The Xperia 1 III boots Android 11, and as is customary for Sonys, the user interface has a very stock feel. Looking deeper, though, there are several touches from Sony that add extra functionality.
Starting with some of the basics, there's an Always-on display feature (AOD) with a limited set of customization options. The lockscreen is business as usual with a clock (that you can customize), a shortcut to the camera and another one for Google Assistant (a bit redundant when there's a hardware key for that already).
Always on display • Lockscreen
The homescreen, too, is as standard as they come. The Google feed is the leftmost pane, but you can disable it if it's not your thing. The quick toggles/notification area is Google's stock too. With this version of Android, you get Notification history and the Bubbles shortcuts as part of the Conversations features - both available on the Xperia, unlike some more heavily customized UIs.
Homescreen • Folder view • App drawer • Notification shade • Quick toggles • Notification settings
This brings us to one of the Sony exclusives, already available on the previous generation, the Multi-window switch. Split-screen multi-window implementation is one of the bits Google changes most often, but the current one has stuck for a couple of years, and it's a really clunky one, so Sony intervened.
You access Multi-window switch from the task switcher or from the dedicated shortcut icon on the homescreen, and you get sort of like two stacked task switcher rolodexes with your currently opened apps to pick one for the top half and one for the bottom half of the screen. The rightmost pane in each half lets you launch another app, not just pick from the already running ones. The phone remembers three previously used pairs so you can access them directly, though we couldn't find a way to save custom app pair presets. It's worth mentioning that the window split can be done in almost any arbitrary ratio, not just 50/50.
Task switcher • Multi-window switcher
Side sense is another of the in-house Sony features. A bar shortcut on either side of the phone opens up a menu of shortcuts to apps and features, most of them user-configurable. The 21:9 multi-window pairs can be customized here, but they don't go into the three pair shortcuts in the regular task switcher. A new addition to the menu a widget to control the Sony headphones app - handy if you have Sony headphones.
There's a fairly standard set of gestures for call handling, as well as a one-handed mode and smart backlight control. It's in this menu that you'll find the navigation options with the two basic types available - gestures or a navbar.
Missing on the midrange Xperia 10 III, Sony's Game Enhancer is part of the 1 III's software package. It's a comprehensive utility for dealing with.. well, games, and comprises of two interfaces - a game hub/launcher, and an overlay you pull out from the side while in a game.
Performance profiles (or Game Mode) can be set on a per-game basis, and it's in here that you get to set the screen refresh rate and lock it at 120Hz regardless of whether the game supports it (though, obviously, it would make sense on the games that do). Additional sliders let you select Touch response speed and touch tracking accuracy.
H.S. power control is the setting that deals with power management, and it won't charge the battery but will only essentially meet your current power consumption to avoid unnecessary heat generation - H.S. stands for Heat Suppression.
The Focus settings is an array of toggles that let you disable pesky notifications, turn off adaptive brightness, disable the camera button and the side sense functionality - limit distractions.
There are also screenshot and video capture features.
The Xperia 1 III is powered by the Snapdragon 888 - no surprises there. Qualcomm's current top-level chipset comes with tons of raw power in both the CPU and graphics departments and has a built-in 5G modem, plus all the efficiency benefits of the 5nm manufacturing process.
Having said that, the Xperia 1 III put out low to average results, with the notable exception of single-core GeekBench, where it was towards the top of the chart.
Higher is better
Higher is better
Antutu didn't show the Xperia 1 III in the best possible light, with both v8 and v9 of the benchmark placing it at the bottom of the current pack of flagships.
Higher is better
Higher is better
Graphics benchmarks treat the Xperia a bit more favorably thanks in part to the 1080p resolution which the phone renders onscreen benchmarks in. The Xperia even manages to snach a narrow victory in the 3DMark Wild Life benchmark.
Higher is better
Higher is better
Higher is better
Higher is better
Higher is better
Higher is better
Higher is better
These numbers you see above are obtained on the first benchmark runs on a cool phone. However, scores drop rapidly with repeated runs and drop pretty badly - by 20%, even 25%, in Antutu. We ran a couple of throttling/stability tests only to confirm the significant decline in performance under sustained load.
CPU throttling test • 3DMark Wild Life stress test
The phone also heats up to uncomfortable levels - that's good in a way because it means heat is being dissipated, but it's apparently not being dissipated efficiently enough. All in all, the Xperia 1 III's performance leaves us wanting.
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