It was early in the year when Vivo set an Android flagship photography benchmark with the X100 Pro That isn’t to say Xiaomi with Leica in its corner, and OnePlus with Hasselblad on its side, didn’t try to run it close. When Vikas Tagra, Head of Product Management at Vivo India says, “the X series represents excellence in the imaging industry,” it isn’t hyperbole. My suspicion is, if Vivo had brought the X100 Ultra to India, its photography benchmark lead would have been greater still. The timing is curious, but by already announcing its 2025 flagship, Vivo X200 Pro, the company wants to gain any advantage possible from being an early mover.
Generationally, a lot’s changed between the Vivo X200 Pro and the X100 Pro that it succeeds, in just less than 12 months as the market forces demand that. The design sees significant changes led by a larger camera island at the back, a 200-megapixel periscope telephoto camera instead of the 50-megapixel sensor in the predecessor, a 6000mAh solid state battery which is the first of its kind and a significantly overhauled Funtouch OS 15. HT had noted earlier that Vivo stole the march by rolling out Android 15 based software for its phones, while most of its rivals were still dabbling with beta testing versions.
“While there are delights we want to talk about, we are intently listening to the pain points of our customers, who may be already using a Vivo phone, or coming from other brands,” Tagra points out. That is the reason for why the 50-megapixel camera troika from the X100 Pro has been shuffled to instead have a 200-megapixel telephoto (the first of its kind, in our market), because those photos require that extra detailing—more pixels means more data for image processing to work with. “You’d be surprised to know what sort of photos are the favourites for smartphone photography. Nature, landscape, street photography, food, macros and wildlife. Our users tell us, it’s akin to a therapy for them,” he says.
Flagship photography, and a context from history
It doesn’t at all mean that Vivo, and their partners Zeiss, have ignored the human element of things. The Multifocal portrait mode in the X200 Pro’s camera, with 35mm, 50mm, 85mm and 135mm focal lengths, enable landscape portraits, classic portraits, figure portraits and close-ups with humans at the centre. In our tests, the results are almost flawless in terms of depth and the cut-outs processed by the algorithms. Yet, the all-round capabilities make for a photography experience that is setting the photography benchmark for flagships of 2025 to try and match.
It will not be easy, because the simplicity with which the X200 Pro is able to deliver pristine photos, isn’t something even more expensive Android flagships have been able to match in entirety. Expect Samsung, OnePlus, Xiaomi and others, to try their best with cameras. A smidgen of context may be necessary here. Samsung’s 2024 flagships, the Galaxy S24 Ultra included, disappointed with the camera performance from the outset; updates did improve things, but largely left buyers disappointed. Xiaomi has the partnership with German photography giants Leica, while OnePlus relies on the expertise of Hasselblad—and they’ll intend to catch up, and surpass anything Vivo and Leica have collectively managed.
It is not often that a smartphone can photograph the evening sun in a perfect blend of illumination, detail, texture and represented curvature. Or capture the details of a fine texture, in a really low indoor photograph, without it coming across as a low light shot, HT’s tests of the Vivo X200 Pro attest to its ease of use. Reasons are manifold, including the Zeiss T coating on all three sensors to reduce light reflections and flares, the use of Sony’s LYT-818 sensor for the primary 50-megapixel wide camera, Zeiss’ image processing expertise showing through in how the camera is optimised, the V3+ chip for computational imaging, and improvements to video as well including cinematic slow motion in 4K resolution at 120fps frame rate.
Performance, AI and software cleanup
The Vivo X200 Pro is powered by the MediaTek Dimensity 9400 chip, paired with 16GB RAM and 512GB storage. Thats the one spec going on sale in India for now, in Titanium Grey and Cosmos Black colour options, with a price tag of ₹94,999. That also puts pressure on some of the upcoming flagships, including those from, OnePlus and Samsung, to give users the value they search for. Performance isn’t at all leaving anything to complain about. Take for instance, the 6.78-inch AMOLED display. On the face of it, the size and resolution seem to have been carried forward from the previous generation. However, this display too has the Zeiss Master Colour Display rating, the idea being the photos clicked from the camera look realistic on this screen.
Vivo made the early moves with Android 15 too, becoming the second phone maker after Google themselves, to have the final release of the software available to consumers on their phones. There are more than minimalist tweaks to the design and interface, animations and transitions redone for speed and clarity, greater control over elements such as the colour system and icons and definitive improvements that can be felt to touch responsiveness. Vivo says the app startup times will generally be around 20% faster than before, and there’s up to 40% faster memory compressions to keep performance consistent.
“Another insight we heard from our consumers is they want the phone to last longer. That is why things such as longer OS upgrade cycles and physical elements such as the Armour Glass, are given value,” says Tagra.
Unlike many phone makers who have put the artificial intelligence (AI) features front and centre with recent launches through 2024, Vivo’s simply letting the AI functionality define utility rather than it be something they shout about. The suite is rather vibrant. AI Photo Enhance, in our experience, does a rather restrained job of improving clarity and adding details to photos that may otherwise be spoilt by a blur for instance. A translator, voice transcription, document scanner and of course, Google Gemini powered circle to search as well.
While Vivo’s restrained treatment of AI within the X200 Pro may be an outlier in the smartphone ecosystem otherwise desperate for a strong sales pitch in the hope phones fly off the shelves, the company does understand the importance of building on this. “AI will obviously keep improving. That is one differentiator we must have,” he notes. The reality is, AI has to find relevance for users and that may be subjective.
All things considered, that is the design, specs, the camera upgrades to what was already a benchmark for Android phones with the Zeiss expertise its trump card, the Vivo X200 Pro is more than ready to take the mantle from its predecessor. Now, much like then, the Android flagship camera experience benchmark has been laid down by the X200 Pro. It may be interesting to see if moving forward the flagship launch has any impact on the market as a whole.