HMD Pulse Plus Smartphone Review – HMD Pulse Plus was announced in April 2024 and later went on sale the same month. The smartphone is already available globally and it will expand to more countries in the coming weeks. This new smartphone from HMD is designed for budget users and yet it packs some modern hardware.
The smartphone looks just like its other siblings, HMD Pulse and Pulse Pro. They sport the same design, which certainly helped them with saving resources that can be used elsewhere. The design is certainly quite appealing but the same can’t be said about its internals. It comes with low-end specs and it doesn’t even have 5G connectivity.
HMD has designed the smartphone with budget users in mind, so they had to make certain sacrifices. Let’s begin with a detailed review of the new HMD Pulse Plus smartphone and see if this smartphone is worth purchasing.
Table of Contents
HMD Pulse Plus Smartphone Review
Highlights
- The HMD Pulse Plus has a 6.65-inch IPS display with 90Hz high refresh rate support.
- The SoC inside the smartphone is the Unisoc T606 4G chipset that can reach clock speeds of up to 2×1.6 GHz.
- The smartphone comes with the latest Android 14 for a better experience.
- The smartphone has a 50MP rear camera system while the selfie camera has an 8MP sensor.
- The smartphone has a 5000 mAh battery with 10W standard charging support.
Design and Display
The HMD Pulse Plus follows the same design language as its other siblings like the HMD Pulse and HMD Pulse Pro. So, it has a similar flat design for the side and mid-frames, but it is made of polycarbonate. It has a solid design and well-constructed body, so there’s no chance of any creaking or bending of the body. The rear panel features a matte frosted finish, which looks quite good.
But at the end of the day, the design is subjective, and not everyone may feel the same way. The smartphone comes in three colors, Apricot Crush, Midnight Blue, and Glacier Green. The phone is protected against dust and splashes, but the company hasn’t specified an IP54 rating for protection. As for the display, you get a 6.65-inch IPS display with 90Hz high refresh rate support.
The display also gets adequately bright at 600 nits under direct sunlight, so you shouldn’t have any issues using the smartphone outdoors for longer periods with auto brightness on. Unfortunately, the display comes with HD+ resolution only, so could be a deal breaker for some people.
Memory and Internal
The HMD Pulse Plus features the Unisoc T606 4G chipset, which is capable of reaching clock speeds of 2×1.6 GHz. This chipset has lower clock speeds, so it has a relatively average performance at best. But the chipset will have no issue running any apps like Facebook, WhatsApp, Snapchat, and more. The performance of this chipset is not great but not terrible either.
The same goes for gaming. The chipset has Mali-G57 MP1 GPU, which is below average and cannot run demanding games. So, don’t expect it to run games like CODm and PUBGm flawlessly but it can run games like Candy Crush, Tempe Run, and other games like this decently well. As for the OS, the smartphone comes with the latest Android 14 for a better experience.
This allows you to enjoy the latest Android features out of the box. But, the smartphone doesn’t support 5G connectivity, so you will have to settle with 4G connectivity only. It’s one of the compromises HMD had to make at this price point. As for RAM and storage, the smartphone can be purchased with up to 4GB to 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, which can be expanded with microSDXC. There’s also a 3.5mm headphone jack, which is getting quite rare these days.
Camera
The HMD Pulse Plus sports a 50MP rear camera system. The primary camera consists of a 50MP sensor, which manages to capture some shots that are above average with a decent level of detail considering the price tag. The camera is accompanied by an LED flash and also supports autofocus, which saves you from the trouble of manually focusing every time you take a picture.
There’s a secondary auxiliary camera that should probably work alongside other camera modes, but the company hasn’t specified Megapixel. For the selfies, there’s an 8MP selfie camera that can take some selfies that are above average with a generally natural color tone. As for video recording, the rear camera can shoot up to 1080p@30FPS, but there’s no stabilization option of any kind.
Battery and Others
The HMD Pulse Plus has a 5000 mAh high-capacity battery, which can last 2 – 3 days with light to medium usage, which includes a bit of camera, social media, texting, watching videos, making notes, and so on. Getting 2 days or even more is not that difficult, but playing games will drain the battery a lot faster. Also, keep in mind that this is a removable battery.
However, the smartphone doesn’t have support for any form of fast charger. It has a standard 10W charger, which will probably take over 3 hours to fully charge the smartphone. Apart from that, the smartphone also has Wi-Fi 5, Bluetooth 5.0, a side-mounted fingerprint scanner, GPS, NFC, and a USB Type-C port. The HMD Pulse Plus starts at $167 (Rs 13,999 in India) approx.
HMD Pulse Plus Specifications Detail
Down below you can see the full specifications of the HMD Pulse Plus smartphone.
| Specifications | HMD Pulse Plus |
| Network | 2G, 3G, 4G |
| Announced | April 2024 |
| SIM | Nano-SIM |
| Dimensions | 6.43 x 2.95 x 0.33 inches |
| Weight | 187 g |
| Size | 6.65 inches |
| Display | IPS LCD 90Hz 480-600 nits brightness 20:9 ratio ~265 PPI density |
| Protection/Others | Dust and splash-resistant |
| Resolution | 720 x 1612 pixels |
| OS | Android 14 |
| Chipset | 12nm – Unisoc T606 |
| CPU | Octa-core 2×1.6 GHz Cortex-A75 6×1.6 GHz Cortex-A55 |
| GPU | Mali-G57 MP1 |
| Card slot | microSDXC |
| RAM | 4GB, 6GB, 8GB |
| Internal | 128GB |
| Camera | 50 MP (wide), AF Auxiliary lens LED flash, HDR Max – 1080p@30fps |
| Selfie | 8 MP |
| Loudspeaker | Yes |
| 3.5mm jack | Yes |
| WLAN | Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac |
| Bluetooth | 5.0, A2DP, LE |
| GPS | GPS, GALILEO |
| NFC | Yes |
| Infrared port | No |
| Radio | Unspecified |
| USB | USB Type-C 2.0, OTG |
| Sensors | Side-mounted fingerprint, accelerometer, proximity, compass |
| Battery | 5000 mAh 10W wired |
| Colors | Apricot Crush, Midnight Blue, Glacier Green |
| Expected Price | $167 (Rs 13,999 in India) approx |
Conclusion
The HMD Pulse Plus is an extremely low-end smartphone, so it doesn’t have a great chipset. The same goes for the display, rear camera, and the front camera. However, the battery is quite good but the charger isn’t. It’s a standard charger and the phone doesn’t support fast charging of any kind. Also, there’s no 5G connectivity support.
This low-end smartphone could have been considered a good budget option if the pricing was also decent, but it is anything but decent. The Xiaomi Redmi 13C, which costs less than $150, provides better specs, including display protection, fast charging, better cameras, and more. It is the better smartphone comparatively and has a lower price tag.
Various other smartphones provide better specs than what the HMD is providing with this smartphone. However, the final decision is up to you, so it is better to choose a smartphone based on your requirements and needs.
