Zeaplus has been known for its affordable smartwatches and some other smartphone accessories for some time. We have already reviewed a few of them and the impressions are that the company can definitely offer a great bang for the buck for some its products.

Still, the Zeaplus M7 is their entry into the smartphone market and we can’t wait to see if their product is worth your attention or not. At the first glance, it has a plain looking but decent design but more importantly it carries a great list of specs for the price of $169.

Zeaplus M7 Video Review:

Zeaplus M7 Review: SPECIFICATIONS

Full list of specs

Zeaplus M7 Review: UNBOXING

NOTHING OUT OF ORDINARY, USUAL STUFF YOU WOULD EXPECT TO GET WITH A BUDGET SMARTPHONE

A quite typical packaging for nowadays budget devices – a plain cardboard box most likely made out of recycled materials.

The contents include a screen protector, USB charging brick, USB cable and instruction manuals. I can’t say that the accessories scream high quality, but they don’t look like they going to brake after a month either.

Zeaplus M7 Review: DESIGN and DISPLAY

A decent 5.5″ display. the overall design is plain looking and has one minor flaw

First of all, Zeaplus M7 is not a small device as it spots a 5.5″ 1080p display, which is actually quite good. It is a bright and vivid LCD panel and it looks good both indoors and outdoors. In addition, the screen has a slight curve on each side to provide a 2.5D glass effect.

On the top of the device there is a 5MP front facing camera, earpiece and a proximity sensor. One more thing that is a actually a welcome feature is the front facing LED flash for those night selfie lovers.

The back is made out of textured plastic material. On the top side there is a 13MP Sony camera with a single LED flash. Just below the snapper there is a finger print scanner. The placement seemed weird at the beginning but right now I think it is pretty good since the phone has quite a huge footprint so it is easy to reach it with your index finger.

On the left you can find a volume rocker and on the right side there is a power key. Both buttons have a great tactile feedback.

On the top side there is a micro USB charging port along with the headset jack and on the bottom there is a mic.

The back plate is removable and under the hood you can find two SIM card slots (one regular size and another microSIM card size), microSD card slot up to 64GB and a removable 3800Ah battery.

Overall the design is kind of plain looking and it would not attract the attention of many people. On the other hand, this device was not build with a design in mind.

The glass front and the metal sides along with the metal buttons of the device feel high quality but the back plate is ruining a lot of things here. Firstly, the textured plastic feels a bit cheap but the biggest complaint is that it is making some wobbling noises when pressed meaning that it does not sit tight enough. I was told that it may be only my review unit but this is my experience.

Zeaplus M7 Review: UI

almost stock looking ui, which is built on top of android 5.0. it works fine most of the time

The Zeaplus M7 runs almost stock looking Android 5.0 Lolipop. Overall, all the apps are opening and closing fast, scrolling through menus is also usually fast but sometimes I encountered with some lags there and there when there were many apps running in the background. All in all, it seems that the UI still needs some polishing to become completely lag-free.

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There are some features we have already seen on many Chinese devices like gesture controls and pulsing notification light. I’ve tested them all and they work fine most of the times. In addition, there are many languages installed, so international users should feel like at home when using a device.

Zeaplus M7 Review: BENCHMARKS

a respectable performer. if you care about synthetic benchmarks…

The Zeaplus M7 is not a killer benchmark performer on Antutu but it is no slouch either. It managed to score a respectable 41k+ score, which is on par with the last year’s flagship devices. Considering that this device costs below $170, the score is pretty good.

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The device scores 783 at single-core benchmark and 3033 at multi-core.

Zeaplus M7 Review: PERFORMANCE

a lot of sheer power that needs some more software OPTIMISATION

As usual, I don’t care about benchmarks and I strongly believe that a real life performance is a much more important factor to look at. To support that I’ve tested the Zeaplus smartphone with a few graphically intensive games like Asphalt 8 and Nova 3. The performance is not bad but not perfect either. The graphics look okay but the are some skipped frames and even little lags at some points. Nothing to be a deal breaker as you can still enjoy 3D games but I’ve seen some better performing devices at his price point.

Zeaplus M7 Review: MULTIMEDIA

OVERALl, MULTIMEDIA CONSUMPTION EXPERIENCE IS GREAT BUT YOU MAY WANT TO DOWNLOAD A THIRD PARTY VIDEO AND MUSIC PLAYER APPS TO HAVE MORE FUNCTIONALITY

Multimedia consumption is great overall. Firstly, the stock music player is easy to use but more importantly the loudspeaker is not bad at all for the price of this device. Being a bloody picky I would add a bit more depth to the sound quality but overall I am more than glad to listen to music via loudspeaker. In addition, it does not get muffled that easily with your fingers.

Other multimedia options like 1080p video works just fine. As usual, I suggest you downloading a third party video player to get some more functionality though. As far as Internet browsing experience, I have no complaints.

Zeaplus M7 Review: CAMERA

Camera application is a stock Mediatek app with some basic settings and a few shooting modes to play with. The camera is able to take max. 13MP pictures and shoot 1080p videos.

Zeaplus M7 Review: IMAGE QUALITY

A DECENT PERFORMER IN THE DAYLIGHT BUT COULD IMPROVE IN THE LOW LIGHT. ALSO, YOU CAN’T WIN THE SELFIE GAME WITH ITS 5MP FRONT CAMERA

The night shots have much more noise, the level of details is significantly lower. Also, the camera software does not brighten up the pictures as some other devices do. Finally, the shutter speed is much slower and you have to keep your hand steady to avoid blurriness.

DOWNLOAD FULL RESOLUTION CAMERA SAMPLES

DONWLOAD VIDEO SAMPLE

Zeaplus M7 Review: CONNECTIVITY

all the connectivity options work fine

I have no major complaints about any of connectivity options. Call quality is not the best but good enough. In addition, I had normal 4G speeds on this device. Also, Wifi, Bluetooth and GPS work just fine.

Zeaplus M7 Review: BATTERY LIFE

good but not great

The 3800mAh battery sounds promising on paper but it could be better in real life. Well, it is not bad as it may get you through the day on average use or even heavy use if you won’t be playing games.

UPDATE: THE BATTERY SEEMS TO BE WORKING BETTER AFTER FULL 5TH CHARGE/DISCHARGE CYCLE. THE ZEAPLUS M7 CAN ACHIEVE MORE THAN 5 HOURS SCREEN-ON TIME WITH AUTOMATIC-BRIGHTNESS SETUP.PLEASE SEE THE GEEKBENCH RESULTS BELOW (test was completed using auto-brightness setting and dim display feature disabled on the benchmark app).

 

Zeaplus M7 Review: CONCLUSIONS

another budget phablet/finger print scanner combo from china. a decent device that does most of the things right but can still unleash some more power with a better OPTIMISED software

The Zeaplus M7 is a decent but not perfect device. Firstly, the overall design is just plain looking but the back cover could be definitely better. The thing that it is making some wobbling noises when pressed can be irritating for some. Well, I was told that it does not happen on all units. Anyway, it is not that bad and it is far from the deal breaker.