Review: Obi Worldphone SF 1

Hats off to Obi. We had a few of its smartphones in earlier this year — the Crane and Hornbill — they were OK, but not droolworthy. Fast-forward a few months and the very same company launches this beauty, the SF1.

The two main features that need a mention right at the beginning (just in case you guys don’t read past the first two paragraphs) are its elevated five-inch FHD screen and its smooth body wrapped in a fingerprint-resistant coating.

Still with us? The phone runs Android Lollipop out of the box paired with Obi Lifespeed, the company’s custom user interface. I know, custom UIs built on to the Android OS are tiresome but Lifespeed is surprisingly bearable and non-intrusive.

We have a 64-bit, octa-core, Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 processor under the hood and a 3,000mAh battery running the show. The SF1 is available in two variants: 32GB of memory and 3GB RAM, and 16GB memory and 2GB RAM. If the battery capacity disappoints you, rest assured, it’s equipped with Quick Charge 1.0, which got a dead battery to 11 per cent in less than ten minutes. That isn’t so bad.

The SF1 is fitted with a 13MP rear camera with autofocus, an LED flash and a Sony Exmor IMX214 sensor. On the front we have a 5MP camera with an LED flash as well. Two fun camera features are its automatic face tracking when in selfie mode and a built-in Refocus feature that lets you shift focus after you capture a picture.
The device is quite loud thanks to its multi-channel Dolby audio technologies. Priced a few dirhams more than 1,000, this handsome device has carved out a comfortable place for itself in the market. Hats off to Obi.