Nokia 8 V 5G UW Review: A Too Expensive Phone

5G is the current trend and it seems like everywhere you look, phone manufacturers slap the 5G title on almost all of their devices. Nokia 8 V 5G UW is a mouthful to begin with and it’s among the handheld devices that have jumped on the bandwagon.

So here is how you can make sense of the name. The ‘V’ is short for Verizon while the ‘UW’ stands for ‘ultra-wideband,’ so it means the phone has support for Verizon’s 5G mmWave network.

Apart from those features, the Nokia 8 V 5G UW doesn’t have any other differences from the Nokia 8.3.

The Good

Let’s start with Nokia 8 V 5G UW display as it’s the first thing you see. It’s a massive phone with a 6.81-inch and 1080p screen. While this isn’t the highest resolution you can have, the phone sports always-on HDR, and its brightness is surely satisfying for the majority of users.

While the display is surrounded by quite thin bezels, the chin seems too big to appear on a 2020 smartphone.

Overall, the phone looks modern but it has nothing standing out, including the circular camera module on the rear.

There is a fingerprint reader on the side of the Nokia 8 V 5G UW. The headphone jack is a nice touch and on the front, there is a hole-punch cutout from which the selfie camera pokes.

The highlights on Nokia 8 V 5G UW specs sheet are the Qualcomm Snapdragon 765G chipset, RAM of 6GB, and onboard storage of 64GB. The processor is powerful enough for day-to-day tasks and while the 8-series chipset is definitely faster, most users won’t even notice a difference.

The Nokia 8 V 5G UW draws power from a 4,500mAh battery which is sufficient for a full day and with moderate use, you can even have another day without reaching for the charger.

The phone comes with Android 10 out of the box and it will eventually have Android 11 but not beyond it, which is a serious drawback.

The software experience is quite neat but Verizon’s influence is evident in its four apps that appear right after you set up the phone. There is nothing you can do to them as they can’t be erased but to banish them to the app drawer.

Nokia 8 V 5G UW camera setup consists of a 64MP primary lens, a 12MP ultra-wide camera, a 2MP macro lens, and a 2MP depth camera. The lenses work well as they yield vivid and bright pictures even in low light.

The only real complaints are arguably about the poor macro sensor. Apart from that, an average user will have no issue with the photography power of the Nokia 8 V 5G UW.

The Bad

There is no phone is without some drawbacks, at least if you don’t go for the real premium offers. And if these disadvantages are hard to stomach to you, you should really avoid the Nokia 8 V 5G UW altogether.

Let’s talk about 5G, after all, it’s what differentiates this phone from its sibling, the Nokia 8.3. There are two variants you might want to care about, the mmWave which is lighting fast but can’t penetrate obstacles or travel distance, and the Sub-6, which isn’t as fast but can cover long distances.

In other parts of the world, the phone comes with a price tag of $700, and Nokia 8 V 5G UW price in India is Rs 55,700. With all of these benefits and disadvantages, Nokia 8 V 5G UW price tag is a little too much.

Users can have Pixel 4a 5G at $100 less and get a more enjoyable experience, especially when the two handsets share the same processor. While the 4a doesn’t have support for mmWave but that isn’t exactly a problem right now, or in a near future.

Our Take

Nokia 8 V 5G UW is a decent phone. It packs power, a massive screen, a 2-day battery, a great camera setup, and a relatively enjoyable software experience. However, the price is a bit hard to stomach.

Our Nokia 8 V 5G UW review only gives you an overall look at the phone, if you want a more in-depth analysis, go for our review of the Nokia 8.3.

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