Lenovo P1m: a dark horse in under 10K budget range

Lenovo Vibe P1 and P1m have arrived in India and the Chinese manufacturer further strengthen its portfolio with these two online exclusive variants. Lenovo has done really well in online retail space this year and has sold over 3Million 4G smartphones so far. So will its success streak continue?

In an age when most smartphone makers are running after packing in more and more gigs of RAM and other hardware, Lenovo has targeted most vulnerable spot in budget Android phones, that is battery. These two devices are banking upon their beefed-up battery capacity. Let’s proceed with our first impressions of the new Lenovo Vibe P1m.

Also Read: Lenovo Vibe P1 First Impression – Designed To Last Long, Really Long

Key Specifications of Lenovo P1m

First thing first, the most interesting specification of this Lenovo’s powerplayer is its battery. The smartphone comes with a removable 4,000mAh battery which according to the makers will deliver 16hours of talk time and 20 hours in standby mode. Interestingly, using USB OTG support, you can also use the massive battery as a power bank and charge other spare gadgets. Big batteries often result in extended charging time (as in powerbanks) and to resolve this issue, Lenovo has bundled in a 10W fast charger with the phone.

Even though it sports a large battery, it weighs only 148 gram for which Lenovo needs to be given a pat on the back. The extra battery doesn’t pile on weight, but it does make it a bit thick. Lenovo Vibe 1m exterior body is made from cheap plastic which ensures it looks like a budget phone. Although, keeping its price in mind, we can’t really afford to criticize Lenovo for cutting some build corners.

Lenovo has hoisted a 5-inch HD TFT display with Gorilla Glass 3 protection. Like premium device amongst the two – P1m also gets to wear a P2i nano-coating which makes it resistant to occasional splashes and spills (but, don’t wear it in the pool). Display on the phone is well illuminated with good black levels and brightness. We were also happy with the color temperature and viewing angles of this screen.

On the performance front, Lenevo P1m didn’t lag too much behind in its more costly sibling Vibe P1. A MediaTek MT6735P SoC coupled with Mali-T720 GPU and 2GB of RAM is placed under its hood. The device runs on Lenovo’s customized version of Android 5.1 Lollipop. For shutterbugs, it features an 8-meapixel autofocus snapper with LED flash. A 5-megapixel front shooter is placed on the front end to capture selfies.  In terms of storage space, it comes with 16GB internal storage which can be expanded upto 32GB using a microSD card. The Dual SIM phone is compatible with Indian 4G LTE bands.

In our limited hands on opportunity, phone didn’t show any lags in transitions. However, it will be too early for us too judge its performance. This budget smartphone has all the right ingredients in it to win the hearts of under 10K budget phone buyers. If it does well for the company, it very well can fuel a jambo size battery war in Indian smartphone arena.