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TCL has made a name for itself over the past couple of years as a reliable smartphone maker. After building phones for Alcatel and Blackberry, TCL established its own unique brand of smartphones. One of the latest phones is the TCL 40XE 5G. This is a mid-range phone that promises to give users a powerful and efficient experience.
Right now, you’re not starved for options when it comes to affordable phones. However, this day and age is much different than years before. Just a few years ago, getting a phone for $100 meant that you were automatically in for a completely terrible experience. However, times have changed, and more phones are filling the “Flagship Killer” shoes that were left behind by OnePlus. The TCL 40XE 5G weighs in at a feather-light $99.99. Will this phone give you a proper bang for your buck, or is it a bust? Let’s find out in this review.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Design
TCL is going for a certain look with this phone, and it’s not the kind of look that’s meant to be shown off. However, that’s not a bad thing. The TCL 40 XE 5G has a very straightforward no “BS” design, but it still has certain defining features intrinsic to TCL’s phones.
The back is made from plastic that has a faux brushed-metal design. It’s dark gray, and that gives it a pretty sleek look to it. It’s nice in sort of a heavy-duty way. The main gripe I have with the back panel is the texture. That scratchy back material irritates the skin just a bit, so not everyone will be a fan of it.
The camera package is also made from gray plastic, but it has a different texture. In fact, the blocky look of the camera package adds to the overall heavy-duty look of the phone.
All in all, the design isn’t meant to turn heads, but it’s actually nice in a certain way.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Build quality
When you pick up a $100 phone, you expect it to feel like a $100 device; you expect to feel like you’re picking up one of those toy phones on a market shelf. That’s not the case with the TCL 40 XE 5G. Picking up this phone before and after I learned the price, I gave two completely different responses.
This phone is so solidly built that it doesn’t feel like a $100 phone. I’d say it feels like a phone more than twice its price. It sits heavily in the hand, so you know that it can take a couple of falls and keep going. It’s unapologetically thick, and the flat frame makes it feel like a tank in the hand.
TCL didn’t go for a premium feeling with this phone. It’s not meant to be a fashion statement. The statement it’s meant to say is “I am tough!”. I’m not going to say that the phone is well-built for its price; I’m going to say that this phone is well-built in general.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Display
TCL is a brand that’s like Samsung in that some people buy their phones for the display. Samsung’s phones have stunning and breathtaking displays while TCL’s don’t aim for quite that. However, TCL is primarily a TV company. It, like Samsung and formerly LG, uses its display expertise to fit its phones with top-notch displays.
In the case of the TCL 40 XE 5G, the display is pretty average. Given the price, it’s actually above average. Last year, I reviewed the TCL Stylus 5G, and that phone blew me away with how nice the display was. It did NOT belong on a phone for only $258. This gave me the expectation that TCL’s phones punch above their weight when it comes to their displays.
The TCL 40 XE 5G’s display is definitely better than what you’d get for most phones in this price range.
Specs
Going over the technical details, this device’s specs are pretty standard for a phone of this price. It has a 6.65-inch LCD display with a resolution of 720 x 1612. This gives it an HD+ resolution and 269ppi. It has a 90Hz refresh rate.
Colors
In the Display settings, you can choose between the different color modes. You have your pick between Natural, Vivid, and Advanced. Natural will give you the most true-to-life colors while Vivid will give you more saturated colors that really push this display to its limits. Advanced has some additional options. You have the option between saturated colors or sRGB colors, and you can also adjust the color temperature. I’m reviewing it in Vivid mode, as that’s the mode that most people would use.
Using the Vivid color mode, the colors popped more than you’d expect from an LCD panel. they’re nicely vivid and they’ll definitely add to your video-watching experience. With the Vivid mode enabled, the colors are also notably warm. This means that yellows and oranges will pop a bit more. If you don’t like the warmer color, you can adjust the color temperature.
If you’re watching a decent video on this phone, you should expect the colors to stick out to you nicely.
Contrast
This isn’t an OLED panel, so the contrast isn’t a shoo-in. You’re going to see gray backgrounds instead of completely black. That being said, the contrast on this display is pretty nice. Darker tones are nicely dark. It’s definitely better than what you’d see on a phone of this price just a few years ago.
Brightness
The TCL 40 XE 5G won’t stand out in this category. Sunlight visibility is pretty subpar. Using this phone in the bright Florida sun, I had a bit of trouble seeing content. I definitely had to block the sun to see some of the finer details. Overall, the brightness is just what you’d expect
NXTVISION
The image quality is nice out of the box, but TCL has an Ace up its sleeve. The company has a proprietary technology called NXTVISION. This basically enhances the colors and contrast of images, videos, and games. It will give you an HDR-like experience without the physical HDR hardware.
The company is not lying about this claim, as turning on the NXTVISION will boost the colors and contrast to a noticeable degree. This makes the picture pop even more. It’s really pleasing to the eye.
Resolution
The one thing that holds this display back is the resolution. It’s rocking a rather large display, but it has a 720p+ resolution. That’s understandable seeing as this is a $100 phone. If it was $100 more, then I’d expect a 1080p display. Be that as it may, you’ll see images and videos with nice colors, but they’ll just lack a bit of clarity.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Speaker
Being such an affordable phone, the TCL 40 XE 5G missed out on several features, and that’s evident in the speaker department. Nowadays, it’s not uncommon for a mid-range phone to come out with a set of dual speakers. However, a $100 phone with dual speakers is asking a bit much. Thus, the TCL 40 XE 5G has a single bottom-firing speaker.
Loudness
In terms of pure loudness, the speaker on this phone is pretty powerful. It’s not exceptionally loud, but it can get up to a pretty nice volume. It won’t cut through if you’re in a crowded area, but it’s not bad for personal use.
Low end
When it comes to the low end, this phone is not turning any heads. The sound is about as tinny as any phone in this price range. There’s not much low-end, so it might not be your first choice when listening to music.
Overall audio quality
The sound quality is pretty good for the price. It’s pretty clear overall, so you won’t have an issue watching movies or taking calls using the speakerphone. In the grand scheme of things, however, the speaker isn’t really anything to write home about.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Performance
The TCL 40 XE 5G is powered by the MediaTek Dimensity 700 SoC. That’s the same processor that powers the TCL Stylus 5G. Thus, you’d expect a similar performance. That happens the be the case.
When I used the Stylus 5G, I was thoroughly impressed with how TCL optimized the software to work with the chip. The Dimensity 700 is one of the lower-end chips in the Dimensity series. However, that doesn’t mean that it’s not capable of delivering a nice experience.
The TCL 40 XE 5G is a nice performer as well. Navigating the interface, I didn’t notice any lag or stutter. At worst, I noticed a few dropped frames when closing out of an app or summoning the notification shade.
There are devices out there that perform so poorly that the experience, whether or not they’re under a heavy load, shows lag and stutters throughout the software. That was the case with the TCL Tab 8 LE. Thankfully, the company was able to redeem itself after that device.
Using the phone, navigating the interface, flying through apps, and performing other tasks are smooth on the TCL 40 XE 5G. I tried my hardest to get the phone to slow down, but I really couldn’t. TCL did a great job optimizing the software for this chip.
However
Using the phone when it’s cool and using it when the SoC is smoldering hot after an intense gaming session are two different things. Right after running some intense games, I definitely noticed a difference in the performance. It didn’t become unusable or anything. It’s just that some animations were completely dropped, and it took a second for some apps to load.
If the phone is under a heavy load, expect to see some slowdown throughout the software.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Gaming
When it comes the gaming, this is where the performance shows some cracks. When you’re playing simple 2D games, you won’t have any issues. Games like Sweet Sins 2 play perfectly smoothly on this phone. One of the 2D games that I tested was Survivor.io. This is a game that gets pretty intense when there are a ton of sprites on the screen, and it will bog down weaker hardware. However, it ran like a dream.
When it comes to 2D games, you won’t have to worry about this phone’s gaming prowess. It will be able to tackle those games without a hitch.
Simple 3D games
Moving onto simple 3D games, the story is much the same. I installed games like Sky: Children of The Light and Dragonball Legends. Both games played perfectly smoothly. While these games aren’t the most graphically intensive, they’re still rather pretty.
Sky is still an extremely pretty game, and it still has the phone rendering large landscapes and environments. The TCL 40 XE 5G runs that game without a hitch. At worst, you can expect the occasional dropped frame. It’s nothing game-breaking, however.
Top-tier 3D games
Now, let’s crank up the graphics. Yes, I’m talking about Genshin Impact. This is one of the best-looking games on the mobile market, and you can bet that it’s cooked a few GPUs thus far. This is about where we see this phone’s limits.
Starting off, this is NOT a game that you’re going to want to play on the highest graphical setting. I turned the graphics up to full, and it is not pretty. The motion blur effect turns the gameplay into a slideshow. Even without rotating the screen and just running straight, the experience is consistently stuttering. Also, it causes the phone to heat up quite a bit. So, Genshin Impact is unplayable at its highest graphical settings.
However, if you crank the graphics down to their lowest settings, it’s like night and day. It runs extremely smoothly with just the occasional dropped frame. It’s nowhere near as laggy as with the highest settings. At their lowest settings, the graphics seem similar to those in Sky, so that could explain why the phone is able to run the game.
Overall, you’re able to play most of the lower-end to mid-tier games without any issues.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Battery
There are definitely elements of this phone that are exceptional for the price, but the battery is on par with what you’d expect. It’s very average; enough to get you through the day.
I start off my day with a full charge, and I’d go through a typical day. This consists of checking social media, some casual gaming, and a fair amount of video-watching with the odd snapshot here and there. Using the phone like this, I was able to get to the end of the day with a bit of power left in the tank. More casual users shouldn’t have any issues making it into the next day.
If you’re planning on doing more heavy gaming or binge-watching videos, then you’ll want to keep your charger handy. On heavier days, I was able to get about six hours of screen-on-time. That’s not too bad, but it’s not the greatest.
This shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. This phone is really meant to cover the basics. You’re not expected to do a ton of gaming or video watching, so the battery will serve your needs.
The story is the same when it comes to the charging. You won’t find any high charging speeds; no name-brand fast charging standards. The TCL 40 XE 5G comes with a charger in the box, and it outputs up to 18W of power. This will charge the phone in just over an hour, which isn’t too bad.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Camera
When you’re talking about using a phone as inexpensive as this one, you shouldn’t expect much in the camera department. I can say that the camera experience is on par with what you’d expect from a $100 budget phone.
Details
Starting off with the details, the pictures aren’t exactly razor-sharp, but they’re not the worst. You’re given a little bit of wiggle room when you’re zooming in. Just know that once you really start zooming in, things will start to get a bit ugly.
Exposure
When it comes to exposure, the phone tends to lean on the side exposing the picture. This is good when taking pictures in the direct sunlight. The highlights were kept well in line. This helped it avoid blowing out the clouds and creating a more balanced picture.
On the other hand, however, the images tend to look darker than the actual scene. It often makes bright sunny days look overcast. You can throw the picture into a photo editor and boost the exposure a bit, and that should liven up the images.
Colors
In terms of color reproduction, this camera does a nice job of giving me some nice colors. There are shots that gave me some nice and well-balanced colors. This seemed more evident with the blues, greens, and yellows. Taking pictures of the grass and sky gave me some nice and pleasing results.
There’s one issue, however. The color could vary wildly depending on the exposure. I took a picture of a tree that was in the shadow, and I tapped the screen to adjust the exposure compensation for the darker shade. The exposure jumped up, and it gave me some extremely weird colors. The colors took on this almost nuclear quality. It honestly looked like I put some special filter on the picture. That could be an issue, as it looks like a completely different scene.
Contrast
The contrast in the images is about average with some standouts. The images aren’t particularly contrasty, but they’re not exactly dull. Taking pictures in direct sunlight caused a ton of harsh shadows to form under plants, and the camera was able to do a decent job of creating some nice contrast. Overall, the contrast is serviceable.
Low light
Moving onto low light, this phone has a bit of an issue in extreme cases. Starting off with moderately dim scenarios, the camera performs well. Inside with nothing but a common house lamp, the camera is able to lighten up the scene and pull some decent details from the image. Along with that, the colors still remain pretty saturated. So, you shouldn’t have an issue with most inside scenarios with some light.
Lowering the lighting conditions to nothing more than a small LED light, you see the quality drop off a bit. The images are still amply bright thanks to the processing, but you’ll notice a significant degradation in quality and more noise. That’s to be expected from pretty much any camera.
The main issue with low light comes when I activate the dark shot mode. This is the mode that will take an extra long exposure. The thing about it is that it tried to brighten the scene too much. I took a picture of an Edifier speaker that was barely lit by my computer screen. The end result really went overboard with the added lighting, making it look unnatural.
Also, in this mode, The images look to have the worst quality. They’re the blurriest and noisiest. You can use this mode to capture a shot, but it just won’t look picturesque.
Overall
The camera is serviceable, and it’s more than usable for the price. I was able to pull some impressive pictures out of this phone.
TCL 40 XE 5G Review: Software
If you’re used to using stock Android or near-stock Android, then you’re going to be in for quite a different experience. TCL has its own unique Android skin, and it brings its own take on Android.
Aesthetic
The thing with TCL’s software is that it’s about efficiency and proper use of space, and that could be bittersweet. The interface is more efficient than stock Android with its densely packed icons and UI elements. The first page of quick settings shows seven items rather than four, the app icons are smaller and take up less space, etc. The software is for people who want to see more items on their screen at one time.
This could have a bit of a bad side, as it could seem a little cluttered. When I swipe up to access the app drawer, I’m immediately met with a barrage of icons. At the top of the screen, I see search filters. Under that, there are my recent apps. Right under that, We see some specialized carousels of apps. THEN, I actually get to my app drawer. This just makes the interface look a bit cluttered.
That’s not really unfortunate, as it’ll take some getting used to. What’s really unfortunate is the fact that there’s no Dynamic Colors feature. This means that your system’s theme won’t match the colors in your wallpaper. This was one of the more popular features that arrived with Android 12. So, if you’re used to Material You, then you will be missing some things.
Usability
In terms of usability, I didn’t have any issues. I didn’t have any issues getting used to the software, and I didn’t run into any missing fundamental features. You get a full Android experience with TCL’s UI, and it’s easy to pick up and use.
Final Verdict
The TCL 40 XE 5G is not a phone that’s meant to be a game-changer or a flagship killer. It’s just meant to be a good phone for the price, and that’s exactly what it is. This phone has a nice display, solid build quality, and great software. You get all of this for the price of only $100. I think that it should be worth at least $100 more than that. TCL did a great job with this phone, and I highly recommend that you pick one up.