This year, we’ve seen a range of high end smartphones being released. Some were great, some were just about okay, a few were just experiments and some even exploded. As is usual, many of these have become top sellers, while others haven’t done well, despite their individual product strengths. The price bracket of these flagship devices has also increased — one could be under Rs 30,000, and another could be well above Rs 60,000. This makes things quite confusing, in a hugely crowded phone market. Let’s cut through the clutter, then, and take a look at the best flagship smartphones that have come out this year.
HTC 10
HTC’s well known aluminium unibody design shines in this smartphone. With a beautiful, quad HD 5.2-inch LCD, you are ready to watch those HD videos or check out any high resolution images and heavy webpages. The 12 MP camera at the back is quick to shoot photos, while the 5 MP front-facing camera can take very clear selfies. The 10 is equipped with the Snapdragon 820 chipset, along with 4 GB of RAM, while HTC’s own Sense UI is among the smoothest Android skins out there, doing its job very well. The phone comes in colours like Carbon Grey and Topaz Gold.
Price: Rs. 47,990
ONEPLUS 3
This time, OnePlus really pulled their socks up and hit it out of the park, with a great product that had no major flaws. The OnePlus 3 features a 5.5-inch full HD AMOLED display that does a stellar job when viewing images or videos. Just like the new fingerprint scanner, both the 16 MP rear camera and 8 MP front-facing camera are vastly improved over the previous generation OnePlus devices, and it certainly shows in the images. The phone is smooth to operate and can handle games and apps effortlessly, thanks to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 chipset and an incredible 6 GB of RAM. Plus, the near-stock Android OxygenOS gives you some nifty little features, without hampering the look and feel of the OS. There’s also the new Dash Charger, which charges the phone really fast, going from 0 to 50 per cent in less than half an hour.
Price: Rs. 27,999
GOOGLE PIXEL
This is the first Google branded smartphone, and it brings a few new and unique things to the table. First, Google’s Assistant is built right into it. Whether it is from your Home screen or from any other Google app, you can search, check with the bot, set a reminder and so on. Second, Pixel users get unlimited cloud storage for photos and videos at full resolution, with no compression, which is great if you shoot a lot of photos and videos with your phone. The Pixel features a 5-inch full HD AMOLED display and runs on the latest Android 7.1 OS (Nougat). The 12.3 MP camera is better than any Nexus device that we have seen so far (it’s as good, if not better, than the Galaxy S7 and the iPhone 7), and even the 8 MP front camera seems to have improved a notch. The phone supports fast charging, and comes in Very Silver and Quite Black colour options.
Price: Rs. 57,000 (32 GB)
SAMSUNG GALAXY S7 EDGE
The S7 Edge is certainly one of the better performing and looking devices launched this year. Samsung put in a fantastic 5.5-inch quad HD S-AMOLED screen with a dual edge display, which makes the phone stand out from the pack. You can shoot some amazingly crisp and detailed photos as well as videos, using the 16 MP camera at the back, while the 5 MP front camera is also quick to focus and complete a shot. The phone comes bundled with a quick charger, so you can charge it sufficiently if you have to go somewhere at short notice. The S7 Edge comes in Black Onyx, Silver and Gold Titanium colour options, and is definitely one of the more stylish smartphones out there today. Oh, and it’s water and dust-resistant, so there’s no need to worry about a random spill, or while carrying it around during a lightrain shower.
Price: Rs. 39,800
APPLE IPHONE 7 PLUS
The new iPhone 7 Plus has several changes and improvements over its predecessor, which helps it make it to this list. The 5.5-inch full HD display has much nicer and more natural colours than before. The 12 MP dual camera setup at the back helps you take clear and sharp photos, whether in low-light or good lighting conditions, and the 7 MP front camera is more than capable of taking great selfies whenever you need to. You can now unlock the device by touching the revamped Home button, which has a new taptic feedback engine, which means you get a little vibration whenever you unlock it — it’s all done quickly and securely. The iPhone 7 Plus comes in two new black shades — Matte and Jet — apart from Gold, Rose Gold and Silver; it now comes in 32, 128, and 256 GB storage variants.
Price: Rs. 72,000 (32 GB)
