Black Shark Official Global Black Shark 4 Pro Gaming Phone
Props to them for also making this compatible with other phones too, even iOS. A few weeks with this phone, and its changed my perspective on mobile gaming. The biggest thing that’s been holding me back, especially for MOBAS and shooters, is the notoriously hard-to-use and imprecise touch-screen controls. With Black Shark’s latest release of the Black Shark 4, they’ve got a couple of tricks to fix all that, the two biggest being, a highly responsive touchscreen, and physical buttons. There’s also Bluetooth 5.0 for connecting headphones, controllers and other accessories, and there’s NFC for digital payments too. Also on the side of the 4 Pro is a fingerprint sensor that doubles as a power button.
But that’s okay because the Black Shark 4 isn’t designed to be used like a “normal” phone all of the time. Unlike other gaming phones, like the RedMagic 6 and the ASUS ROG Phone 5, Xiaomi opted for a somewhat muted design with the Black Shark 4. You won’t find RGB anywhere (other than the display) https://kpopelaw.com/everything-you-need-to-know-about-sm-r732-firmware/, but you will find some subtle Black Shark branding on the back. This is an average score considering that I rate battery life to be very good when the smartphone lasts at least 10+ hours on this benchmark.
Black Shark has upgraded their liquid sandwich design cooling system, which it claims is 30% more effective at heat dissipation. More graphically intensive games like Genshin Impact do stress the phone more and after a few hours, it can still get too hot. What’s more impressive, however, and in my experience actually more beneficial to gaming, is its 720Hz touch sampling rate. Black Shark claims this to be “the most responsive smartphone touchscreen ever”. This high pressure-sensitivity makes it super easy to get precise movements for even the most competitive games. Camera performance is important on any smartphone, but if there’s any category of smartphone where it doesn’t matter as much, it’s gaming phones – at least, that’s what the manufacturers seem to believe.
However, the company does things slightly differently when it comes to its Black Shark gaming arm, where peak performance and battery life are more important. The Black Shark 4 Pro launched in the US for $579.99 back in late February, and it’s one of the more understated-looking gaming phones that I’ve used. Unlike many gaming handsets (including the Black Shark 3 series), the Black Shark 4 and 4 Pro have narrow bezels and a punch-hole selfie camera. We’re more used to seeing this design on regular smartphones, so it’s interesting to see Xiaomi buck the gaming phone trend somewhat.
- Based on my experience, here’s what I think of this gaming phone.
- Beyond being where you can adjust settings, Shark Chan can be a virtual butler, of sorts, offering congratulations for charging the phone and nagging you when an alarm goes off.
- In Apex Legends Mobile, my game of the moment, I can shoot 5 times in a row with my semi-automatic rifle by pressing the “shoot” button only once.
- However, the key difference comes where the processor is concerned.
- The back of the Black Shark 4 Pro is subtle in design, a shift from the schematics of traditional gaming phones.
The frequency of 162.3 Hz is relatively low, so sensitive users will likely notice flickering and experience eyestrain at the stated brightness setting and below. However, the Black Shark Joy Buds were the stand-out accessory among the bunch. Noise-canceling, low latency, smart, and were sent with a charging case. Like everything else in the Black Shark suite of accessories, they have quick-connect functionality with the phone itself.
