IQOO 12 Review: Racy Performance in a Classy Design

IQOO isn't a brand we've covered in great detail at TalkAndroid. Still, we recently had the good fortune to spend some time with its latest flagship, which sports the latest Snapdragon chipset, a healthy serving of RAM, exceptionally speedy charging, excellent cameras, a rather bright AMOLED display, and an understated design with low-key BMW Motorsport branding. It's a smart-looking phone with flagship hardware and a price of just $660, cheaper than the OnePlus 12.

Join us after the break for our review of the rather intriguing IQOO 12.

Design

When you read that a brand has collaborated with another brand to create a design, you can be forgiven for automatically thinking that said design will be in your face and possibly a touch on the gaudy side of things. Thankfully, IQOO and BMW Motorsport went the other way and created an understated aesthetic that looks clean and classy. BMW Motorsport's tri-color logo is tasteful in size and placed in line with the IQOO branding.

The rear panel has an enamel glass finish, which is neither glossy nor matte. It resists fingerprints and smudges and offers a bit of extra grip compared to the usual glass finish on some smartphones.

The large camera housing is almost Apple Watch in shape, with three lenses incorporated into it with the dual LED flash module located adjacent.

The frame has flat edges all around, and its aluminum material gives the IQOO 12 a solid feel and a premium look. In fact, the IQOO 12 feels solid throughout and is actually quite comfortable to hold. The right-hand edge houses the power button and volume rocker, while you find the SIM tray, USB-C port, and speaker chamber on the bottom of the handset. An IR blaster sits on the top edge, and the phone boasts IP64 water and dust protection.

Hardware

Performance

Powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor with 16GB of LPDDR5X RAM and 512GB of UFS 4.0 storage, the IQOO 12 will never disappoint in the performance rankings. There is power to scream through whatever task is thrown at the device.

The 6.78-inch AMOLED display is as bright as you would like when outdoors, with up to 3000 nits available, and thanks to its 144Hz refresh rate, gameplay is slick and responsive. When the phone isn't under load, the refresh rate can drop down to as low as 1Hz for power efficiency. You can, of course, choose to keep the refresh rate locked at 60Hz or 144Hz. Resolution holds at 2800 x 1260, a neat middleground between FHD+ and QHD+.

Those with sensitive eyes will be glad to know that the AMOLED panel supports 2160Hz PWM, hopefully easing any issues.

Audio is decent for a smartphone, although if a 3.5mm audio jack was on your wishlist you'll be disappointed.

Battery

Battery life is, as it has been on most flagship phones powered by the second or third-generation 8 Series Snapdragon chips. You'll get through the day with up to 20% left in the tank. The 5,000mAh takes just 11 minutes to achieve a 50% charge and 28 minutes to get to full thanks to the ultra-fast 120W wired charging. While it's a shame that wireless charging isn't included, the price of the IQOO 12 and the speedy nature of its wired charging mean mean that it's not needed or missed.

You'll be glad to learn that the IQOO 12 has a 120W charger in the box, unlike many more expensive competitors.

Software

Overall, Funtouch OS 14 is relatively clean and easy to use. It looks modern, and there's a coherent design language throughout, with loads of options for customizing the UI to your taste. That being said, there is a fair amount of bloatware that can be uninstalled within a couple of minutes.

The app drawer is, as you will find on most phones (other than Samsung), with a vertical scroll and the option of having a row of recommended apps on top. There is an option to switch to horizontal app drawer scrolling present, too, which is a nice choice to have available. As mentioned, there are loads of options when it comes to customizing the home screen and notifications, with dynamic lighting effects available for almost any conceivable function.

Returning to bloatware, the IQOO 12 has Vivo's dialer and messaging app by default, but again, you can switch to Google's version with a few taps.

Funtouch OS 14 is based on Android 14, and Vivo is guaranteeing three Android OS upgrades as well as 4 years of security patches. It's not exactly Samsung levels of software support, but its much better than the likes of Motorola.

Cameras

That porthole camera housing on the rear panel includes a trio of lenses consisting of a 50MP main lens with OIS and EIS, a 64MP telephoto lens with 3x optical zoom and OIS that is responsible for portrait imagery, plus another 50MP lens that takes care of ultra-wide and macro photography. A 16MP selfie camera resides in the punch-hole in the top-center of the display.

The camera app offers the usual options via the More toggle and it's easy to navigate with Settings in the top right corner. You can choose between Natural, Vivid, and Textured photo styles and I found Natural to be the most well, natural.

All three rear cameras produce excellent results, there was no obvious weak link or corner cutting. The main camera was the one in use for the vast majority of the time, and the images taken featured excellent levels of details. The ultra-wide produced good shots in general, and the telephoto lens was capable of excellent portrait imagery, as you can seem from the picture of Max the cat below.

Colors are bright and vibrant without being over the top (although you can go that route if you wish by choosing Vivid). I found that I was taking fewer shots with the IQOO 12 in that I didn't need to retake an image due to some sort of imperfection.

The IQOO 12 has cameras you can trust to produce good results. Sure, the Galaxy S24 Ultra will give you better options and results, but that's also twice the price.

Conclusion

Vivo's IQOO 12 gets the mix of high-performance hardware, excellent design, and capable software almost perfectly. Besides the bit of bloatware (which can be easily removed), lack of wireless charging, and, more importantly, limited availability, it's difficult to see any weak points in this $660 flagship.

The IQOO 12 blows its competition out of the water in terms of sheer value for money. The OnePlus 12R is its closest rival (16/256GB variant at $599), but it is slower in almost every department and has a lackluster camera setup in comparison. If you can pick up the IQOO 12, you won'[t be disappointed and thanks to the good level of software support, it's a phone that will last you for years to come.