Black Shark 5 Pro review 2024: great gaming phone

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Black Shark has been making game phones for a long time. It’s backed by Xiaomi, but the company is quick to point out that it’s not owned by Xiaomi. It usually comes with high-end gear in a cheaper package. Now there’s the Black Shark 5 Pro, which is more of the same. You can map physical triggers to touch controls to help your game.

If you want a powerful smartphone that also looks good, the Black Shark 5 Pro could be a good choice. But you might want to wait until after the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 comes out before buying a gaming phone. The Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 claims to fix a lot of the problems with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 flagship chipset.

Black Shark 5 Pro Specifications

Specifications	Details
Display	6.67-inch AMOLED, 1080 x 2400 pixels, 144Hz refresh rate
Processor	Qualcomm Snapdragon 888
RAM	8GB / 12GB
Storage	128GB / 256GB
Rear Camera	64MP + 8MP + 5MP triple camera
Front Camera	20MP
Battery	4500mAh, 120W fast charging
Operating System	Android 11, Joy UI 12.5

Black Shark 5 Pro: Design

The Black Shark 5 Pro’s style is just “gamer,” but it’s not too much like what we have seen from other gaming brands. On the back, there is a soft-touch glass and a small icon that lights up. I thought I could use this as a warning light but that isn’t true. It doesn’t do much, but you can change some settings in the software to make it do things like answer the phone when it rings.

It’s a pretty thick phone, but the smooth edges on the back make it easy to hold. Even though it has a pretty big 108MP sensor, the camera doesn’t take up a lot of room and doesn’t stick out much. The screen is also fully flat and has a single selfie camera hole in the middle. You can buy this smartphone from its official website

Black Shark 5 Pro: Display

The Black Shark 5 Pro features an OLED display that is 6.7 inches in size and has a resolution of Full High Definition Plus. It has a very excellent panel with vibrant colours, deep blacks, and a refresh rate of 144 hertz (Hz). On this particular screen, the video games Genshin Impact, Call of Duty Mobile, and Apex Legends Mobile presented an extremely appealing visual experience for me. The adjustable refresh rate of 144 Hz was also a great touch.

Black Shark 5 Pro: Camera

With the Black Shark 5 Pro’s new 108 MP main camera, shots are taken with a default resolution of 27 MP. This is because the camera uses pixel binning to get more light, but it can also use the full resolution if needed.

The pictures look a little bit fuzzy, but we like how much brighter they are. When there isn’t much light or there is a lot of contrast, pictures come out well because they are clear and have good features.

Performance and gaming

As is the case with most gaming phones, the main selling point of the Xiaomi Black Shark 5 Pro is its performance power. This means that it can run high-end games at their highest graphics levels without a problem. At the heart of the device is a Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor, which is backed up by up to 12GB of RAM. In our testing, this mix gave us great gaming performance.

This is made easier by the fact that the right side of the phone has pop-up physical triggers that can be given a function for your game. This makes your phone more like a gaming controller. This setup gives you a pretty big edge in games.

Battery life and charging

For gaming phones to be worth it, they should have great battery life. The Black Shark 5 Pro definitely delivers in this way. The 4,650 mAh battery gives it a reasonable time. In the Tom’s Guide battery life test, we set a phone’s screen brightness to 150 nits and then tell it to load web pages over a wireless connection over and over again. With its display set to an adaptable refresh rate, the Black Shark 5 Pro did very well, lasting 11 hours and 2 minutes. It beat the RedMagic 7 Pro by an hour and a half, even though the Black Shark has a smaller battery and a higher refresh rate.

Price and availability

Direct from the manufacturer, the Xiaomi Black Shark 5 Pro may be purchased for a price that starts at €799. Additionally, the Black Shark 5 Pro can be purchased on amazon.de as well. The pricing for the various gadgets are the same when considering Amazon’s shipping options.

Final Words

I think the Black Shark 5 Pro is one of the best game phones by a long shot. It has a lot of power, a lot of useful tools, and a great battery life. It costs $799 to start, which isn’t cheap, but you get a lot for your money. Just the fact that there are real trigger buttons makes this a winner in my book.

Even though the Black Shark 5 Pro’s cameras aren’t as good as the iPhone 13 Pro Max’s, which is one of the best gaming phones you can buy because it has an A15 Bionic chip, it still did better than most other gaming phones.

Black Shark 5 Pro review: The good and The bad

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