Nokia X review: Under cover

Synthetic benchmarks and performance

The Nokia X is powered by a dual-core 1.0GHz Cortex-A5 processor coupled with 512MB of RAM, which should be barely enough to run a standard Android Jelly Bean version. Luckily Nokia has done some great work optimizing platform its proprietary launcher, so the final result is decently smooth with very little visible lag.

The GPU in charge of graphics is Adreno 203. It is probably the slowest GPU currently in mass production, but it should be enough to handle less demanding games running on WVGA resolution. Unfortunately GFXBenchmark, 3DMark and Epic Citadel are still incompatible with Nokia X, so you'll have to rely on the all-in-one test scores.

There aren't many benchmarks available in the Nokia Store, but we managed to sideload a few, so we are able to provide you with comparable scores.

The single-core performance, as usual, we measure with the BenchmarkPi test. The 1.0 GHz Cortex-A5 processor quite expectedly hit the bottom of our charts, twice slower than its Cortex-A9 siblings and 50% behind the Cortex-A7 cores.

Benchmark Pi

Lower is better

• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  305
• Alcatel One Touch Hero
  308
• Huawei Ascend Mate
  347
• Huawei Ascend P6
  348
• LG Optimus G
  353
• Sony Xperia C
  374
• Motorola Moto G
  392
• Sony Xperia M
  400
• LG Nexus 4
  431
• Samsung Galaxy Core LTE
  466
• Nokia X
  676

GeekBench 3 tests the multi-core performance and Nokia X occupied the last spot in our all-time chart. However its performance wasn't too bad considering that all other tested devices are way more expensive than it.

GeekBench 3

Higher is better

• LG Optimus G
  1465
• Alcatel One Touch Hero
  1321
• Huawei Ascend P6
  1315
• LG Nexus 4
  1288
• Motorola Moto G
  1120
• Sony Xperia C
  1079
• Oppo R819
  1047
• HTC One mini
  887
• Samsung Galaxy Core LTE
  647
• Samsung Galaxy Ace 3
  564
• Nokia X
  421

The all-in-one tests AnTuTu and Quadrant gauge the overall hardware performance, including graphics and RAM bandwidth. Nokia X, being the only Cortex-A5 device we've put through the newest versions of the apps once again finished last on both tests, but again the gap was a bit lower than we expected.

AnTuTu 4

Higher is better

• Motorola Moto G
  17214
• LG Optimus G
  16943
• Huawei Ascend Mate
  15714
• Alcatel One Touch Hero
  15667
• Oppo Find 5
  15167
• Sony Xperia C
  13948
• Samsung Galaxy Core LTE
  13109
• Sony Xperia M
  9902
• Nokia X
  7514

Quadrant

Higher is better

• LG Nexus 5
  8844
• Samsung Galaxy Grand 2
  8588
• Motorola Moto G
  8508
• Samsung Galaxy S4 mini
  7153
• HTC One mini
  6048
• Sony Xperia V
  5816
• HTC Desire 600 dual sim
  5053
• Samsung Galaxy Express
  4998
• Sony Xperia C
  4941
• Sony Xperia L
  4279
• Sony Xperia M
  4147
• Samsung Galaxy Core
  3240
• Nokia X
  2880

Finally, we ran SunSpider and BrowserMark web benchmarks on the default Nokia X browser. The Nokia X punched way above its weight here, beating some quite expensive devices in both SunSpider and BrowserMark.

SunSpider

Lower is better

• Samsung Galaxy Note II
  972
• LG Optimus G Pro
  1011
• Samsung Galaxy Grand 2
  1063
• HTC One
  1124
• Alcatel One Touch Hero
  1181
• LG Optimus G
  1251
• Motorola Moto G
  1308
• Sony Xperia Z
  1336
• Oppo R819
  1423
• HTC Butterfly
  1433
• Alcatel One Touch Hero
  1646
• Samsung Galaxy Core LTE
  1680
• Huawei Ascend Mate
  1741
• Sony Xperia M
  1867
• Nokia X
  2363
• Huawei Ascend P6
  3858

BrowserMark 2

Higher is better

• Motorola Moto G
  2562
• Samsung Galaxy Grand 2
  2432
• Samsung Galaxy S4 mini
  2314
• Alcatel One Touch Hero
  2096
• Sony Xperia Z
  2093
• LG Optimus G
  2048
• Sony Xperia C
  1984
• Sony Xperia L
  1809
• Nokia X
  1729
• Sony Xperia M
  1642
• Samsung Galaxy S III
  1247
• Samsung Galaxy Core LTE
  1100
• Huawei Ascend P6
  974
• Samsung Galaxy S III mini
  714

The Nokia X did come out last on most of the tests we ran, but given its modest price that was to be expected. If anything the smartphone does better than expected given its standing in the pecking order. And as we told you the phone handles its platform very well and that's what matters in the end. Yes, some hiccups or bottlenecks may occur if you put huge pressure on the Nokia X but overall - the UI experience and performance is solid.