Vivo Apex 2020: the smartphone of dreams that no one can have

The Chinese manufacturer has presented a smartphone that will never be put on the market but helps us understand how the industry will evolve in the coming years

It was supposed to be presented at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, but it was cancelled due to the Coronavirus emergency, and so it was only seen in an online streaming event.

It's the Vivo Apex 2020 and is the new concept phone with which Vivo anticipates some technologies that (perhaps) we will see on its next models. A bit 'like the Mi Mix Alpha from Xiaomi, the Apex 2020 by Vivo is not a smartphone that will come on the market: it is a demonstration of muscle and technology by the company of the BBK Electronics group (which also owns the Chinese brands Oppo, OnePlus and Realme) and at most we will be able to see in the future on some model of some of the technologies integrated in Apex 2020. But certainly not all of them, because Apex 2020 has several features that do not yet seem ready for mass production.

Vivo Apex 2020: data sheet

Obviously the Apex 2020 is a flagship smartphone, a top of the range, and like almost all top of the range 2020 is based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 platform, with native support for 5G. It then has an extremely curved 6.45-inch full HD+ (1,080×2,330 pixels) screen, 12 GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage. It weighs 169 grams and measures 157x66x8.8 millimeters. And, up to here, you may be wondering: what's so wonderful about this Apex 2020? In fact, the features described so far are pretty much the same as all the top of the line 2020s. The difference, however, is in the camera department and charging.

Vivo Apex 2020: the cameras

Both the front and rear camera departments of the Vivo Apex 2020 have user dream features. The front camera, 16 MP, is under the screen. No notch and no holes: the sensor picks up light passing through the screen and an artificial intelligence algorithm cleans it from interference due to the display. The main rear camera has a 48 MP sensor with a gimbal-type stabilizer, which is even more efficient than a regular OIS optical stabilizer. Then there is a periscope zoom lens with four lens groups (two fixed and two that move), 16 MP and with magnification between 5x and 7.5x.

Vivo Apex 2020: battery and charging

Another feature that would make the eyes of any smartphone enthusiast shine is the charging of the Vivo Apex 2020: it is wireless and 60 Watts. Today, there are chargers with similar or even higher wattages, but not wireless. Vivo claims that such a charger takes a maximum of twenty minutes to fill up a 2,000 mAh battery. But it doesn't say what battery the Apex 2020 mounts.