Lenovo K5 Note Hands on Overview | Review

Lenovo launched Vibe K5 Note, the company’s latest mid-range smartphone in India recently starting at Rs. 11,999.  Is the smartphone worth the price?

The Vibe K5 Note has a  5.5-inch display with a resolution of 1920 by 1080 pixels and a pixel density of about 400 PPI, same as the K3 Note and the K4 Note. Unlike the K4 Note that has Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection, this just has a scratch resistant to prevent the display from scratches.  
It has a 8-megapixel front-facing camera with   77.4-degree wide-angle lens and f/2.2 aperture. There is a earpiece on the top along with the usual set of proximity and ambient light sensors next to it. It also has a tiny notification LED on the right corner, which glows in blue for notification and in red when it is charging. It is hardly visible when it’s off. The phone also has gyroscope and magnetometer.
The capacitive touch buttons are present below the display. These are backlit, but it is hardly visible under bright light. These also offer haptic feedback when pressed.
The smartphone has a brushed metal finish on the sides and measures 152×75.7×8.49mm, making it smaller and slimmer than the K4 Note. The volume rockers and the power button are present on the right side. The 3.5mm audio jack is present on the top and the micro USB slot is present on the bottom along with the microphone hole.
The phone has unibody metal finish that feels good to hold. It has a 13-megapixel rear camera with dual-tone LED flash. A tiny secondary microphone hole is present above the camera sensor.  The fingerprint sensor is present below the camera. It weighs 165 grams, slightly heavier than the K5 note due to its metal body. The Lenovo branding and the loudspeaker grill are present on the bottom part of the back. You can also use the bundled clear cover for protecting the metal body from getting scratches. In addition to gold, there is also graphite gray and silver color options.
Unlike the Vibe K3 Note and K4 Note smartphones, this has a hybrid dual SIM slot, so you can use two nano SIM cards or a nano SIM and a microSD card at a time. This might not be useful for everyone since most don’t prefer to lose a SIM slot for expanding the storage.

The 13-megapixel camera with dual-tone LED flash, phase-detection auto-focus (PDAF) and f/2.2 aperture is decent.

The camera UI is simple with toggles for flash, front camera and HDR. The menu option lets you choose Panorama and also has several Effects (Mono, Sepia, Negative, Memory, Gorgeous, Elegant and Cool). Settings option lets you choose aspect ratio (16:9, 4:3 and 1:1), adjust white balance, ISO (100 to 1600), enable geo location, option to use volume button as a shutter key and more.

Daylight shots are decent, but some images seem dull if the environment is not bright. Thanks to PDAF, auto focus is quick. Macro shots are good and HDF shots came out well, but some images are too bright. The phone doesn’t have a manual mode. Low-light shots have a lot of noise. Images with flash are decent. The dual-tone flash helps to bring natural tone and is not over powering.

The 8MP front-facing camera is good for selfies and video chats. Colors are vibrant and the images are sharp as well. It also has beautify mode. Even though the front camera has been improved, the rear camera is not the best for capturing images in low-lighting conditions.

Check out some camera samples below (Click the image to view full resolution sample.)


It can record videos at 1080p full HD resolution at 30 fps. Video is decent. Audio is crisp since it has a secondary microphone. Sadly it doesn’t have slow motion recording. Check out the video sample below.