Home
Mobiles
Mobiles Reviews
iQOO Z10R Review: Slim and Stylish, but Not for Everyone

iQOO Z10R Review: Slim and Stylish, but Not for Everyone

Name: iQOO Z10R Review: Slim and Stylish, but Not for Everyone
Item: iQOO Z10R 5G

In our review, iQOO's Z10R finds itself in a tough spot, given that competing devices offer more at the same price point.

Written by Sheldon Pinto, Edited by Ketan Pratap | Updated: 12 December 2025 12:58 IST

iQOO Z10R Review: Slim and Stylish, but Not for Everyone

The iQOO Z10R is priced from Rs 20,999 in India

Click Here to Add Gadgets360 As A Trusted Source

Highlights

The iQOO Z10R has a stylish and slim IP69-rated design
Software runs smoothly but gaming does not
Battery life is good for a day

The upper end of the budget smartphone segment is highly competitive. On the one hand, we have high-end budget phones that offer good value but lack capable cameras. On the other hand, we have low-end mid-range phones that offer decent low-light imaging and better overall specifications, albeit at a slightly higher price. The iQOO Z10R is one such device that somehow does not fit in either of the above-mentioned smartphone segments. After using it for a few weeks, I discovered that the iQOO Z10R finds itself on the fence, trying to offer mid-range performance at a budget price. Does it succeed in finding its sweet spot? Or does it fail to deliver both value and performance? Read on to find out.

iQOO Z10R Design

The iQOO Z10R can easily be mistaken for an older Vivo V-series smartphone. The Vivo V-series has abandoned this keyhole-shaped camera module in favour of a more mature, capsule-shaped one this year, following the launch of its Vivo V60.

The iQOO Z10R does remind me of the older Vivo V50 series

Similarities aside, the phone does not feel like a budget smartphone, but a midrange one. There's a lovely quad-curved screen that adds to its premium feel and appearance. The aggressively curved display glass seamlessly blends into the polycarbonate frame and then into the curved rear panel. The rounded sides and curved-edge panels do make the iQOO Z10R feel and appear quite slim.

Vivo T4 Review: Nearly Perfect

I found the bright blue finish and the wavy pattern of the Aquamarine finish a bit loud. So, it's good that a subtle greyish Moonstone finish also exists. But it's made out of polycarbonate and naturally gathers fingerprints and smudges. However, given the bright colour, you can only spot the grime when viewed at an angle.

The iQOO Z10R is just 7.39mm thick

Alas, you can still find iQOO Z10R's budget roots by running your finger over the speaker grille and the USB-C port, which feel a bit sharp. Minor niggles aside, iQOO does provide an IP69 rating for dust and water, which is commendable for a smartphone at this price point. As always, smartphone manufacturers do not cover damage caused by water ingress, so we recommend our readers be cautious when testing the phone's water resistance.

Motorola Edge 60 Fusion Review

The quad-curved AMOLED panel gets bright enough to tackle the outdoors

The iQOO Z10R has a 6.7-inch, 120Hz quad-curved AMOLED panel, with the company claiming a peak local brightness of 1,800 nits. In practice, I did find it sufficiently bright both indoors and outdoors. The display is also HDR10-certified, so I could enjoy shows in HDR, and it appeared contrasted and vibrant as expected. Colours in the Standard screen colour mode are a bit saturated, so I switched to the closer-to-natural Professional mode, but it showed colours that were a bit too warm. Given that this is a quad-curved screen, you will see some unnecessary reflections from its curved edges near the corners, which can be distracting.

Moto G96 Review: A Do-It-All Budget Beast

iQOO Z10R Performance

The phone still runs Android 15 with iQOO's Funtouch OS. The device, along with others in this segment, is expected to get upgraded to both Android 16 and OriginOS by the first half of 2026. Since it retails with Android 15 out of the box, iQOO's software commitment of 2 years of OS updates and 3 years of security updates does seem a bit worrying for those who hold on to their phone for a long time.

The iQOO Z10R still runs the Android 15-based Funtouch OS

There are also some third-party apps (Amazon, Facebook, LinkedIn, Snapchat, Netflix and PhonePe) that come preinstalled on the phone, but all of these can be uninstalled if not required. The software experience, although now dated, does feel quite smooth, with no noticeable hiccups when multitasking or switching between apps. There's still plenty of customisation options available, but no built-in AI action (apart from Google's Gemini). The only annoying bit about the software experience is the jarring vibrations that were produced by the haptic motor. I preferred to keep it switched off for software interactions.

As for performance, the phone performs as expected, on par with competing smartphones priced both above and below it, as shown in the following table.

Benchmarks	iQOO Z10R	Moto G69	Vivo T4
Display resolution	FHD+	FHD+	FHD+
Chipset	MediaTek Dimensity 7400 (4nm)	Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 (4nm)	Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 (4 nm)
AnTuTu v10	9,06,550	7,66,690	7,80,665
PCMark Work 3.0	10,933	14,809	11,328
Geekbench 6 Single	974	1,008	1,120
Geekbench 6 Multi	2,824	2,907	3,043
Geekbench AI CPU (Quant)	2,119	NA	NA
Geekbench AI GPU (Quant)	586	NA	NA
3DM Wild Life	3,148	3,010	3,924
3DM Wild Life Unlimited	3,144	3,065	4,090
3DM Steel Nomad Light	347	NA	NA

Gaming performance is decent. But the screen's touch sampling rate is a bit slow for fast-paced FPS games. Call of Duty: Mobile was playable at the default Very High graphics and Max frame rate settings, and also worked just fine with the Ultra frame rate (which sets the graphics to Low). At the default settings, I noticed some lag and frame drops after 10 minutes of gaming. Of course, you will not get 90fps gaming in Ultra mode, but more in the range of 45-60fps, and so I would not recommend this phone purely for gaming. The phone did not feel hot while playing games, and the same applies when using the camera app outdoors. iQOO did not include a vapour chamber cooling system on the Z10R, but went with a simpler graphite sheet, which is suitable for insulation but not sustained performance.

The iQOO Z10R has only one user-accessible rear-facing camera

The iQOO Z10R shares its cameras with the slightly more expensive iQOO Z10 and the Vivo T4, but has a different processor powering the imaging experience, and so the results are quite different. There's a single 50-megapixel primary camera (Sony IMX882) with OIS and an f/1.7 aperture. It is accompanied by another 2-megapixel sensor for gathering depth data when using the Portrait camera mode. Selfies are captured with a 32-megapixel camera featuring an f/2.4 aperture. Both cameras produce 12-megapixel binned images.

iQOO Z10R Primary camera samples (Tap images to expand)

The primary camera captures decent images in daylight. They appear a bit contrasted at times, but there's good dynamic range and decent colour reproduction when compared to the actual scene. An area where this camera falls short is detail. There's just not enough of it when you zoom into an image, even by a little. Textures begin to tear, and finer details appear blotchy even in daylight. The same also applies to low-light imagery, and the dedicated Night mode also does not help in any way. The same sensor produces better images on the Vivo T4. So, this is either a case of lazy optimisation or the result of a different Image Signal Processor (ISP) because of the latter's Qualcomm chipset.

iQOO Z10R Primary camera Portrait mode (top), Selfie camera Portrait mode (bottom). (Tap images to expand)

The primary camera's Portrait mode surprisingly manages quality images with good detail and accurate edge-detection. The same even applies to low-light images. The 32-megapixel front-facing camera isn't as impressive and shoots decent selfies in daylight, but image quality falls apart in low light.

Video recordings have decent image quality, even though you can shoot in 4K resolution. 1080p video recordings were cropped heavily to the extent that they appeared zoomed in. Video stabilisation is also a bit shaky. 4K videos have a wider field of view. Colours appeared fine, but the quality was a bit soft when shooting at 1080p. 4K video recordings looked better overall and managed good, resolved detail as well. Dynamic range falls a bit short, so that you will notice some highlight clipping and less detail in the shadows. The same 4K setting appears noisy with faded colour in low-light shooting conditions.

The iQOO Z10R retail box comes with a 44W charger

Compared to competing smartphones that are priced a bit higher, the iQOO Z10R does have a relatively smaller battery. With a 5,700mAh capacity, it can easily last a full day of heavy use and a little over a day of casual use. PCMark's Work Battery Life test, which runs various everyday tasks in a loop until the battery drains to 80 per cent, lasted a solid 19 hours and 57 minutes. Because it does not have a massive battery capacity, the included 44W charger was quick to charge the phone to 46 percent in 30 minutes and reached a fully charged state in 1 hour and 20 minutes.

iQOO Z10R Verdict

The iQOO Z10R is neither a reasonable budget Android smartphone nor a great mid-range device. This is because it's priced too high for a budget device and does not pack in the good low-light camera performance one expects from a mid-range device either. Sadly, there are enough options above and below its price point that do a better job. There is the Moto G96, which does a fine job in most areas, except for software updates, starting at Rs. 18,999. And then, there are basic mid-rangers like the Vivo T4 (Review) and the Motorola Edge 60 Fusion (Review) that fire on all fours, delivering immense value at around Rs. 22,000, which isn't very far from the iQOO Z10R's Rs. 20,999 price tag. Despite having features like a quad-curved display and an IP69 rating, it's not easy to recommend the iQOO Z10R, as the iQOO Z10 (a replica of the Vivo T4) delivers much more at a slightly higher price. Get the iQOO Z10R only if you crave a quad-curved display and an IP69 rating, as there's better value to be found both above and below its price point.

iQOO Z10R 5G

REVIEW
KEY SPECS
NEWS

Design
Display
Software
Performance
Battery Life
Camera
Value for Money

Good
Slim IP69-rated design
Bright and fast HDR-capable curved-edge display
Smooth software experience
Good battery life

Bad
Only 2 years OS and 3 years of SMRs
Jarring haptics
Average overall camera performance

Read detailed iQOO Z10R 5G review

Display 6.77-inch

Processor MediaTek Dimensity 7400

Front Camera 32-megapixel

Rear Camera 50-megapixel + 2-megapixel

RAM 8GB, 12GB

Storage 128GB, 256GB

Battery Capacity 5700mAh

OS Android 15

Resolution 1080x2392 pixels

More iQOO mobiles iQOO mobiles price in India

Comments

Get your daily dose of tech news, reviews, and insights, in under 80 characters on Gadgets 360 Turbo. Connect with fellow tech lovers on our Forum. Follow us on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News for instant updates. Catch all the action on our YouTube channel.

Further reading: iQOO, iQOO Z10R, iQOO Z10R 5G, iQOO Z10R 5G Price in India, iQOO Z10R Specifications, iQOO Z10R Design, iQOO Z10R Display, iQOO Z10R Software, iQOO Z10R Performance, iQOO Z10R Battery, iQOO Z10R Cameras

Sheldon Pinto

Email Sheldon Pinto

Sheldon Pinto is based in Mumbai, and has several years of experience in reviewing smartphones and gadgets. As a Senior Reviewer at Gadgets 360, you will always find him deeply immersed in his reviews, switching from one phone to another. When the battery dies out, Sheldon is always browsing the web for a good sci-fi movie or reading up on cars and bikes. He also loves creating lists of interesting places to eat and travel. Sheldon is available on Twitter at @shellshocd, and you can mail him at ...More