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Sony Xperia Z Ultra Review - Battery life, Call Quality, Sound and Verdict Review

Michael Sawh By Michael Sawh
Contributor

Battery life, Call Quality, Sound and Verdict

Sony's 6.4-inch phone is a big performer. It is just too large for your pocket

By Michael Sawh June 25th 2013 2:18pm
Sony Xperia Z Ultra smartphone displaying colorful screen.

Sections

Sony Xperia Z Ultra – Battery Life

The Sony Xperia Z Ultra packs a 3,050 mAh capacity battery which is smaller than the one inside the Galaxy Mega 6.3 (3,200 mAh). You do still have some of the power management tools, specifically STAMINA mode to keep the Z Ultra going.

Sony claims you should get around 8 hours of life. In extreme conditions looping video the Z Ultra manages with maximum brightness around 5-6 hours but on general use manages around 7-8 hours. You will need to tap into that Stamina mode to get through a day’s use.

 
Sony Xperia Z Ultra product 20

In terms of speed of charging, hooking up to the power adaptor for 30 minutes from a critical battery levels jumps up around 10 per cent. Battery quickly drops off simply going on Twitter or browsing the net, though. Streaming movies hits it harder and it’s here where the screen invariably saps the life out of the battery. It can make it through a day, but for more intensive tasks, you really need to keep an eye on what you are using during the day.

 

Sony Xperia Z Ultra – Call & Sound Quality

Once you get over the embarrassment of putting the tablet-looking phone next to your ear, Sony includes a host of features to ensure calls come out nice and clear. There’s active noise cancellation using a secondary mic and ‘HD voice’ also aims to reduce background noise and improve clarity.

 

The call-making experience is very similar to our experience with the Xperia Z where calls can sound a little distant. The HD voice technology does a good job drowning out exterior noise but can sound hollow and muted at times.

Sony Xperia Z Ultra product 2

As for the internal speaker, we’ve already mentioned the issue of speaker placement
becoming a nuisance when watching video or browsing in landscape mode.

It’s a very tiny speaker. Sony’s ClearAudio and xLoud enhancement audio tech aim to improve clarity, and while dialogue is nice and clear it’s overall a tinny experience. it lacks the warmth and richness needed to make it ideal for watching films. Things improve when you plug in a pair of headphones.Sony Xperia Z Ultra product 13

 

Should I buy the Sony Xperia Z Ultra?

If you are truly sold on a phone this size, then the Z Ultra is the best 6-inch phone out there. It’s only real rival is the Samsung Galaxy Mega 6.3 (£449). The super-sized Galaxy S4 didn’t really make a good impression with its old specs and some performance issues. 

The Xperia Z Ultra at £600 is more expensive SIM-free and does have the same size issues. It’s just feel too big to comfortably use as a phone and is more suited to be used as a tablet. We do like the bright, colourful screen, the Z1-like performance and it has a far nicer design than the Mega. We were left disappointed by some of the features to take advantage of the larger screen estate notably the frustrating input support and decent but not Z1-quality camera.

You have to keep an eye on what you are using to make sure the battery makes it through the day as well. If you really have to go for a ‘big phone’ without the worry of fitting in your pocket, using it in one hand or getting the benefits of the larger screen, we’d opt for the Samsung Galaxy Note 3.

 

Verdict

The Sony Xperia Z Ultra is a big phone with a big performance but it’s just too much to handle or keep in the pocket.

We test every mobile phone we review thoroughly. We use industry standard tests to compare features properly and we use the phone as our main device over the review period. We’ll always tell you what we find and we never, ever, accept money to review a product.

Find out more about how we test in our ethics policy.

Used as our main phone for the review period

Reviewed using respected industry benchmarks and real world testing

Always has a SIM card installed

Tested with phone calls, games and popular apps

Trusted Score

rating-star rating-star rating-star rating-star rating-star

Score in detail

  • Performance 8
  • Camera 7
  • Design 8
  • Battery Life 7
  • Value 7
  • Features 8
  • Software 8
  • Calls & Sound 8
  • Screen Quality 8
Michael Sawh
By Michael Sawh
Contributor

Michael Sawh is a Freelance Journalist specialising in wearable and fitness tech. Previously Editor of Wareable, he’s also spent time manning the features section at Trusted Reviews and T3. His words …

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Why trust our journalism?

Founded in 2003, Trusted Reviews exists to give our readers thorough, unbiased and independent advice on what to buy.

Today, we have millions of users a month from around the world, and assess more than 1,000 products a year.

author icon

Editorial independence

Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.

author icon

Professional conduct

We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.

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