Lava Blaze 5G Review: Homegrown smartphone for your everyday needs

Lava Blaze 5G Review Summary:

Editor’s rating: 3.5/5

Lava, one of the biggest Indian smartphone brands started off with a bang but faded in the background due to heavyweights like Samsung, Realme, and Redmi taking over the smartphone industry. The company made a comeback in 2021 with its Z Series and also launched its first 5G smartphone called Lava Agni 5G in 2022. Now, the brand is back with one more super affordable 5G device that comes with Dimensity 700 chipset, glass-back design, 5000mAh battery, and more. However, is this affordable Indian smartphone really worth considering? Let’s find out.

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Jump To..

• Unboxing
• Price and availability
• Design
• Display
• Performance
• Camera
• Battery
• Should you buy Lava Blaze 5G?

Lava Blaze 5G : Price & Availability In India

The Lava Blaze 5G is available in a single 4GB RAM+128GB storage configuration for Rs. 10,999. The device comes in Glass Blue and Glass Green colorways. The smartphone retails via e-commerce portals like Flipkart, Amazon, and offline stores.

Lava Blaze 5G Specs

Specs	Lava Blaze 5G
Software	Android 12
Display	6.5-inch IPS LCD, 90Hz refresh rate
SoC	MediaTek Dimensity 700
RAM	4GB
Storage	128GB
Rear cameras	50MP+2MP+VGA lens
Front Camera	8MP
Battery	5000mAh
Charging	15W
Thickness	8.9mm
Weight	207 grams
Connectivity	5G, 4G LTE, WiFi, Bluetooth, and more

Lava Blaze 5G Unboxing

The Lava Blaze 5G box consists of-

• Lava Blaze 5G handset
• Silicone case
• SIM ejector tool
• 12W adapter
• USB to USB-C cable
• User manual Free service at home card

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Lava Blaze 5G Review: Design

Lava Blaze 5G looks attractive at first look as it is made up of glass on the backside. Despite being a budget smartphone, the smartphone is made of glass is feels pretty impressive. The smartphone feels good to hold in hand but is slightly bulky as it weighs 207 grams. It comes in two colors and I received the Green color variant for review purposes. The device has a matte finish for the back panel and the shade of pastel green is quite unique. I definitely liked it since I am a fan of pastel shades. There is a flat frame around the Laval Blaze 5G which is made up of plastic materials.

The backside has a dual-tone rectangular camera module at the top left corner that houses the triple camera lenses and LED flash. It does not protrude much so the balance of the device on flat surfaces even without a protective cover is good. The bottom side has Lava branding. The right edge houses the power button whereas the left edge has a SIM tray and volume rockers. The bottom side has a 3.5mm headphone jack, USB Type-C port, speaker grille, and microphone while the top edge is left vacant. The front has a 6.5-inch display with fairly thick bezels and a waterdrop notch for the selfie camera. All in all, the design and build quality of Lava Blaze 5G are pretty impressive.

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Lava Blaze 5G Review: Display & Sound

The Lava Blaze 5G sports a 6.5-inch IPS LCD panel with an HD+ resolution. The display supports a 90Hz refresh rate and the effect can be seen while scrolling, which is moderately smooth. The viewing angles are good and when you push the brightness to max settings, the screen is clearly visible in daylight. It comes with Widevine L1 certification for content consumption as well. Apart from a slightly lower peak brightness levels, the display is decent.

Lava Blaze 5G Review: Camera

The Lava Blaze 5G has a triple camera setup at the back, but sadly only one of them is really useful. It includes a 50MP main, 2MP macro sensor, and a VGA sensor. For selfies, there is an 8MP front camera.

The 50MP main camera captures good shots in daylight. The images are detailed although the colors seem boosted and the dynamic range isn’t the best in class. Highlights also appear slightly blown off and when in low light conditions, the camera gives slightly shaky images due to the absence of any stabilization.

The macro and VGA lenses don’t serve any purpose as they offer quite mediocre quality shots. Otherwise, the camera app offers features like portrait mode, slow motion, UHD, Pro Mode, Panorama, timelapse and intelligent scanning. Moreover, even GIFs can be made using the camera on the device, which is pretty cool.

Coming to the 8MP selfie camera, does its job well. The selfie camera captures real skin tones but it does smoothen the skin texture a bit. Portrait mode performs well as the selfies are detailed and there is some amount of background blur as well. Edge detection is not very good, but then you can’t get all of this in an 11k smartphone camera right?

The smartphone can record up to 2K videos using the rear camera whereas the front camera can capture 1080p videos.

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Lava Blaze 5G Review: Performance

One of the most important features of this India-made smartphone can be found in its name itself. With support for eight 5G bands, Lava Blaze 5G is the most affordable 5G device in the market. It supports n1, n3, n5, n8, n28, n41, n77 and n78 5G bands. The smartphone is powered by MediaTek Dimensity 700 chipset with 4GB RAM and 128GB storage. The smartphone did not pose any issues while performing day-to-day tasks like social media scrolling, switching between apps, calling, texting, and more. RAM management was decent as even the heavy apps did reload when I pulled them up from the background. Some benchmark tests were performed as well, here are the results.

The gaming experience is decent as even heavy games like COD can be played with medium graphics, but if you are an avid gamer, this device might disappoint you. Lava Blaze 5G can meet the requirements of casual gamers only.

Coming to the software experience, the Lava Blaze 5G runs Android 12 at the moment, however, the company has promised an Android 13 update very soon. Moreover, Android 12 gives a clean, bloatware-free experience which is rare to find even in some pricier devices nowadays. So kudos to Lava for doing this.

The smartphone comes with some nifty features like App Lock, Android Auto, Dura Speed, and more. YouTube Music and YouTube run in the background but don’t skip ads. Connectivity options include WiFi 802.11, Bluetooth 5.1, GPS, and more. The single speaker present on the device gives a decent sound output and I did not face any issues while calling or listening to music.

The #ProudlyIndian brand has promised Android 13 updates and quarterly security updates for 2 years.

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Lava Blaze 5G Review: Battery

The Lava Blaze 5G packs a 5000mAh battery under the hood. The battery lasts long and drains slowly. With moderate usage, it easily lasted about 12 hours and had to be charged at the end of the day. The device supports 15W fast charging but Lava has bundled 12W charger inside the box. The charger took about 3 hours and 20 minutes to charge the battery from 0 to 100% which is obviously slow, so if you are someone who doesn’t have hours to charge your device, then it might be a problem for you.

Review Verdict: Should you buy Lava Blaze 5G?

Looking at the specs as well as the price point, Lava Blaze 5G does hit the bull’s eye in quite a few departments. It has a good battery, a fast chipset, a decent display, and a solid design as well. Moreover, it comes with support for eight 5G bands, but on the flip side camera is one of the weakest links of the smartphone along with charging speed.

Lava is aimed towards consumers who want to own a 5G device without spending much and although there are slight niggles, if you want a well-performing 5G phone for just Rs. 11,000, then Lava Blaze 5G is surely an option worth considering.