone.
Since
releasing its stellar G2 smartphone in 2013, Korean tech firm LG has
worked hard to reestablish itself as an innovator in the market. Keeping
this up in 2014 LG loaded its latest flagship G3 handset with a wealth of innovative software and hardware features.
Taiwanese
firm HTC is probably the only company in the world that is as focused
on design as Apple. As a result it's no surprise its 2014 flagship smartphone, the One M8, is one of the best looking and designed smartphones currently available.
Since
news of the PRISM spying campaign broke, privacy has been at the
forefront of many people's minds. The scandal has made people more
concerned than ever about what happens to their data.
Microsoft
made a big deal about Windows Phone 8.1, listing it as the first
"enterprise-ready" version of its mobile OS, when it first arrived in
the UK.
Samsung
handsets' releases always come with a lot of fanfare. Luckily this year
the fuss was justified and Samsung unveiled what in our mind is its
most innovative smartphone to date, the Galaxy S5.
Apple launched its iPhone 5S last September, and according to its own sales stats the handset was another winner. Apple managed to shift nine million iPhone 5S and 5C devices in the first three days of availability.
