We recently published our review of the recently launched vivo Y36, calling it a “stylish phone” that doesn’t carry a premium price tag unlike some of its rivals in the category.

And though this Qualcomm Snapdragon 680-based unit is more of an iterative upgrade than a massive leap, particularly in terms of processing power, it’s still a pretty good option, suited for both day-to-day tasks and gaming without compromising on battery life. We know this first-hand because aside from using the device for weeks for our review, we also spent a considerable amount of time testing certain games to find the optimal graphics settings for the vivo Y36 4G, so you don’t have to.

Yes, it’s time for our vivo Y36 performance review.

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Where you can buy the vivo Y36

Before anything else, though, let’s make one thing abundantly clear: This smartphone can and will run supported games above 60 fps if you maximize its display capabilities and set the refresh rate to 90Hz in the Settings app. Much to our surprise — and delight — the vivo Y36 4G, unlike other devices made by the BBK Electronics group (which vivo is a part of), can render games at higher frame rates than we initially thought.

Sure, your handset’s battery life will be shorter, but the trade-off is almost certainly worth it, because what good is a high-refresh screen and a capable chipset that can drive it if you cannot squeeze out better frame rates out of them?

Mobile Legends: Bang Bang

Let’s start with arguably the most popular MOBA in the region and one of the OG apps that popularized mobile gaming in the Philippines, Mobile Legends: Bang Bang. In our testing, we found that the vivo Y36 can not only hit 90 fps in Brawl mode, but also supports the Ultra graphics preset, which delivers the best visuals in the game.

Our unit averaged 75 fps with the graphics set to Smooth and the Super refresh-rate option enabled. To top it off, the vivo Y36 4G comes with a touch-sampling rate of 240Hz. This means it reacts faster to your touch, which can make all the difference when you’re playing a competitive game like Mobile Legends.

At the other end of the spectrum, turning up the visuals all the way up can still net you an average of 45 fps, which is enough for smooth gameplay, if you’re not picky or particular about frame rates.

Genshin Impact

Next, we fired up Genshin Impact, easily one of the most demanding apps ever released on mobile. Most smartphones and even some premium models struggle to run the game at high frame rates, and the vivo Y36 is no exception.

By default, Genshin Impact uses the Low graphics preset to render its console-quality graphics, but you can set the frame rate to 30 fps and get a rock-solid 26 fps even in dense areas like towns and monster-filled dungeons. Playing at the lowest settings bumped our average fps to 36, but it will also make floating in-game text barely legible, which is why we don’t recommend it at all.

Still, it’s pretty impressive that an affordable handset like the vivo Y36 4G has enough firepower to play one of the most graphically heavy mobile games out there without stuttering like crazy.

In case you’re curious, we also installed the equally — if not more — demanding Honkai: Star Rail on our unit. It ran at around 28 fps using the default preset (Very Low) on the vivo Y36.

Diablo Immortal

Blizzard’s “Diablo for mobile” is another console-quality action RPG that’s free on the Google Play Store, so we decided to give it a try as well. Unlike Genshin Impact, though, Diablo Immortal is not optimized for the vivo Y36 4G, so it doesn’t support 60 fps and higher resolutions. That means your play sessions will be locked at up to 30 fps, while the resolution is maxed out at Medium.

That’s not a deal-breaker for us, especially considering the phone plays the game at a very solid 25 fps with the visuals set to Medium. Toning down the settings will obviously result in better frame rates, but we’re happy to play the game with a nice balance between graphics quality and smooth gameplay. You should at least try it, too.

Dead Cells

Although not as demanding as the other titles we’re featuring here, Dead Cells is one of our favorite rogue-like action-platformers on any system. It has aged so well since its Android release in 2020, too, with updates still coming to the game three years later.

Another great thing about Dead Cells is that it can run at up to 120 fps on mobile platforms, making it an ideal candidate for testing. Or at least it should hit 90 fps on the vivo Y36, right? Totally! Our unit does hit 90 fps occasionally, but the average is 73 fps. Still a fantastic result that shows the Snapdragon 680 is a solid performer, even though it leans toward the efficient side with its 6nm process technology.

Streets of Rage 4

Finally, we have beat-’em-up gem Streets of Rage 4. This game runs like a dream on the Medium preset, averaging 58 fps during our numerous playthroughs. That’s about as good as it gets on the vivo Y36 4G considering the game’s maximum supported frame rate of 60 fps.

Impressive battery endurance

As we mentioned in our review, we’ve come away impressed with the vivo Y36’s battery life, which places it among the top-performing models in the category with a score of 19 hours and 18 minutes in PCMark’s battery-endurance test. Wired charging is a pleasant experience as well, with the smartphone taking just a little over an hour to reach a full charge from zero. That said, it’s feasible to boost battery power while you grab a cup of coffee or a snack at a café.

Looking at our most recent battery stats, you’ll see that 38 minutes of Genshin Impact gameplay only consumed 10% of our unit’s battery power. Meanwhile, playing Diablo Immortal and Dead Cells for about 15 minutes reduced the battery by 2%. Keep in mind that the screenshots above were taken while we were running a battery-consuming FPS overlay on top of the games we tested.

In the Philippines, the vivo Y36 has a suggested retail price of P12,999, or roughly $231 converted.

vivo Y36 specs

• 6.64-inch LCD display, FHD+ resolution, 90Hz refresh rate
• 6nm Qualcomm Snapdragon 680 4G processor
• Adreno 610 GPU
• 8GB RAM
• 256GB storage
• Triple 50-megapixel main, 2-megapixel portrait, 2-megapixel macro rear cameras
• 16-megapixel front camera
• Side fingerprint reader
• 5,000mAh battery with 44-watt fast wired charging
• Funtouch OS 13 based on Android 13
• Colors: Glitter Aqua and Meteor Black

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