We’ve used so many rugged phones this year. But the model we have today is special, as it’s unlike any other rugged phone that we’ve seen so far. And it’s called the Zeeker P10.
We’ve seen many rugged models that come with good rugged features but ignore other aspects of user experience meant for a regular smartphone. But in addition to top rugged features, on the Zeeker P10, you will see a practical camera system including a 108MP main camera and IR night vision camera. And during our limited experience, it really impressed us with its excellent balance of ruggedness and practical features. So let’s take a deeper look into the brand-new Zeeker P10 and see what makes it stand out from a bunch of rugged phones.
Ruggedness & design
Let’s start with its appearance. The phone has a bigger size than most regular phones that feature a tough protective shield. And the weight of 317g also suggested that it’s born for a tough environment. The Zeeker team has claimed that the P10 comes with industry-leading ruggedness and achieves 1.8 meters drop-proofness.
Considering how most rugged models only claim up to 1.5-meter protection, the 1.8-meter drop-proof is more significant for matching the average height of human beings. And of course, the P10 comes with plenty of industry standards of ruggedness, such as the Military-standard-810G. As for its water and dust proofness, the P10 has been certified by IP68 & IP69K rating, which includes a 30-min resistant test of 1.5-meter underwater and an all-angle dust test.
In our intentional endurance tests which included dropping it from 1.8m and even up to 2.0m, and exposing it to water and dust, the phone didn’t show any obvious signs of damage and still worked well. So, on the P10, it seems that Zeeker really did what they promised. And based on its excellent ruggedness, it’s definitely on the recommended list of rugged phones in 2021 and should be ranked very high on the list.
Let’s look at its front. Fortunately, unlike some rugged phones lowering priority of displays, the P10 features a 6.49-inch 1080P display, covered with scratch-resistant Corning Gorilla Glass. The LCD panel has a pretty good presentation with sharp and clear detail, which is already better than most rugged competitors. As for audio, we were shocked by the loudness of the speaker for the first time I used it. But it makes sense. Of course, it’s very useful for field works or outdoor adventures.
Performance & software
High performance is not at the top priority for a rugged phone due to the fast power consumption, so P10 is powered by the MTK G85 platform, which is an effective chipset for guaranteeing the balance between sufficient performance and good battery life. Although it doesn’t compare to regular phones’ results in the benchmarks we run, the P10 still shows good flexibility in software experience. There were no obvious laggy feel or crashes during the limited experience we had. And if you’d like to play lite games on the P10, the gaming experience is also not bad at all. In games like PUBG mobile, the phone could stably run at a smooth frame rate under mid-graphic settings.
Speaking of software, the P10 runs the Zeeker UI based on Android 11. The software is fast and intuitive, which did feel like the original Android system. On the P10, you can also enjoy all the Google services with the pre-installed Google apps. Apart from Google apps, on the P10 you will find an outdoors toolkit which includes 12 Apps that were designed for adventures or field works, such as plumb bob, sound meter, barometer, and so on. There ll be at least one or two useful tools for you in this list. And surprisingly, the phone also reserves the FM radio function. All you need to do is to plug in the headphone as the antenna.
Zeeker P10 Cameras
By far, the P10’s camera system is the best among all the rugged phones we experienced. It surprisingly features a 108MP main camera, another 8MP 120° wide-angle camera, an Infrared-ray camera for night vision, and a 2MP depth sensor, which sounds even better than some regular phones.
Main Camera
From the samples, it’s not surprising that the 108MP sensor gave us sharp images with rich detail. During the daytime, it has a pretty good contrast and natural white balance. And the color presentation is also close to what we actually see. Or if you want super high resolution when shooting photos, it seems that the 108MP mode doesn’t really improve the image quality apart from slightly improving the resolution. Under low light conditions, the night mode can obviously improve the image brightness and bring better detail for darkness, while reducing noise significantly.
Ultra Wide Angle Camera
The wide-angle camera has a really wide shooting angle, which provides a pretty good perspective for landscape photography. And its colors are quite close to the main camera, but its night performance is a bit weaker than the main camera.
IR Night Vision Camera
The biggest surprise for me is the IR night vision camera. It’s definitely a useful tool to have for outdoor adventures. This camera will give you insight into everything at night, irrespective of how dark the night is.
Another interesting feature of the camera is that the phone supports underwater photo shooting. So if you are fond of underwater sports, you can definitely use it for shooting good photos or videos.
Battery & Charging
The Zeeker P10 comes with a 6000mAh large battery and unusually features 15W wireless charging too besides 18W wired charging. In the past few days, we used this phone, the battery could easily last for over 2 days. And if you have a wireless charging pad like me, charging the rugged phone will become much more delightful and convenient.
Verdict
As a rugged phone, the Zeeker P10 delivers much more than we expected. Apart from solid ruggedness, the phone can often surprise us over other features without notice. And it’s definitely the most interesting rugged phone that we reviewed this year.
