The Essential Phone Review: Save Your Money!

44 Comments

1. I am going to repeat what others have said. You got the phone during the first weeks of availability. It has been 9 months now and Essential has updated the software, skipped Oreo 8.0 in favor of 8.1. The issues you mentioned have been fixed such as some lagging, the camera app has had several updates making it very good, and the price has come down to $499.00. At this moment Amazon has the camera on sale for $399.00. So the value has increased taking a good whack at the major players. Samsung's Galaxy S9 series phones are struggling with camera issues and I am sure will get fixed with software updates, too. However, at half the price of the S9+, the Essential phone is the better buy at the moment, in my opinion.

   The Essential PH-1 was designed to be user-centric. It is all about the user and not the carrier you choose. That, plus the industrial look and feel evokes an emotional response that is unique in the world of Android phones.

   FYI: I got mine in April 2018 and all the updates came down right away, so I did not experience any of the issues the earlier adopters did. I did several test shoots against my Canon digital SLR. The color saturation, tone, sharpness, and color accuracy were identical. In Black & White mode, the Essential was sharper.

   Since they have fixed the camera issues and significantly lowered the price, I think it deserves reviewing again. What do you say?

2. You watch Adam Ruins Everything? Hahaha best show!!

3. First Phone with Notch

4. The creator of the notch! No iPhone X bullshit.

5. It's nice but seriously overpriced.

   I STILL would much rather have the OnePlus X. Beautiful design, amazing build quality, decent specs, awesome affordable price.

6. I got mine 2 weeks ago brand new with a dbrand skin for 250 it's been great so far ? Happy I missed all the BS

7. Or you can just go and buy a S7 edge, 580 bucks.. one of the best cameras ever, one of the best displays ever, good (not amazing) battery life, great specs, good storage …. etc..

8. I get your 700 dollar price point. But yeah the price was revisited. And pixel had a shit load of problems. I work for a cell phone company and the amount of pixels and pixel 2s that we see returned in a couple of days is crazy. I have a whole tray full of pixel phones that are sitting their collecting dust. So I don't agree with you on that point. And yeah the thing is you reviewed this phone after using it for IDK how many hours. Keep it and use it for a month then I'll ask you how this compares to other phones in the same category

9. Okay to clear things up if you have Sprint your updates are going to roll in slow, tremendously! Sprint users are still on Android 7.1.1 and I'm receiving the second update with the April patch 8.1 Oreo.. it activated Bluetooth 5.0 and has some Notch settings..

10. I've taken some good photos with the pixel camera

11. Most problems fixed with Android 8.1 update. Can we get a new review?

12. Better than iPhone x

13. it's $250 now on Ebay – worth it at that price?

14. i will wait for iphone E

15. One the best techies I invest time in, good again job brother!

16. Nokia 2 or 3 would save money

17. $700 saves money? :p

18. Ph1 Phone. Nice pun

19. No headphone jack implues only Bluetooth wireless headphones. Nice

20. Ulefone Mix; 4gb ram, 64gb internal, sd card slot, dual sim, dual cam, headphone jack, fairly stock, fingerprint sensor and pretty fast. $130. You're welcome!

21. "The phone with the bare essentials" Includes magnetic module thingo

22. Panthers in the house! ????

23. Can you please revisit this device? It is a much better option especially with the price drop and updates.

24. Switched from an Apple iPhone to the Essential. Got sick of trying to keep up with the Apple diehards. This is the first Android I've used in 7 years, and I love it. Feels amazing to hold, runs incredibly well. Front facing camera could be better but it's not at all bad. Rear camera is solid but nothing impressive. For $450 / $500 it's an awesome value and I'm really happy using it. It's a real head turner too, people always ask me about it.

25. $360 CAD now. It's a no brainer buy now.

26. oh, I thought the 2017 moto phones were the only ones to have the 4 little dots pop out when you press the home key. oops

27. I like the Pitt shirt

28. Brownlee now its only 500 (450 on amazon) bucks!!! Do you think that its worth it still or are there better phones for the same price

29. Sold mine. Worst phone I've ever had.

30. Theres a price drop for it for 449.99 at best buy would it be worth upgrading from s7 edge my screen is fuck and to fix cost pretty much half of what this phone costs now, please let me know thanks

31. Bought for $460 Canadian, and today ordered $50 Canadian 360 camera! Bam! After updating to 8.1 this phone is amazing.

32. Which batter water proof and best camera phones

33. What game is that?

34. Next Essential ph-2
    Essential Ph-two
    Essential Phtwo
    :/

35. At the new price it's worth it 100% there are no bugs I've found with the new 8.1 update either. Really a good phone.

36. Amazon description says water proof

37. Front looks like S8

38. WINK WINK!!!

39. Go Pitt!!

40. Essential ph-one
    essential PHONE
    I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE

41. Lousy review in my opinion.

42. Make it an OLED screen and I'll buy it.

43. Esencial phone without headphone jack??

44. Essential pH 1 ??