Wileyfox Swift 2 X review
Even at just £219, the Swift 2X has some tough competition
The budget end of the Android market is an increasingly hotly-contested arena. If you wanted a good phone between £150 and £300, it used to be all about Motorola, but now you can also choose a phone by Honor, OnePlus, ZTE and Wileyfox.
This relative newcomer has taken its place as "the UK's OnePlus," in the sense that the not-so-well-known brand offers low-cost, good-spec phones, sold directly through the Wileyfox website. Their latest is the Swift 2 X, an update on the Swift 2 in the style of the OnePlus 3 becoming the 3T. However, unlike many brands, they haven't discontinued its predecessor.
At £219 to buy outright, the Swift 2 X is a very affordable phone - but is it worth the money? Would you be better off spending a little more, or plumping for a competitor like the £224 Honor 6X? Here's our Wileyfox Swift 2 X review.
Wileyfox Swift 2 X design
Out of the box, the Swift 2 X is a pleasant surprise. It's classier and more expensive-looking than you'd expect for the price, and while it's not going to stand out too much among other shiny rectangles, it's still a good-looking handset.
The 2 X comes in a choice of Midnight or Gold - so no black, and no Rose (why does no one want to call it pink?) as we saw on the Swift 2. However, the Midnight colour is lovely - a deep slate blue that could be mistaken for charcoal until it catches the light. It's a refreshing compromise between the professional-but-boring black and colourful-but-loud chassis approaches we're so often stuck with. The Gold, too, is a pale Champagne rather than full-on 24K yellow gold, and in some lights it looks more silver.
The two colourways differ in the faceplate, too: the Midnight has black while the Gold comes with white. Both are sleek and glossy, though unsurprisingly with thick black bars above and below the screen, the latter decorated with Wileyfox's subtle branding.
The back panel follows the same aesthetic, with the cool aluminium finish punctuated by the round, centred camera lens and circular fingerprint sensor directly below. The Wileyfox logo and wordmark are also centred, which recalls Motorola's design language, though while the USB C port is also in the middle of the bottom edge, the headphone jack (3.5mm!) sits to the left of the phone's top edge.
The handset is a fairly average size at 72.2 by 144mm, with edges rounded and thinned to 8.8mm. The dual-SIM tray sits on the top left side and the body-coloured volume rocker and power button are over on the right. These, and the handset in general, feel sturdy and well-made, with an overall weight of 155g.
Wileyfox Swift 2 X hardware, storage and performance
We've mentioned the price, so obviously we're not expecting a PC replacement here. But that said, it's constantly impressive how much can be squeezed into a budget phone these days - it wasn't so long ago these specs would have made a flagship (although of course an age in smartphone terms. I'm just old.).
The 2 X comes with 32GB of onboard storage - more than fair, when they could have gone for 16 - and the second SIM slot doubles as microSD to add up to 64GB more. The Snapdragon 430 octa-core CPU (1.4 GHz) and Adreno 505 GPU are a little older and less sparkly than you'll find on a current mid-range phone, but together with 3GB of RAM, this phone is capable of handling most people's daily usage without problems.
The benchmarks are a little disappointing even for a phone of this price: AnTuTu gave a score of 43234, which is lower than the £150 ZTE Blade Velocity (44354) and quite a bit lower than the £224 Honor 6X's 56213 - not ideal considering the 2 X's price tag is only £5 less. Geekbench 4's multi-core CPU test came out at 2015 for multi - the Honor 6X scored 3286, while the ZTE got 1976. For comparison, the Nexus 5X averages at 2162.
Finally, the PCMark Work 2.0 test gave a slightly poor output of 2778 - phones with similar scores include the LG G3 (2723) and the Sony Xperia E5 (2813). This clearly isn't a performance phone, though, and for most people's casual use (social media, texting, reading the internet…) it'll be more than enough. It's not infallible - ours got a little warm and laggy at times - but while it's not winning any speed contests, it should serve all but gamers perfectly well.
The 2 X includes NFC for Android Pay, and there's a speedy fingerprint sensor on the back. The Honor 6X also has both, but not every budget phone can say the same. The fingerprint sensor in particular makes a fairly big difference to how you use the phone day-to-day, and it's really missed on phones without one - so the inclusion here is appreciated.
Audio output from the speaker on the bottom edge is average - not amazing, not rubbish. However, while it looks like there are two speaker grilles, only the one on the right puts out any sound. Worth knowing in case you thought yours was faulty!
Next page: Display, battery and software
Wileyfox Swift 2 X review
Even at just £219, the Swift 2X has some tough competition
Wileyfox Swift 2 X software
One of the selling points (for geeks, at least) of Wileyfox phones was that they run Cyanogen, the popular super-customisable version of Android that OnePlus used to favour too. However, in December, Cyanogen announced it was shutting down, meaning phones running the OS - including Wileyfox handsets - wouldn't be getting any more updates.
However, Wileyfox responded quickly (they said the move was "expected") - and immediately rolled out an update to "ensure [users] are on-boarded for the future." This means the Swift 2 X is still running Cyanogen OS 13.1 (based on Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow) for now, but it and all other Wileyfox phones will be getting Android 7.0 Nougat (the latest version) "beginning as early as February" and finished by the end of March. The Nougat update hasn't surfaced on our review handset yet, but there can't be long to wait, and the software works fine in the meantime.
Out of the box, Cyanogen provides a familiar Android experience with a plethora of extra settings that control freaks will adore - there are ‘themes' to easily change the whole look of the phone, or you can go granular: changing things like the exact colour of the notification light or selecting from five (!) display options for the battery indicator in the status bar. In their response to the Cyanogen announcement, Wileyfox said it'll be transitioning to "a purer Android experience - enhanced," which suggests their phones will be keeping the tweakability.
Thankfully, Android's beloved app drawer is still there (take note, Honor) and adorably, the icon's been switched for a little Wileyfox logo. This would probably be irritating if the logo weren't a cute fox, however - not sure we'd appreciate, say, the Huawei or Acer logo in that position on the homescreen.
There's very little in the way of bloat or adware on the phone - the only thing that might annoy you is that the Cyanogen browser homepage is set to a Bing search page with a big ad for the Bing app. But the browser can be uninstalled or the homepage changed, so it's only a little thing.
Wileyfox Swift 2 X battery
A 3010mAh battery is a lovely surprise on a phone this cheap. Stamina is one of the areas that budget phones are usually a letdown, and that's definitely not the case on the Swift 2X.
That said, it's not immortal - depending on how much you use your phone, you might find it doesn't last you until bedtime. Despite not having a particularly bright display, screen-on time does seem to deplete the battery particularly fast - almost alarmingly so in the case of Pokémon Go. You'll want to keep it plugged in (or have a power pack on hand) for watching a film on the train, for instance, but for everyday use it should last you until evening.
It's also good to see the newer USB C charging port on the Swift 2 X - again, lots of budget phones don't include that. The phone even offers Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0, so it's refreshingly fast to power up - providing you've got a QC-compatible wall charger, because the phone doesn't come with one. It doesn't come with a wall plug at all. This is because Wileyfox make their phone packaging specifically to fit through a letterbox, and most UK plugs just won't do that (although you can get ones like Mu Plug that fold up, in fairness). That's a bit annoying, but most people have a USB plug kicking around somewhere - though probably not a Quick Charge 3.0 one, so if you want to enjoy that headline figure of 50% charge in 40 minutes, you're going to need to buy one separately.
There's one more thing you'll notice about charging the Swift 2 X: the indicator LED is BRIGHTER THAN THE ACTUAL SUN. Seriously, it's blinding. I put the phone on charge straight out of the box (as you do) and immediately wished there was a pair of bundled sunglasses, because wow. Luckily, you can just turn it off by going to Settings > Display & Lights > Battery/notification light. You'll definitely want to do that if you plan to sleep in the same room as this thing.
Wileyfox Swift 2 X display
It seems we've got a little demanding of our budget phones of late: the Swift 2 X has a 1080p (full HD) screen specifically because of the complaints about the 720p panel on its predecessor, the Swift 2 Plus. It's been 50-50 for a while now whether a lower-end phone comes with HD or full HD, and it seems we've just tipped the balance into 720p no longer being acceptable.
The 5.2-inch display on the Swift 2 X has a resolution of 1080 x 1920 pixels, which is 424 pixels per inch. The Honor 6X has 403, and to most people that's going to look about the same - but to my eye, the Swift 2 X's screen is a little less beautiful.
Don't get me wrong, the display is perfectly fine and you're unlikely to have any complaints with it - but it tends towards being too warm for my liking, and it doesn't go as bright as I'd expect, either. If you keep it on adaptive brightness (which you should for maximum battery life), you probably won't even notice the latter point, and I only really spotted the slight pinky-orange tint when the screen was next to others. Nonetheless, it's definitely warmer than most.
The screen's covered with extra-tough Gorilla Glass 3, but one of the brilliant things about Wileyfox is their screen repair service: pay £14.99 at purchase and you'll get a free replacement if the screen breaks within the first year. That only covers you for one replacement, mind, but that's a lot better than most manufacturers offer. Especially in the UK.
Next page: Camera samples, UK availability and the all-important verdict
Wileyfox Swift 2 X review
Even at just £219, the Swift 2X has some tough competition
Wileyfox Swift 2 X cameras
This is the weakest area of the Swift 2 X. On paper, the 16MP main camera and 8MP front shooter sound fine, and while those specs are still good for the price, the camera performance is disappointing.
Taken on the Wileyfox Swift 2 X
In good light, you'll get a decently clear shot from the main camera, but you'll need to focus carefully - and take a few shots to make sure you definitely get one that's sharp. Even in good light, though, a lot of our test photos came out grainy and darker than they should have. They're not bad by any means, but those cost savings were going to show somewhere - and in the case of the Swift 2 X, it's the camera.
Taken on the Wileyfox Swift 2 X
The front-facing camera is similarly just OK: selfies are clear and easy to focus, but often come out a little yellower than they should be. They're also not remotely flattering, and there's no beauty mode, despite the many superfluous filters included with the camera app - to find these, tap the 3-slider icon, then the magic wand, then tap on the actual word, not the circle beside it (Sketch, Solarize, Neon and so on. Yes, it has Solarize but no Beauty mode, thanks 1993).
Taken on the Wileyfox Swift 2 X
You're going to need some editing apps if you want to keep and share the photos you take on this phone - but that's not too much of a hardship given the price.
Wileyfox Swift 2 X UK price and availability
The Wileyfox Swift 2 X is available directly from Wileyfox for £219. It'll also be on Amazon UK from the 14th of February.
Our verdict
With so many budget brands to choose from, Android fans are now in the privileged position of being able to be a little choosy - even demanding - with our lower-end phones. The Swift 2 X is good, but it's not as good as the Honor 6X, and that costs just £5 more.
However, if you're the kind of person who breaks their phone screen a lot, Wileyfox handsets are always worth considering for that great-value screen replacement service. The 2 X may also offer an advantage in terms of software if the promised Nougat update turns out to be stock, near-stock, or even stock-plus (by which we mean plus useful customisations like Cyanogen offers - not plus ads and gimmicks!).
But with the update still to come, we're giving the Wileyfox Swift 2 X a solid three stars out of five: it's good, but even at this price, not quite good enough.