The TCL M2U was released quite a while ago, let’s see how does it look today. Find out more in our full review.

Thanks to LightInTheBox for sending TCL M2U for a review.

TCL M2U: VIDEO REVIEW

TCL M2U Review: UNBOXING

The device comes with the USB cable, charging plug and some documentation. 

TCL M2U Review: DESIGN and DISPLAY

TCL M2U is not a small device as it has a 5.5” display, which has only 720p resolution but it is actually not bad.

It is not on par with the 1080p panels but the display is quite sharp and bright, and you can also adjust the colour temperature in the settings.

On the front we have an 8MP selfie shooter, some other usual stuff and the capacitive buttons, which, however, do not have a backlight. 

The backplate is non-removable, it is made of plastic and here we have a 13MP camera with a single LED, and the rear-mounted speaker on the bottom.

The buttons are located on the right, they are clicky and tactile. 

An interesting thing is that we have 3 slots for each SIM card and the microSD card. That’s actually really convenient as you can easily hot-swap all the cards and you can do it very easily by just simply pushing a little button on the flap. 

On the top there is a headset jack and on the bottom you can find your micro USB port, and the mic.

Overall, the phone feels solid and it is well-constructed despite using mainly plastic materials in its design.

TCL M2U Review: UI

When it comes to the UI, we have TCL’s own take on Android but the phone is still rocking outdated 4.4 Kitkat version. A funny thing is that there is no software update feature in the settings menu and I couldn’t find any newer firmware on the Internet. On the other hand, the UI is running fast and fluid and I had just a few minor hiccups.

There is no app tray but there are plenty of customisation options and features. Just to name a few, you can shake the device to quickly re-arrange the icons, use and customise plenty of gesture controls, which are actually working fine; customise quick toggles and so on.

Overall, the UI is fast and responsive but the thing that the phone is still rocking Android 4.4 is kind of disappointing. 

TCL M2U Review: BENCHMARKS

TCL M2U Review: HARDWARE and PERFORMANCE

TCL M2U rocks a quad-core MTK6752M chip with the clock speeds of up to 1.5GHz, 2GB of RAM and 16GB of expandable storage. 

Surprisingly, Asphalt 8 runs absolutely fine even on the highest visual settings with just a few skipped frames. Also, the phone does not overheat to uncomfortable levels. 

TCL M2U Review: MULTIMEDIA

The sound via earphones is not bad and the loudspeaker is actually pretty good for the price of the phone. It is pretty loud and it has a decent amount of depth in its sound. 

TCL M2U Review: CAMERA

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The image quality is not always impressive. While decent looking pictures are possible but most of the shots lack in detail and the noise levels are high.

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The night shots don’t look spectacular either. The biggest concern is that most of the shots are affected by the purple tint and the level of detail is quite low. 

The phone can shoot up to 720P videos and they look just mediocre.

As for selfies, the 8MP shooter will do the trick for social media but the image quality is not very good. 

TCL M2U Review: CONNECTIVITY

All the connectivity options that include Wifi, Bluetooth and GPS are working fine. Also, the signal reception is excellent and the call quality is good.

TCL M2U Review: BATTERY LIFE

The phone has a generous 3500mAh battery, which is not user replaceable. The performance of the battery is very good. I could get over 5 or even 6 hours of screen-on time on light usage. 

TCL M2U Review: CONCLUSIONS

So, here it is, TCL M2U. It was released quite a while ago but it still looks like a decent phone given the current price of under $120. 

The phone is well-built, the dedicated slots for each SIM and microSD card are really convenient, user interface is fast, the performance and the battery life are great.

However, the image and video quality are not really impressive and the phone is still rocking the outdated Android 4.4 and there is almost zero chances of getting a software update.

All in all, TCL M2U is a decent phone for the price as it does most of the things well. However, make sure to take the shortcomings into consideration. 

Buy TCL M2U from LightInTheBox

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