Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro review: Expanding universe

Introduction

Talking about high-end smartphones in our parts of the world, Lenovo is hardly the first name that pops in your head. The Chinese maker's first two attempts at a premium handset have been hard to find outside of its homeland, but Lenovo appears to have enough faith in the Vibe Z2 Pro to make it a truly global phone. Perhaps climbing to the number 3 spot in China was the confidence boost they needed to try and storm the international smartphone market.

Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro official photos

The Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro certainly seems fit for the job. It features a 6" QHD IPS LCD display and a Snapdragon 801 chipset with 3GB of RAM, all packed in neat-looking metal body with very little screen bezel.

As a result, the Vibe Z2 Pro is actually quite compact for the massive 6" screen it flaunts. 2.1mm shorter than the 5.5" Apple iPhone 6 Plus is impressive whichever way you look at it. Here's the rest of the key specs.

Key features

• 6.0" 16M-color QHD IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen with Gorilla Glass 3
• Android OS v4.4.2 KitKat with custom Lenovo UI
• LTE Cat 4 support
• Quad-core 2.5GHz Krait 400 CPU, Adreno 330 GPU; Qualcomm Snapdragon 801 chipset
• 3GB of RAM
• 16MP OIS camera with 2160p video recording @ 30fps, 1080p @ 60fps, 720p @ 120fps
• 5MP front-facing camera, 1080p video recording
• Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/, Wi-Fi Direct and DLNA
• GPS with A-GPS, GLONASS
• 32GB of built-in storage
• microUSB 2.0 port with USB host and MHL 2.0
• Bluetooth v4.0
• NFC
• Standard 3.5mm audio jack
• Accelerometer and proximity sensor
• Active noise cancellation with a dedicated mic
• 4,000mAh Li-Po battery

Main disadvantages

• Non-expandable storage
• Snapdragon 805 would have been a better fit for the QHD resolution
• Battery isn't user-replaceable
• No Infrared port

There are virtually no deal-breakers we can spot right off the bat. The lack of a microSD card slot can turn off quite a few users, but the base storage option of 32GB should still be enough for most. And while the battery isn't user replaceable, it's got enough juice to make you forget about it.

Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro live shots

With a thin waistline of 7.7mm, the Lenovo Vibe Z2 Pro makes a great first impression, while the metal body and QHD screen are likely to keep you happy in the long run. We'll see if the Vibe Z2 Pro delivers on its promises when we are done with the review.

Let's dive right in and start finding out what Lenovo's smartphone fleet commanding admiral has to offer.