Today we will review the HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM smartphone and find out if this HTC smartphone is worth buying. Also, we will know what are the advantages and disadvantages of this smartphone.
Look and design
The design of Desire 626 Dual SIM is similar to other smartphones in HTC’s Desire range. The phone is made of plastic body and comes with dual tone color scheme. This phone is quite similar to HTC’s popular smartphone HTC Desire 820. But its screen is smaller. The phone is comfortable to hold and use. The phone looks good and gives a pleasant feel.
There is a front camera on the front of the phone and an earpiece grill on the top. There is a speaker and microphone at the bottom. Although the plastic rear panel is removable, the battery cannot be removed from the phone. The phone has power and volume buttons on the right side, a 3.5mm audio socket on the top. There is a micro-USB port on the bottom and a flap on the left that has two nano-SIM slots and a separate microSD slot.
The rear panel has a camera, a single-tone LED flash and a small hole for a microphone. Our review unit was white in colour and we kept needing to clean it. Overall, the Desire 626 Dual SIM has a fresh layout and the design of this smartphone is good for the price.
HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM has a 5-inch screen with a resolution of 720×1280 pixels. The screen density is 294 ppi. The screen is sharp and readable but the colours and brightness are a bit low. Colours look a bit dull and artificial while the brightness varies in different parts of the same image.
Specifications and software
If we look at the specifications, then the Desire 626 smartphone can be called a smartphone of 2015. This phone has an octa-core MediaTek MT6752 running at 1.8 GHz. This processor was released in 2014 and is an old processor compared to the processors given in other devices available today at this price. The phone has 16 GB internal storage which can be expanded up to 32 GB via microSD card. The phone has 2 GB RAM. The battery is of 2000 mAh. The phone supports 4G (FDD Band 3 and TDD Band 40) in both SIM slots. Some global variants of the phone have Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 410 processor but this variant is not available in India.
Apart from this, the phone seems to be old in terms of software as well. HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM runs on Android 4.4.4 and is two generations behind the latest version. This is really strange when today there are other phones available in the market that run on Android 6.0 at a price less than the Desire 626.
Apart from this, the same thing applies to HTC Sense. The skin is old and has fewer features than the new version. From the notification shade to the app switcher, everything seems old.
Obviously, the HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM lags behind in hardware and software compared to the smartphones available in the sub-15,000 category in the market today. The phone also lacks a fingerprint sensor. Due to the old software, many options are not available. This includes app permissions. Apart from this, Lenovo Vibe K4 Note and Redmi Note 3 have higher resolution screens, RAM, better speakers, audio enhancements and more powerful processors.
Camera
HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM has a 13-megapixel rear camera with single-tone LED flash. The phone has a 5-megapixel front camera. Both cameras can record up to 1080 pixels. Multi-angle, panorama, motion tracking, HDR and slow-motion videos can be shot with the rear camera.
The camera app on the Desire 626 is not a typical HTC camera app but is similar to the ones on many budget smartphones launched recently. It is disappointing that HTC Sense is a good user interface skin as its camera app is excellent. However, the app on this phone is not bad either. All the tasks can be done in the app easily and pictures can be taken quickly.
However, it is the camera that disappoints. Photos look blurry, which means the images lack sharpness. It is difficult to capture images in motion even though the objects are clearly visible. Bright scenes tend to be oversaturated while dull images come out dark and scattered.
The same problem is seen in low light and close-up shots. Close-up shots also come out blurry, scattered and washed out. Simply put, the quality of photos taken by HTC Desire 626 is below average. They cannot be compared with the camera of any phone in this price range.
Performance
By today’s standards, the performance of the HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM is not too bad. But it cannot be called great either. The phone hangs sometimes but the phone is easy to operate. Due to the old software, there was a problem in running heavy apps. Apps close suddenly but the phone is comfortable for normal use. However, the phone does not have anything that other phones in this price range are offering.
In our benchmarking tests, we had to compare the HTC Desire 626 with the Lenovo Vibe S1 that comes with the same processor. The graphics benchmark figures were excellent, but elsewhere, the phone failed to compete with the Lenovo Vibe S1 (Review). It is worth noting that the price of the Vibe S1 has now come down to Rs 12,999, which is less than the Desire 626.
The HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM packs a 2000mAh battery that lasted 6 hours and 5 minutes in our video loop test. The battery life is quite less than what we see on many other devices these days. The battery drains very quickly even with normal usage. We were not able to use the phone for even a day on a fully charged battery. The mono speaker is also poor and produces very low sound. However, the Wi-Fi and cellular network antennas work pretty well and we were able to connect to our network with ease.
Our verdict
These are the days when a premium smartphone takes a few months to become outdated. There is no reason for HTC to launch a one year old smartphone at this price. Customers are also aware that there are other options available in the market today with more latest specifications at this price or less. The phone has a great design which is similar to other devices (in the price range), we do not see any reason to buy this smartphone.
The HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM is simply not made for 2016. It is a lame attempt by the company to try and retain its hold in the Indian market. The phone runs on outdated hardware and software. Battery life is poor and features are less than expected. We would recommend you to skip the HTC Desire 626 Dual SIM and go for something like the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 or the Lenovo Vibe K4 Note instead.
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