Vivo’s sub-brand iQOO has announced a new smartphone called the iQOO U3. The iQOO U3 is a budget-friendly 5G smartphone that features a high refresh rate display, a large-sized battery, and 48-megapixel dual rear cameras.

iQOO U3 specifications and features

The iQOO U3 has 164.15 x 75.35 x 8.4mm dimensions and it weighs 185.5 grams. The device is fitted with a 6.58-inch IPS LCD screen that has a waterdrop notch for an 8-megapixel selfie camera. The screen supports a 20.07:9 aspect ratio, a Full HD+ resolution of 1080 x 2408 pixels, a 401ppi pixel density, HDR10, and a refresh rate of 90Hz. The iQOO U3 offers a screen-to-body ratio of 90.61 percent.

The rear side of the phone features a uniquely designed dual camera setup housed inside a rectangle camera module. It includes a 48-megapixel main shooter with an f/1.79 aperture and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. The phone comes with support for photography features such as night scene mode, panorama, time-lapse photography, EIS, and 4K video recording.

iQOO U3
iQOO U3

The iQOO UI 1.5 based Android 10 OS comes preinstalled on the iQOO U3. The Dimensity 800U chipset along with up to 8 GB of LPDDR4x RAM fuels the device. It has UFS 2.2 storage of 128 GB and it lacks support for external storage.

The iQOO U3 is backed by a 5000mAh battery that supports 18W dual-engine fast charging. The other features that are available on the device include liquid cooling technology, dual SIM support, Wi-Fi 802.11ac, Bluetooth 5.1, GPS, USB-C, face unlock, a side-facing fingerprint reader, and a 3.5mm audio jack.

iQOO U3 pricing and availability

The iQOO U3 has landed in China in two options such as 6 GB RAM + 128 GB storage and 8 GB RAM + 128 GB storage. It has a starting price of 1,498 Yuan (~$229) and 1,698 Yuan (~$259) and it comes in two colors like Black and Glow Blue. The handset is now up for pre-orders in the home market with a 50 Yuan discount and it is expected to hit the Chinese markets by Dec. 17.