LeEco Le 2 Review – The Best Budget Smartphone to buy

LeEco Le 2 - Best smartphone Under Rs 10,000

A company entered the Indian market named the LeTv with its smartphone called LeTv Le 1s. No Doubt it turned out to be a great smartphone. To all my surprise even with the MediaTek Helio x10 inside. Later they came up with Le 1s Eco more substantial changing the name to LeEco everywhere. Now this year they came with the LeEco Le 2.  Even this year they had almost the same competition, but I will tell you in this review why they still stand out in the game.

LeEco Le 2 - Best smartphone Under Rs 10,000

LeEco Le 2 – Best Smartphone Under Rs 10,000

LeEco Le 2 Specification

  • GSM/ HSPA/ LTE(VoLTE)
  • 5.5 Inch 1080p IPS LCD Screen
  • Qualcomm Snapdragon 652 Processor  with Adreno 510 GPU
  • 32GB Internal Memory 3GB Ram
  • 16MP rear f/2.0 Camera and 8MP front F/2.2 camera
  • Fingerprint scanner at rear
  • Fast charging (50% in 30 min)
  • 3000 mAh Battery Non-removable
CPU-Z information Le 2

CPU-Z information Le 2

Inbox Content

  • Handset
  • USB type C cable
  • Quick charge adapter.2.7A/12v
  • Sim removal Tool and Paperwork
  • USB type C to 3.5mm Headphone jack converter
  • Transparent phone case

Build of the Le 2

I also mentioned right about the competition in the budget segment. There’s the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 and Moto G4 Plus which stands in the race. The 1st factor which it makes it a different is it’s all metal Unibody design. Even the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 doesn’t have a complete metal design. In this the case the Le 2 gives you exactly what they said. No doubt it’s the most fantastic design that no one could offer at that price. The complete metal body has a side chamfered edges which totally adds to a perfect fit in hand. There are the power button and the volume rocker at the right, IR blaster at the top and USB type C port with Speaker grill and Microphone grill at the bottom.

The rear has a slight 0.1mm camera hump which is covered with the transparent phone provided in the box. Below to the camera is the fingerprint scanner will talk to you about in detail in a min. There’s still LeTv branding on the phone and the box. The front looks like a huge edge to edge display; the bezel is gaunt. The top has an earpiece, front camera, sensor and notification LED. At the front, the bottom had three capacitive buttons.  Forgot to mention the rear has a Dual LED Flash with Noise cancelling microphone as well. Also left to the device has the Dual Nano Sim Slot.

Overall I loved the build quality. It has very best even then my expectation. Whoever tried my device they thought it can be an expensive phone. When I said the pricing even they were shocked to know it. Also, even Redmi Note 3 users loved and praised the design.

Screen/Display on the Le 2

It does come with the LCD 1920 x 1080 resolution screen. It has perfect high brightness for day and Lows for the night. Viewing Angles are perfectly Good. The Edge to the edge of the display lets you enjoy your content even better on the screen. It’s the best screen on the budget phone I have seen. Even in outdoor sunlight visibility, I didn’t have an issue. If you keep the screen brightness above 25% then no problems in daylight condition. In fact, it’s the best display which I loved even better than the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3. There’s colour mode choice for Vivid, Natural, Soft in the settings menu which will let you adjust the screen as per choice. Adaptive brightness will let you get the best as well. We give total thumbs up to the screen.

Le 2 screen setings

Le 2 display settings

 

Operating System Experience

Le 2 EUI Notifications

Le 2 EUI Notifications

The LeEco Le 2 has EUI Operating system which is skinned by LeEco on Android version 6.0.1. The OS got Almost three updates in my 2-3 weeks of the span which were entirely big upgrades. Each update changed the experience and made it better each day. I am a total fan of stock/vanilla Android. Still, after the Vanilla Android, this was the one which I loved using each day.  The Software experience is appreciating and it much stable from the day one itself. I loved it even than the MIUI. Even this OS doesn’t have any App Drawer like the iOS, MIUI.  The software was well optimised for the battery as well as the camera.

Le 2 EUI Multi-tasking and Quick Serttings Toggle

Le 2 EUI Multi-tasking and Quick Settings Toggle

The most standout thing than all the other smartphones is the Le 2 comes with the YupTV Live Channels subscription(Live App), Hungama music Subscription(Music App) and Eros Now Movies (LeViDi App)subscription for one year in India. That make it an attractive device. No other would offer this type of tie-ups.  When you swipe left on the home screen, you get LeView a custom Youtube Interface which is also good to use than the native youtube app.

There are few, things and habits that I needed to change to adopt the operating system entirely, and one was the notification. Of course, you get the notification bar when you swipe down, but I always use to keep finding settings toggles like other Android phones. In this OS it was in the multitasking menu. It was impressive and inspired to the iOS one. If you talk of multi-tasking, The 3GB ram does its job well. I didn’t face any Ram management with the Le 2. I was able to multi-task with six apps sometimes and hardly remember clearing memory and cache in the Operating system.

 

Internal Storage

If you talk of storage what you get out of the box in 32GB, then almost 5.93 GB is used and 23.19GB free for the user to use. 32GB is exact what a minimum memory the smartphone should have. I Manged to work with that space and I was entirely happy with space itself. It does equip USB Type-C port so if you connect it to PC via USB 3.0 port you will get much faster speed as well.

Le 2 Avaialble Storage out of the box

Le 2 Available Storage out of the box

Call Quality

Even this part is an important element, and I mainly wanted to add this. As the LeEco team always pushes updates and one of them was especially for the Reliance Jio VoLTE Support. I tried using the Jio Sim in the LeEco Le 2 without the MyJio App and the Jio4GVoice app. I was able to make calls, use 4G flawless. Even on Personal Wifi, I was able to make calls due to VoLTE Support. Talking of Call Quality, it was fantastic to call quality. I didn’t find any cluttering issue or anything like that. The earpiece was much loud and clear. Also, the noise cancelling mic does it’s Job well.

Gaming Performance

The Phone does come with the Snapdragon 652 Inside with Adreno 510 GPU. If you are the Fan of the benchmarks score then definitely this device doesn’t disappoint you in that. Talking from the GeekBench CPU Score of Single Core for Le 2 was 1477 which was close to even the Galaxy Note 7. Regarding the Multi-Core score was 2322 which was good but not as compared to a single score.  Concerned about pricing, it did an excellent job.

Le 2 GeekBench Single Core and MultiCore Score

Le 2 GeekBench Single Core and MultiCore Score

We even ran the GeekBench Compute score, and it almost topped in that with 3488. The score is even better than the Nexus 9.

Le 2 GeekBench Compute Score

Le 2 GeekBench Compute Score

We also ran Antutu Benchmark, and it came out to be 81677 which was a better score to iPhone 6.

Le 2 Antutu Score

Le 2 Antutu Score

Talking to the actual gaming experience, We saw that device automatically comes to performance mode. We ran Asphalt 8, Implosion, Brothers in Arms 3, OverKill 3 All these games were buttery smooth. I saw slight frames drop sometimes, but the game was playable so no complaints to that. There was almost no overheating with the device even after extended gameplay. Due to this reason, it’s the best gaming budget phone to buy.

Camera

Up till now, this device has not disappointed even in the single part which we saw. I totally appreciate for doing an excellent job by the team LeEco. There were camera updates also pushed for the device. I will start from the camera interface which is much simpler and lets you control Exposure, ISO, contrast, sharpness, saturation. There isn’t Pro mode so you might need a different app if you want the pro mode. In the camera App, There are different modes like the HDR, Night, Square, Scene. Regarding Video, it can Shoot 4K video as well with Slo-Mo. For the Front camera, there’s beauty mode inbuilt.

The actual performance of the camera is good during the daylight when it comes to low light and artificial light it bumps the ISO. That makes the image noisy. I tried lowering the ISO but no control shutter speed which kind of down to flexibility. If you talk to the competitor to my surprise, it did an excellent job. If you still think of Redmi Note 3, then it did a good job than it. In the part of the video, it was also good with a bit of stabilisation, but it wasn’t appreciable.

Battery

The Le 2 comes with 3000 mAh battery. I mean this is pretty standard in the smartphones of 2016. It’s not about mAh nowadays; The game is much about SOT. The screen on time which I received is between 4 Hours 40 min to 5 Hours 20 Mins. This was the battery life after being on 4G, Wifi, Medium gaming, Youtube and Social Network. I think this device is capable of getting the most. Also it supports fast charging by default it’s turned off so you need to turn it on. Fast charging at the under 15,000Rs if offered by few devices. Fast charging bangs extra point in this review. The battery use to last 1 and the half day at least for me, which is totally awesome.

Music

One this LeEco wanted to change in the making is by removing the headphone jack. There’s only one port for all. Even music, charging depends on same port. The EUI is specially optimised for CDLAC, and we especially got the CDLAC headphones separate without the box. I must say The CDLAC technology enhances the sound listening experience. As being digital, it totally reflects the sound quality. There’s Also Dolby Atmos present for the speaker’s profiles. The speakers on the Le 2 is entirely decent you don’t get excellent music.

Verdict

LeEco Le 2

LeEco Le 2

Coming to the pricing of the device as it costs only 11,999rs, It offers much better than my expectations. You get the best build, good gaming device, decent camera, Good sound output. Overall a complete package without bulging the pocket out.

LeEco Le 2

9

Build

9.5/10

Performance

8.5/10

Camera

8.0/10

Experience

8.9/10

Value for money

9.9/10

Pros

  • Amazing Build
  • Brilliant Display
  • Good Gaming Performance
  • Good Camera
  • CDLAC

Cons

  • Fingerprint Scanner Can be more accurate