ZTE continues to make inroads to Canada – ZTE and Fido teamed up to bring an exclusive Axon smartphone in Canada last November. ZTE is now bringing an Axon Pro version, unlocked and available to all Canadians, but like the ASUS ZenFone Zoom available only through B&H Photo Video stores in New York, the Axon Pro will only be available through the Canadian arm of Newegg. While we found it to be an excellent smartphone when we reviewed the device, the Newegg price of $649.99 may keep the Pro out of many potential users’ pockets. Timing is also off with MWC right around the corner with a slew of new devices in this crowded market segment.
Although the ZTE Axon Pro is available in silver, gold and blue – silver is the only option that Newegg is carrying. The device measures 153.9 x 73.7 x 9.4 mm and weighs in at 172.9 grams. It sports a 5.5-inch Quad HD IPS LCD display with a resolution of 2560 x 1440 pixels and 534 pixels-per-inch (PPI). A 64-bit Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 octa-core handles the processing power with four cores clocked at 1.5 GHz and four cores clocked at 2.0 GHz. An Adreno 430 GPU handles the graphics on the device. ZTE put a generous 4GB of RAM in the Axon Pro and 64GB of internal memory, although there is no means to expand. A 3000 mAh battery with quick charge 2.0 provides power to the Pro, although we found this to be one of sore spots with our review model.
The camera area is quite interesting – the rear of the device has two cameras – a main 13MP with autofocus and a dual-LED flash along with a secondary 2MP for depth information. This is much like the HTC One M8 duo-camera setup – although it all boils down to how good are the photos? In low-light you must have HDR on, which tends to slow things down a bit. We found the autofocus to be a little slow, but once focused, the Pro does take a quick picture. Pictures overall were acceptable, but it is no match for the Galaxy S6 (Edge) and Note 5 and the LG G4 or V10 or even the Nexus 5X or 6P pictures.
The ZTE Axon Pro also has an excellent sound system if you are using earphones of some sort, unfortunately it does not come through the single external speaker. It has WiFi, v4.0 Bluetooth, GPS, NFC, an FM radio and microUSB v2.0 port for charging and data transfer. It is a very nice smartphone available in Canada and only you can decide if the price is right for you.