To help us provide you with free impartial advice, we may earn a commission if you buy through links on our site. Learn more

Nokia Lumia 1520 review

Nokia Lumia 1520 header
Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £600
inc VAT

Nothing particularly ground-breaking, but the Nokia Lumia 1520 is very good Windows Phone phablet

Specifications

Processor: Quad-core 2.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 800, Screen Size: 6in, Screen resolution: 1,920×1,080, Rear camera: 20-megapixel, Storage: 32GB, Wireless data: 3G, 4G, Size: 163x85x9mm, Weight: 209g, Operating system: Windows Phone 8

http://www.mobilefun.co.uk
[/vc_column_text]

The Windows Phone Store has come a long way from its humble beginnings – to the point that there are very few essential apps still absent. You can get Netflix for on-demand movies, RightMove if you’re in the market for a new house, Dropbox for syncing your files across all your devices, and BBC iPlayer for catch-up TV. There are inevitably still some popular iOS and Android apps missing, but that list is narrowing by the day.

Several apps are practically must-haves because they fix our gripes with the stock Windows Phone 8 ones. The free UC Browser won’t lose your previously-visited pages if you go back to the Live Tiles, meaning you don’t have to jump into browser history when you open it again like you would with Internet Explorer. We were more than happy to spend 79p on Chronos Calendar, which has a clean week view that’s absent from the stock Windows Phone calendar, as well as several other useful features.

There are some Nokia-specific alternatives to Microsoft’s official apps too, which go from strength to strength. Nokia Mix Radio, with all its free tracks, music mixes and offline support, is as wonderful as ever, but we’re particularly impressed with Nokia Screen Beamer and HERE Maps. Screen Beamer is an evolution of the Photo Beamer app we’ve seen before, but instead of just displaying photos from your photo gallery in another device’s web browser, it will now send whatever you have on the 1520’s screen to the browser.

It’s simple to use – you just go to beam.nokia.com in the other device’s web browser, then scan the QR code shown in that browser with your 1520’s camera. Your 1520’s screen will then be displayed in the other device’s browser in almost real time (there’s around a half-second delay, so it’s no good for video). It’s a great way to get your phone’s screen on to something bigger without messing around with cables.

HERE Navigation

Offline turn-by-turn navigation from HERE Drive

HERE Maps’ main claim to fame is that it has offline mapping support. Google Maps also lets you save maps, but HERE has two main advantages; you can download map data for as many regions as you want or have storage for, instead of the limited amount of map data allowed by Google, and HERE has both offline mapping and postcode and point of interest (POI) support. It’s perfect if you’ve ever been lost and stranded without signal when using Google Maps, or for using your phone abroad without incurring data charges, but the Point of Interest data isn’t as comprehensive as Google’s. HERE Maps is complemented by the HERE Drive turn-by-turn navigation app.

The Nokia Lumia 1520 is also getting updaded to Windows Phone 8.1 courtesy of the Lumia Denim update. This is great news for the phablet as the new operating system will make much better use of its large, high-resolution screen. As well as improving the interface Microsoft has also done a lot of work on stock apps to make Windows Phone 8.1 a genuinely excellent operating system. Cortana, Microsoft’s personal digital assistant, is also present in this update, so you’ll be able to start organising your calendar and browse the web using Cortana’s voice commands. Check out our Lumia 830 review to see how Cortana fared against Apple’s Siri.

Pages: 1 2 3 4

Details

Price£600
Rating*****

Hardware

Main display size6.0in
Native resolution1,920×1,080
CCD effective megapixels20-megapixel
GPSyes
Internal memory32768MB
Memory card supportmicroSD
Memory card included0MB
Operating frequenciesGSM 850/900/1800/1900, 3G 850/900/1900/2100. 4G 1, 3, 7, 8, 20
Wireless data4G
Size163x85x9mm
Weight209g

Features

Operating systemWindows Phone 8
Microsoft Office compatibilityWord, Excel, PowerPoint
FM Radioyes
Accessoriesheadphones, data cable, charger
Talk time27 hours
Standby time32 days

Buying Information

SIM-free price£600
Price on contract0
SIM-free supplierwww.mobilefun.co.uk
Contract/prepay supplierwww.carphonewarehouse.com
Detailswww.nokia.co.uk

Read more

Reviews