The Meizu 18s series and the 18x are top tier Oppo and Vivo flagships

We said that because the phones look like Oppo Reno and Vivo clones

Meizu is a brand that you may not heard of for a while. They used to sell phones in the country but has since stopped, for unknown reasons. Although despite that, the brand still sells top-notch flagship phones. Just goes to show the brand isn’t dead just yet and is actually making a killing. Their next flagship is called the Meizu 18s, and along with the Pro variant called the Meizu 18s Pro. There’s also the Meizu 18x, which, interestingly, resembles a typical Vivo phone, in particular, the V21 series.

The Meizu 18s uses a 6.2in curved QHD+ SAMOLED panel with 120Hz refresh rate. Yes, this resolution is technically 1440p and usually is only available at the highest-rated flagships. The Pro version is larger, at 6.7in. still using the same SAMOLED panel, resolution and refresh rate. The Pro variant has been confirmed to be protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 6. The vanilla variant should have a similar-level protection, although this is unannounced.

The battery of the Meizu 18s is not the largest, in fact, it’s pretty small for today’s standards, only having a capacity of 3190mAh, this is partly compensated thanks to the 36W fast charging support. The Pro version has a larger 4490mAh battery with 40W fast charging support, still not as large as even some budget phones like the Tecno Pova 2 and the Realme Narzo 50A have a 7000mAh and a 6000mAh battery capacity respectively.

Both variants come with a steroid-induced Snapdragon 888+ processor so the phones should guarantee top-tier performance even under extreme conditions Also, in addition to this, the phones have a game booster called “Game Mode 5.0” that users can use and control to enhance their gameplay. This app also comes with the “real-time dynamic temperature control” technology (as Meizu calls it) that helps it maintain temperature. Probably a gimmick, but if it works, it works.

For cameras, the Meizu 18s comes with a triple camera setup, with a pattern similar to the Oppo Reno series. The main camera is a Sony IMX682 64mp shooter, the second is a 16mp ultrawide and the third is an 8mp telephoto with 3x optical zoom. As these are flagships, OIS is enabled, particularly for the main lens.

The Meizu 18s Pro uses a flagship Samsung ISOCELL GN1 50mp sensor instead, also with OIS, complete with a 32mp Sony IMX616 ultrawide and the same 8mp telephoto as the vanilla variant. There’s also a fourth 0.3mp Time-of-Flight sensor included with the phone for enhanced focusing. The Pro variant can also record in 8K while the regular variant can record only up to 4K. Both have gyro-EIS enabled in addition to OIS.

For the front cameras, the Meizu 18s comes with a single 20mp dot notch camera, while the 18s Pro comes with a 44mp sensor. This 44mp sensor has been confirmed to be able to shoot 4K video at 30 and 60fps, as a bonus, this also comes with gyro-EIS so that when you’re vlogging, the video would remain steady and not shaky.

Both phones come with an in-display ultrasonic fingerprint sensor, NFC and no headphone jack. This is partly compensated by the fact that both of these phones come with stereo speakers

Meizu 18x

While we have discussed the vanilla and Pro variants, the 18x stands out from the two. This phone appears to be the “lite” variant with some of its specs nerfed from the higher-end flagship siblings. Also, we noticed that the design is inspired from a typical Vivo phone, in particular the Vivo V21 series, which have the same camera pattern at the back.

Anyway, while this phone is a “lite” variant of the Meizu 18s, it still uses a flagship-level Snapdragon 870 processor, which should guarantee good performance. The phone still uses an AMOLED panel, although flat instead of curved and has a size of 6.67in, a resolution of FHD+ and a 120Hz refresh rate. This phone also has a slower optical in-display fingerprint sensor. Still pretty fast for a casual user for when someone unlocks the phone though.

For the cameras, the phone uses a Samsung ISOCELL GW3 sensor which has a resolution of 64mp. The phone also comes with an 8mp ultrawide and unfortunately, a 2mp depth sensor. No telephoto here.

For selfies, the phone comes with a standard 13mp sensor. For the battery, it has a modest battery size of 4300mAh coupled with 30W fast charging. In addition, QC4+ and USB PD are supported. All three phones ship with Meizu’s Flyme OS 9.2 based on Android 11. They also all come with expandable Virtual RAM (up to 7GB), UFS 3.1 storage and LPDDR4x RAM.

PRICES:

Meizu 18s

• 8/128: CNY 3700 (~Php 29.1K)
• 8/256: CNY 4000 (~Php 31.5K)
• 12/256: CNY 4300 (~Php 33.9K)

Meizu 18s Pro

• 8/128: CNY 4600 (~Php 36.2K)
• 8/256: CNY 5000 (~Php 39.4K)
• 12/256: CNY 5400 (~Php 42.5K)

Meizu 18x

• 8/128: CNY 2600 (~Php 20.5K)
• 8/256: CNY 2800 (~Php 22.1K)
• 12/256: CNY 3000 (~Php 23.6K)

The phones are now available for pre-orders in China. It is unlikely these would come to the Philippines officially, but there would obviously be grey market sellers which you can buy from. Grey market sellers are legal, but not official, so technical support and warranty may not be fully guaranteed. These, along with parts replacement and servicing.

Sources: Meizu (18s Pro), Meizu (18s), Meizu (18x) all in Chinese, via GSMArena