Benco S1 Plus Review: Attractive Design but Falls Short in Performance

Benco S1 Plus Review: TechLekh Verdict

The Benco S1 Plus has an attractive, unique design, at least in the white color option. Its display is satisfactory, with 90Hz refresh rate support, and it has good battery life, fast charging speed, 8GB RAM, and 256GB storage.

However, its performance and camera are unimpressive. While you cannot have everything in an entry-level budget phone, if only Benco had provided better performance, it would have been a good value phone for gamers as well.

Nevertheless, if you do not need to take photos often and only do basic tasks, the phone will suffice. However, considering what it offers, the pricing could have been better, especially since the Redmi 12 checks all the boxes and is simply a better phone at a similar price.

The Benco S1 Plus is a budget smartphone launched in June 2024 in Nepal. Priced at Rs. 19,999 (8/256GB), the Benco S1 Plus is the third phone to launch in the country in Benco’s S1 lineup of smartphones.

The Benco S1 Plus with its pearl patterns back design is indeed an attractive phone. But how is the actual phone? I’m Pranish Khadgi, and I will share my experience in this Benco S1 Plus review.

ALSO READ: Best Phones Under 20000 in Nepal (November 2024 Updated)

Benco S1 Plus Review

Attractive Design

• 166.90 x 74.90 x 8.50 mm
• 199 g
• Dual SIM

The design of the Benco S1 Plus is surely attractive. I have it in Moon White, which has a unique pattern that somewhat resembles marble.

Benco says the back cover is made from pearl material extracted from nacre, also known as mother of pearl. However, it feels like plastic, but it does not feel cheap.

The phone has a boxy design with a color-matching frame. The display bezels on the front are minimal for an entry-level, budget phone. It also has a punch-hole cutout, which is nice.

The volume and power buttons are on the right side. The power button doubles as a fingerprint sensor, which works well. The SIM card slot is on the left side and has dedicated slots for two SIM cards and a microSD card.

Similarly, the bottom side features a 3.5mm headphone jack, a microphone, a USB-C port, and a speaker. Speaking of the speaker, it is average at best; nothing extraordinary.

ALSO READ: Redmi 12 Review: Best Phone Under Rs. 20,000 in Nepal

90Hz Display

• 6.8 inches IPS LCD
• 1080 x 2460 pixels
• 90Hz refresh rate
• 580 nits (peak)

The Benco S1 Plus has a large display measuring 6.8 inches diagonally. It is an IPS LCD panel with a Full HD+ resolution and supports up to a 90Hz refresh rate.

The display quality is satisfactory for the price. Sharpness and colors are mediocre. They are not great, but one can’t complain much in this price range. The display feels smooth, thanks to the 90Hz refresh rate.

The brightness level is not very high; it may be adequate for indoor use, but in bright situations, it may be difficult to see.

Underwhelming Performance

• UNISOC T616 (12 nm)
• Occta-core (2x 2.0 GHz Cortex-A75 & 6x 1.8 GHz Cortex-A55)
• Mail-G57 MP1
• 256GB 8GB RAM, UFS 2.2

The Benco S1 Plus is powered by a Unisoc T616 processor, paired with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. Given its price, the RAM and storage capacity are commendable. However, the entry-level chipset is mediocre at best.

While the phone’s overall performance is poor, it handles basic tasks comfortably. I was able to use social media apps without any issues. However, it does test your patience. For instance, when you want to view a captured photo immediately, the phone displays “image processing” and takes a few seconds to show it.

Additionally, the phone tends to warm up during use, possibly exacerbated by the summer heat.

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Gaming

As for gaming, I tried PUBG Mobile on the Benco S1 Plus. The frame rate can be set up to Ultra with Smooth graphics, but the gaming experience is poor.

It delivered an average frame rate of 24fps. The game is playable, but it is far from smooth. There were frequent frame drops, and the phone was not responsive enough.

Additionally, the entire phone and frame heated up, especially the upper portion. When I measured it using an IR thermometer, the hottest spot read 45 degrees Celsius.

The second game I played was Genshin Impact, which is a very resource-heavy game. By default, the graphics settings are set to Lowest. Any higher than that, even “Low” settings, was unplayable.

At Lowest graphics quality, I set the fps to 60 to see how much it could deliver. The Benco S1 Plus was only able to deliver an average gameplay of 28 fps. Nevertheless, the gameplay was decent. There were a few frame drops here and there, but it was playable.

Subpar Camera

• Rear Camera: 48 MP, f/1.79 (main)
  • 2 MP (macro)

• Front Camera: 16MP

The phone has a 48MP main camera and a 2MP macro camera. On the front, it features a 16MP selfie camera.

Normal Photos

The camera performance is a weak point for Benco phones. The quality of the photos from the main camera is poor. The colors are unnatural and they have warm color temperatures. The photos appear yellowish and greenish.

The dynamic range is also below par. The shadows are dark, while the highlights have no detail.

The overall detail is acceptable for the price. It captures detail to some extent, but they are not the best.

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Front Camera

The front cameras have a similar story. The dynamic range is bad; it blows out the highlights. The default selfie mode has a beauty mode that helps remove pimples and facial imperfections, but it makes the photo very unnatural. The face appears as if it has no natural texture or detail.

With enough light, the selfies come out decent, but at other times, when the light drops even slightly, it fails to expose the face properly.

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Videos

• 1080p@30fps

The rear camera of the Benco S1 Plus can shoot up to 1080p video. The video is very shaky with average quality, poor dynamic range, and low detail.

Battery

• 5000mAh
• 33W charging support

The Benco S1 Plus has a 5000mAh battery and delivers good battery life. After using the phone for 2 hours, including 40 minutes of PUBG Mobile and the rest on social media, the battery dropped from 100 percent to 70 percent.

Similarly, when the battery percentage hit 10 percent, the phone had almost 7 hours of screen-on time. This implies that the phone easily provides a full day’s battery life.

The charging speed is also good. It supports 33W fast charging, and the phone comes with a compatible charger and earphones in the box, which is rare nowadays.

In half an hour, the phone charges to 50 percent, while it takes around 1.5 hours to charge over 90 percent.

Software

• Android 13
• INONE UI 1.2

In terms of software, it comes with last year’s Android 13 with INONE UI 1.2 skin on top. The phone should have come with Android 14, but unfortunately, that’s not the case.

The INONE UI of the Benco is a lightweight Android skin and is similar to the stock Android. There is no bloatware either. The phone does not even have its own gallery app for viewing photos; you need to use the Google Photos app.

One neat feature it has is a Smart Window, similar to the iPhone’s Dynamic Island but without any dynamics. The Smart Window appears during face unlock, charging, and incoming calls. However, it does not support any custom notifications.

The Smart Window brings one annoying drawback. If I have enabled face unlock and want to see the battery percentage at a glance, the Smart Window does not allow that. I need to unlock the phone every time to see the battery percentage, which is frustrating.

This problem persists even when the phone is charging. I can’t quickly see if the phone is charging or not. Either I need to unlock it or wait a few seconds, both of which are infuriating.

Anyway, the rest of the software experience is simple and basic. It does not have many customization features, either.

During my usage, I encountered a bug. When trying to unlock the phone with a pin code, the keyboard would automatically close no matter how many times I swiped up. It fixed itself, and that was the last time I faced it.

Also, I am not sure if it is a phone issue, but when I connected a smartwatch, the phone had trouble keeping the connection. After a while, it refused to connect.

The other phone I tried did not have this issue, so there is a chance it’s the phone’s fault, but it is also likely that it’s the watch’s issue. Nevertheless, this is something I experienced, so I believe I should mention it.

As for software updates, Benco has not said anything about them.

So, this is my Benco S1 Plus review. What do you think about the phone? If you have any questions, please let me know in the comments!