First announced at CES 2021, the affordable TCL 20 Series phones sport a ton of interesting features, including NXTVISION display technology that automatically converts SD content into HDR. The phones first launched in Europe, and now, they’re available in the United States for $500 and under.
The $500 TCL 20 Pro 5G is the highlight of TCL’s new lineup. Powered by a Snapdragon 690 5G chipset and a comfortable 4,500mAh battery, it features a 6.67-inch FHD+ curved display with NXTVISION 2.0 support for visual enhancements, HDR10 playback, and real-time SDR to HDR conversion. Other features, like an in-display fingerprint reader and 48-megapixel main camera, help round out the phone and provide a premium user experience.
For those who want some bang for their buck, the $250 TCL 20S seems like a killer investment. It doesn’t support 5G, but it has a respectable Snapdragon 665 chipset, a 5,000mAh battery, and a 6.67-inch 20:9 FHD+ display with NXTVISION 2.0 technology. Its 64-megapixel camera is large for a phone at this price, and a fingerprint reader located on the power button makes unlocking the 20S a piece of cake.
Oddly enough, most affordable phone in TCL’s 20 Series lineup actually has the largest display. It’s the TCL 20 SE, a $190 phone running a Snapdragon 460 chipset (no 5G here). Designed for media consumption, the 20 SE has a 6.82-inch HD+ display with a 20:9 aspect ratio and an unobtrusive camera notch. It also features a rear-mounted fingerprint reader, so it’s automatically my favorite. (Of course, it has the lowest resolution of any phone in the 20 series and doesn’t support NXTVISION enhancements.)
You can order the new TCL 20 Series phones now on Amazon. Bear in mind that only the Pro model supports 5G, and even then, it only supports the slower sub-6 5G protocol.
