Vivo Y73 Review – This Mid-Range Phone is Just About Style

Among the latest editions in the Vivo Y-series lineup, Vivo Y73 is truly impressive when it comes to the design as it looks flamboyant at the very first glance. Even with the best specifications, testing the phone in the real world is crucial and that is where our hands-on review comes into play.

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Here’s everything you need to know about the latest Vivo Y73 2021 launched in India in a single trim at Rs 20,999/-.

In India, the Vivo Y73 2021 is available in a single trim i.e. 8GB+128GB at a price tag of Rs 20,990/-. Apart from this, you get various offers including up to Rs 16,300/- discount with its exchange program on Flipkart. There’s 10 per cent off on using BoB Mastercard DB for first-time users as well as 20 per cent off on using Amex Network Cards from SBi, IndusInd Bank, or ICICI for the first transaction. Check out other offers on the listing.

Before we talk in detail about the Vivo Y73 2021 let’s see what the on-paper specs look like?

• Display: 16.36 cm (6.44 inch) Full HD+ AMOLED Display
• Processor: MediaTek Helio G95
• Storage: 8GB/128GB
• Software: FunTouch OS 11.1 based on Android 11
• Rear cameras: 64MP + 2MP + 2MP
• Selfie Camera: 16MP
• Battery: 4000 mAh, 33W fast charging
• Weight: 170g
• Dimensions: 161.24 x 74.30 x 7.38 mm

Vivo Y73 2021 is slim at 7.38mm and weighs 176 grams. This makes it easy to hold and the slim structure enables for better grip as well.

On the front, you get a giant display (of course) with a waterdrop-shaped notch and thick bezels around the edges. The phone has a front glass and a back plastic panel with an AG coating on top. I would rather call it glasstic with a textured finish that looks pretty good. The Roman Black and Diamond Flare colour where the latter looks truly out-of-the-box as it makes a diamond structure’s radiant effect when you move the back panel against the light.

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The phone is slim and it can be seen on its sides as well as they have been squeezed to albeit accommodate the buttons but it looks really slim. Overall, the phone fails to look premium as promised. It doesn’t look ugly and that’s for sure, however, it looks dope but doesn’t have a premium-ness to it.

The camera bump resembles the one available on the Vivo X60 series. As always, Vivo’s rear camera bump protrudes a bit, and the phone wobbles if you keep it against a flat surface but that’s okay, it is something almost all smartphones create some kind of wobble due to their protruding camera bump.

The bottom side gives you access to a bottom-firing speaker, a USB-C port, 3.5mm headphone jack, and a microphone. You get a sim card slot on the top-left side that has a microSD card slot. Next up, you get a power button and a volume rocker on the right and that makes up for all the I/O ports and buttons on the device.

Vivo Y73 sports a giant 6.44-inch FHD+ Super AMOLED display with a standard 60Hz refresh rate. The device has 408 PPI density and it is HDR10 compliant. There’s a U-shaped notch on the middle of the top bezel housing the selfie shooter.

The display is huge but lies in a gold lock zone of displays which means it is tall yet easy to use. It has a 1080×2400 pixels resolution which is way better than HD+ displays and since it is Super AMOLED, it is as bright and vibrant as it could get. Y73 has good viewing angles and overall, the colours shown on the giant display are accurate.

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We don’t get a faster refresh rate which is one of the shortcomings of the Super AMOLED panel here. It is capped at 60Hz, which for those who don’t know, it is the standard refresh rate. Yet, the OS optimization among others has helped the display to be quite responsive.

The display is HDR10 compliant which means viewing and streaming HDR content on your Vivo Y3 will be great when using YouTube, Netflix, or other video/OTT platforms.

Vivo Y73 is powered by a MediaTek Helio G95 SoC under the hood. This includes an octa-core arrangement with two 2.05GHz Cortex-A76 plus six 2.0GHz Cortex-A55 cores. It is also clubbed with the Mali-G76 MC4. Vivo Y73 2021 is available in India with just 8GB+128GB storage. What’s more interesting about the device is the 3GB extension that the Virtual RAM on-board Vivo Y73 offers which is a blessing in disguise, to be honest. The increased RAM (not that it is smaller before vRAM), makes the apps load faster and multitasking is bliss, to be honest.

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The processor we have here is an Helio G95 SoC which isn’t something you should expect after paying Rs 21,000/- for a phone but perhaps that’s what Vivo has stuck with. To be honest, the G95 SoC isn’t any worse, it is average but it has made its presence on sub Rs 15K smartphones which means you are paying too much for an underwhelming processor here.

In any case, it is still a gaming chipset, and thus, playing even the most heart-wrenching graphics-intensive games on Vivo Y73 2021 leaves it on the right course without stumbling. Of course, you will get some jitters when playing long sessions but overall, you can play COD Mobile and others with high settings available. I was able to tune in COD Mobile with high graphics with max fps as well as very high graphics and very high fps is supported too. Poco X3 Pro is considered as a fruitful and way better competitor at least in the performance department when compared to Vivo Y73.

I hope Vivo upgrades it with Dimensity chipsets and justifies its pricing and that could have made Y73 future-ready with 5G, however, let’s not put salt on the wound at the moment.

Vivo Y73 arrives with the latest Android 11 out-of-the-box. Vivo smartphones use their customized FuntouchOS 11.1 which comes with its array of features, customizations based on Android 11. Well, you get a tonne of bloatware with Vivo Y73. Even though you can remove many, it is still annoying that you get so much bloatware pre-loaded.

The UI is super smooth and it is something Vivo has been refining for years now. App opening and loading time is negligible although if you try multitasking apps in two digits, this will surely cause some delay. Hopefully, the software-driven virtual RAM will be able to help. Also, as it has Android 11, it will surely get Android 12-based FuntouchOS 12 as well although we are at least a year away from it.

Vivo Y73 2021 packs a triple-rear camera setup. This includes a 64MP primary snapper with f/1.79 aperture, a 2MP depth, and a 2MP macro camera with f/2.4 aperture each. On the front, there’s a 16MP snapper with f/2.0 aperture mounted in a water drop-shaped notch.

The primary camera on the rear camera assembly is capable of taking quality shots. Since the camera app is fully stocked with various modes, you are free to horn its large 64MP sensor to get the best shots possible. This includes modes like HDR, Live Filter, Beauty Mode, Time Lapse, Eye-tracking, and so on.

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The shots were amazing in the daytime. Colours were saturated and overall, the large sensor was capable of retaining most data from its primary sensor. Turn on HDR and you get a further enhanced photo shot which appears as it is processed after snapping.

Nighttime photography on Vivo Y73 2021 isn’t that tiring or disappointing though. I was able to capture quality shots in indoor lighting conditions where the Smart AI works in the background to bring the colours in the shot to life. However, I noticed that the system overexposed some shots and underexposed others and therefore, it is a mixed bag of responses.

Portrait mode on Vivo V73 2021 works with the help of both primary and depth sensors (as usual). It had a convincing edge detection and separation system on-board that makes Vivo Y73 2021 a stronger contender in the camera department but beware, there are still many other devices in the same segment.

The macro sensor is an average 2MP sensor. It does let you take macro shots but it has limitations similar to hundreds of smartphones out there with 2MP macro sensors.

Finally, there’s a 16MP selfie shooter that was able to take high-quality shots in the daytime. One thing that I noticed using the front camera is that it softens skin tones even when the battery mode is turned off. This is something I am aware of with Vivo smartphones and Y73 is no exception to the rule.

The new Vivo Y73 comes with a standard 4,000 mAh battery which may look big but considering that Android smartphones are now hurtling towards larger battery sizes, 4,000mAh is still average but not bad. I can easily get a day’s worth of battery backup on a single charge and that includes moderate to heavy usage. If you cling to light usage and using the phone on power-saving mode, the battery should go a few hours into the next day as well although I am being too optimistic here. It’s probably one of the cutbacks Vivo made to slim down the size of the phone.

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The phone gets a 33W fast charging tech capable of juicing up the battery from 0 to 61 per cent in 30 minutes. It will take about an hour (-+ minutes) to charge to its full capacity. Although the charging speed is fast, the smaller battery could be an issue for many.

Well, Vivo Y73 2021 sports a single bottom-firing loudspeaker. There’s a speaker under the earpiece but it is reserved for calls only. Talking about the loudspeaker, it is loud and clear although it isn’t anything that will stun you.

The connectivity features are almost the same as the case with many other Vivo Y-series smartphones. There’s a Type-C 2.0 port for charging the phone and data sharing. There’s Wi-Fi 802.11ac with dual-band support, GPS navigation that includes BDS, Galileo, Glonass, and A-GPS systems. There’s Bluetooth 5.1 with aptX HD, LE, and A2DP. There’s a 3.5mm headphone jack as well. As is the case with Y73s, there’s no NFC or radio on the device.

Vivo Y73 has a 4G LTE network on-board. 5G is not available in India so getting a 5G-ready smartphone won’t make any difference. Jio 4G LTE works fine and the signal reception and call quality were fine as well. I didn’t have any issue with the Jio 4G whilst testing out the Vivo Y73 2021 although I guess it is a bit subjective since your cellular connection on the Jio 4G LTE (as mentioned above) might be better or worse.

Every Android smartphone has the basic PIN and Pattern authentication methods as a norm. There’s an under-the-display fingerprint scanner which is way better than Face Unlock. I won’t say that the UD FPS is slow but introduces a bit of delay which is something many other mid-range smartphones from Vivo offer. Lucky enough, unlocking the phone via fingerprint scanner in bright daylight works like a charm too.

You also get Face Unlock with Vivo Y73 which is snappy as well although much less secure than a fingerprint scanner. Since the FPS is not side-mounted, you are free to either use UD FPS or Face Unlock based on your preference.

Pros 

• 64MP triple-rear camera
• 33W fast charging
• AMOLED display
• In-display fingerprint sensor
• Extended RAM option

Cons 

• Standard refresh rate
• Meagre processor
• No dust and water resistance
• No 5G connectivity