Ulefone is one of a group of rugged phone makers from China that are trying to outdo the rest with ever more sophisticated designs and very affordable prices.
Their Armor series is a regularly reviewed best-selling line with better processors, improved displays, and unique features.
Today we will be looking at the latest design, the Ulefone Armor 15. This relatively inexpensive device features some notable improvements over the Armor 14 series and a hidden capability that we have never seen before.
Is the Armor 15 the right choice for those who work outdoors, or could you get better for your money?
Armor 15 is only $349.99 from Ulefone North America (plus shipping), but only $259.99 directly from the Ulefone global website (plus shipping).
However, the cheapest option is a global model, where the Armor 15 sold in the United States has been fine-tuned for this mobile communication environment.
In addition to the basic phone, Ulefone also sells a protective case designed to further protect the phone. The phone and protective case cost €284,98 on the global site when purchased together.
The Armor 15 comes with the back panel in black, red, and blue, although they are all mostly black.
Integrated
The Armor 15 is easily one of the most attractive designs Ulefone has created and exudes an outdoor lifestyle without looking like it was built to withstand mortar shards.
This design is also a bit smaller than many rugged designs, as the designers use a 5,45-inch screen and nothing larger.
With a mass of 346 grams, this device is lighter than the 14 Pro, but only by a few grams. Even with rounded, rubberized corners, it's not something you'd want to be bumped into accidentally or otherwise.
Like many rugged phone designs, to provide additional internal space, the rear camera cluster is pushed out a few mm. It is impossible for the device to sit properly when placed on a flat surface. To fit this projection, Ulefone has also made a matching bulge at the bottom that is almost as proud.
This prevents the colored back from being scratched and reduces the possibility of the phone slipping. The only drawback to this arrangement is that it negates the possibility of wireless charging, which would allow the user to avoid unplugging the USB-C port and helps keep the phone waterproof.
The charging port covered with a rubber plug is on the bottom, where you'd expect, and there are two very similar covers on the other end that hide a hidden secret about this design that we'll talk about later.
As for the button design, it is mainly based on numbers. A thumb-approved power button and fingerprint sensor, plus a dedicated camera button and volume controls on the right, plus a SIM card slot and customizable button on the left.
One aspect of the buttons that we particularly liked is that the volume rocker is two separate buttons, not a switch, which makes it much easier to use for combo presses, like the screenshot.
But by far the strangest feature of the Armor 15 is that hidden under two rubber doors at the top is a pair of TWS earphones. The fact that they've found enough space to house these two items is impressive, and the location also offers a way to recharge them when not in use.
The nice thing about these is that once paired with the Armor 15 via Bluetooth, they will automatically connect when you take them out of your home and disconnect when you put them back in.
Ulefone makes an Armor case for this design that takes into account the doors that cover the headphone garage and provides an easy way to attach the phone to a belt with a carabiner.
The Armor 15 looks good from the outside, but what's inside may be more important.
Material
Technical sheet
The Ulefone Armor 15 that was sent to us for review came with the following hardware:
UPC: MediaTek Helio G35
GPU: IMG PowerVR GE8320
RAM: 6 GB LPDDR4X
Storage: 128 GB (microSD memory card up to 1 TB)
Filter: 5,45-inch IPS TFT
Resolution: 720x1440HD+
SIM: Dual Nano SIM
Reading: 346g
Size: 170,2x79,6x18,2mm
Robust Specification: IP68, IP69K and MIL-STD-810H
Rear cameras: 363MP SONY IMX12 sensor and 5MP Samsung S3K3M13 wide-angle camera
Frontal camera: Sensor SONY IMX481 16MP
operating system: android 12
Battery: 6600mAh
After reviewing previous Ulefone designs, we were expecting a MediaTek SoC, and the designers of Armor 15 did not meet those expectations.
However, we were surprised that the Armor 15 used the same Helio G35 as the base model Power Armor 14, which was probably the weakest link in this design.
The G35 isn't the most powerful SoC platform we've tested, sitting a notch below the Qualcomm Snapdragon 480. It may be an octa-core design, but the PowerVR GE8320 is a remarkably lackluster GPU that isn't well-suited for gaming or VR.
Perhaps it's time for Chinese phone makers to ditch the seven-year-old ARM Cortex-A53 SoCs and switch to a more contemporary architecture.
In this context, the Helio G35 SoC is associated with 6 GB of RAM and 128 GB of storage, amounts that should be sufficient for basic tasks. However, the SIM tray can accept a Micro SD card up to 1TB in size, allowing for more storage, and can also hold two Nano SIMs simultaneously.
We've seen some weird resolutions on Chinese phones lately, and the 18 x 9 pixel 720:1440 aspect ratio panel on this design is one of them.
Ulefone refers to it as HD+, conveniently forgetting that HD is 1920 x 1080, a higher resolution.
Previously Ulefone designers used to use SONY IMX350 as main rear camera and SONY IMX481 for front selfies. These have been updated with the new SONY IMX363 backed with a Samsung S5K3M3 wide angle camera on the back. But, the same SONY IMX481 sensor is in the front.
The SONY IMX363 is a great sensor that appeared in the Pixel 3 and iPhone 11, but unfortunately it's still limited to 1080p video capture. Still image capture is generally very good with a maximum resolution of 4032 x 3024, and the inclusion of a dedicated photo button helps to quickly set up shooting.
The camera is enabled to take videos and still images underwater. But since water resistance is max 1,5m for 30 minutes and the phone doesn't float, we'd be very careful trying to use it that way.
As with all Ulefone rugged designs, liquid damage is not covered under warranty.
Unfortunately, we also have to mention that the Helio G85 SoC does not have video encryption security to access HD streaming content from Netflix, Disney or Amazon at more than 480p.
The other big drawback of this design is that it doesn't support 5G. While in some regions 5G is not an option, in those where it is, a reversion to 4G would be considered retrograde.
Presumably to make physical room for other features, the Armor 15's battery is only 6600mAh, even less than the Power Armor 14 Pro. This capacity would be fine in a regular phone, but it's low for rugged designs that can be carried around. for days away from the power grid.
Battery life is rated at 36 hours of talk time and 360 hours of standby time, about half of what some of the 10,000mAh compatible phones offer.
Performance
References
Here's how the Ulefone Armor 15 fared in our benchmark test suite:
Geek bank: 178 (single core); 974 (multi-core)
PCMark (running 3.0): 5448
To mean: 4505
password processor: 2382
Tirachinas 3DMark: 813 (OGL)
Extreme 3DMark Slingshot: 458 (OGL). 663 (volcano)
3DMark wildlife: N / A
HWBot Prime: 4671
Rather than jump through the hoops of our benchmark tests, the Armor 15 made less graceful progress and delivered disappointing numbers.
While the performance limitations of the Helio G35 are well documented, in today's age, a phone that can't read even some of the graphics tests smoothly is a problem.
It didn't even manage to play 3DMark Wild Life because unfortunately the Vulcan implementation didn't support enough features.
To put those numbers into perspective, our tests of the Power Armor 14 Pro (opens in a new tab) using the Helio G85 managed to run all tests and achieved an OpenGL score of 3472 on the Slingshot bench, while the G35 only it scored 813. That's a fraction of the power, and while the differences varied with each test, it was still one of the worst results we tested.
In use, the phone feels snappy and responsive, but if you challenge it with work that involves graphics or rendering, it doesn't have the computing power to do much.
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(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)(Image credit: Mark Pickavance)
final verdict
To put it bluntly, it's not the most powerful rugged phone Ulefone has ever made, though as the interface is reasonably fast, most users will gloriously ignore its limitations, at least initially.
Other limitations include the inability to capture video better than 1080p, no 5G communications, and only 480p Netflix streaming. These are mostly issues with the Helio G35 SoC and its use of the ARM Cortex-A53, which should be left out.
The inclusion of the built-in earphones is a nice touch, but Ulefone doesn't seem to list replacements if you accidentally break or lose them.
Overall, Armor 15 doesn't go far enough and suffers compared to the cheaper Power Armor 14 Pro (Opens in a new tab) design. Inevitably, Ulefone will come up with a Pro model that will fix some of these issues, but probably not all of them.
Ulefone Power Armor 14 Pro: price comparison
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