At night, the Black Shark 5 Pro did not impress me with the dedicated night mode called Super Night Scene. When it comes to video, you can shoot up to 4K at 60 FPS with the main lens, 4K at 30 FPS with the ultra wide-angle and 1080p at 30 FPS with the selfie camera. The Black Shark 5 Pro’s screen ticks all the boxes for a gaming experience. The variable refresh rate can go up to 144 Hz and the touch sampling rate up to 720 Hz.

The Black Shark 4 Pro has triple rear AI cameras, a 64MP f/1.8 primary camera paired with a 120-degree ultra-wide-angle shooter of 8MP, and a dedicated 5MP depth of field sensor. The front camera is a 20MP sensor with an f/2.2 sensor covered with a 5P lens.

Getting into what might put you off, we have to start with the looks. The design of the phone is something of an acquired taste because Black Shark logos adorn the back. The phone is also relatively thick compared with many 2022 flagships. As far as features, it’s clear Xiaomi is trying to keep costs down by offering a fairly underwhelming rear camera module.

• A little bit of light goes a long way here, as you can see in the sample shots below.
• All of this in a package that’s priced at less than $500, and it’s definitely one of the best phones of the year.
• If the RAM storage is insufficient, the user may not be able to run several apps simultaneously, and if the RAM runs out, the apps may crash, which can cause the device to reboot automatically.
• That’s fine with me because MIUI 12.5 is fantastic in terms of looks and usability alike, bringing a wide array of great features to the table.

The Black Shark 4 Pro runs on Android 11 and all this is powered by a 4500 mAh battery. It measures 163.8 x 76.4 x 9.9 mm (height x width x thickness) with a total weight of 220 grams including battery. The Xiaomi Black Shark 4 comes with Android OS v11.0 out of the box, and a Li-Po 4500 mAh, non-removable battery. The 6.67 inches phone comes with a high resolution AMOLED display (1080 x 2400 px). We also have an 8MP ultra-wide lens which stock Android firmware is an IMX355 sensor, it never disappoints us and we managed to take some good pictures. The camera performs in low light conditions rather well and there is a night shooting mode but it depends on the software so we don’t recommend relying on it too much . There is a 5MP macro sensor which can take 3cm close-up photos of relatively average quality.

What’s undoubtedly great are the physical triggers that pop up when you toggle the switch next to them. While it’s cool to fiddle with these switches, I would have preferred a software switch instead. Besides the two switches and two triggers, there’s also a side-mounted fingerprint sensor that doubles as the power button.