Alcatel GO FLIP V Review: Compact, Intuitive, and Reliable

Alcatel GO FLIP V review on performance and other areas such as design and call quality. Read this review to get insight on the phone’s pros and cons.

Alcatel GO FLIP V is a phone targeting users who’d rather use a basic phone for their daily communication. From its classic flip phone design to the small form factor, GO FLIP focuses on usability and comfort more than anything else.

It’s a phone aimed for customers with a preference for simplicity. If you feel a smartphone is too much, GO FLIP V is the one to consider.

As a phone catered to today’s need, GO FLIP V also put a focus on a fast and reliable network. That’s why Alcatel equips the phone with 4G LTE. Accessibility is also something GO FLIP V focuses on. We’ll see in the Alcatel GO FLIP V review below about the details buyers need to know.

Key Specs

Alcatel GO FLIP V specifications:

• Weight: 118g
• Dimensions: 105 x 53 x 18.7mm
• OS: AOSP Based OS
• Screen size: 2.8-inch (internal), 1.44-inch (external)
• Resolution: 240 x 320
• CPU: 1.1 Ghz Quad-core, Qualcomm Snapdragon 210
• RAM: 1GB
• Storage: 8GB
• Battery: 1350mAh, Removable
• Rear camera: 2MP

Design

As you may have noticed, Alcatel GO FLIP V features a classic flip design that was once popular among phone owners. There’s a bit of contemporary touch to the design that makes it less old-school.

The soft rounded edges, the minimal complexity in design, and the colorful notification screen. These are among the design choices that make the phone relevant to today’s trend.

But all in all, GO FLIP focuses on comfort. It aims to be a phone that feels nice to hold. That’s why it has a compact build quality. It’s small but not as small as flip phones from the old times. But it’s also not too big to hold with your hand. The back cover comes with a light texture for extra grip.

The keypad on GO FLIP also supports the ergonomic purpose of the whole phone. The tactile keys are not only satisfying to press, but each is also large enough to notice. That and combined with white fonts, the phone makes sure users won’t have any difficulty when typing.

There are shortcuts for important features. Press the button with the Message icon, and the phone redirects you to the messaging app. On the right side, you can find the camera button above the Volume keys. The camera button will launch the camera app with just one click. We always appreciate this kind of extra convenience.

Read also: Alcatel GO FLIP V User Manual

Display

For Display, GO FLIP V users will enjoy not only one display but also two full-color ones. Apart from the main screen, there’s also the 1.44” external display. With this second display, you can check who’s calling without opening the phone.

The main display itself is a 2.8” QVGA screen (320 x 240 px in resolution). It’s a 4:3 screen coated with Acrylic glass. On the other hand, the external screen has a smaller resolution of 128 x 128 (1:1 aspect ratio). The comparison shows that the main screen clearly has better quality.

With the main screen, color vibrancy is alright. Just don’t compare it even to a very cheap smartphone display. You will clearly see how GO FLIP V would far behind.

The quality aside, Alcatel GO FLIP seems to be more focused on being intuitive and easy. This principle also shows on the phone’s screen. Despite being comparably smaller than a smartphone display, the display feels big enough. Especially when you use it for texting and emails. The colors are punchy. Everything on the display is nice to look at.

This is also supported by the fact that the software is also well-designed. Browsing websites is a different case, though. You will start to feel the inconvenience of a smaller screen when opening a webpage. But to draw a conclusion, the overall verdict for the GO FLIP V display is that it’s not bad for a flip phone.

Read also: Orbic Journey V Review: Basic Phone for HD Quality Call

Camera

The camera on Alcatel GO FLIP V doesn’t stray far from the concept of simplicity. Here we got a 2 MP camera with no LED flash. It’s only one camera on the top part of the phone, right above the second screen. No front-facing camera is available on GO FLIP V.

With that resolution (2 MP), don’t expect excellent results for a picture. The image quality is passable at best. Without any aid such as shooting modes and LED flash, the image results depending on factors such as natural lighting and how steady you can be while taking a picture. The lens of the GO FLIP V camera has fixed focus instead of autofocus.

The minimal setup for the camera is accompanied by a few features software-wise. There’s a zoom in/out feature so you can look at an object clearly. The zoom feature is a viewfinder zoom, not a camera zoom where you can take a picture of an object from afar.

You can shoot a video too with the GO FLIP V camera. The camcorder feature allows users to take 720p videos at 30 fps. It’s actually a decent resolution for videos taken with a basic phone. But like the camera, there are no additional features such as autofocus.

Storage

Alcatel GO FLIP V provides an 8 GB of ROM storage for storing your data and files. This capacity is not big, so it won’t be a surprise if we’d run out of space in no time.

Especially if you put a lot of pictures or music files on your phone. Another thing to note, that 8 GB of memory includes the space allocated for the system.

To tackle this, GO FLIP V also provides an external storage solution. You can add your own SD card which you have to purchase separately. The maximum capacity allowed is not a lot at 32 GB. But it’s clearly better than nothing.

Performance

Unlike with the camera, Alcatel GO FLIP V pays more attention when it comes to performance. As a device marketed to be reliable, being a phone that just does the work is a priority. GO FLIP V approaches including a decent processor topped up with intuitive software.

Let’s take a look at the hardware setup first. Alcatel GO FLIP V runs on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 210 1.1 GHz processor. This chipset is especially popular in entry-level devices.

Focusing to make the most of an entry-level phone’s capability, it also gives access to the latest technology such as HD Voice and LTE. For RAM, 1 GB is available to assist the task processing on GO FLIP V.

How does this spec translate to the intuitiveness when using the phone? We find that using GO FLIP is very comfortable. There is rarely a lag when moving from one menu or one app to another. Combined with the tactile navigation keys on the keypad, our overall experience was pleasant.

But the area we like the most on this phone is the software. GO FLIP V runs on an Android Open Source Project (AOSP) based OS. Because it’s a modified Android, users will notice smartphone-like features and looks. From the icons, status bars, and apps like calendar, you will sense familiarity.

The design on the app’s interface also reminds users of smartphones. It’s intuitive and modern. Browsing through the apps, you won’t feel like using an old-school flip phone.

The app design of the Messages app looks like today’s chat app. You can send texts and pictures with ease. It’s technically an MMS but the design enhances the user experience.

Aside from texting and calling, other apps also give similar smartphone-like experiences. One of them is the Calendar app. The clean UI makes creating an event an easy task.

There are also the Email app, Browser, Music Player, and Calculator. Unfortunately, there isn’t an option on GO FLIP V where you can download an app from an app store. So your option is limited to the pre-installed app.

It’s important to mention that Alcatel GO FLIP V also put a special focus on accessibility. They are being serious with it by providing features for users with personal limitations.

Hearing aid and TTY mode are available for users with poor hearing. There are also RTT (Real Time Texting) and emergency alerts. Concluding Alcatel GO FLIP V review for performance, we’d say this phone delivers its promises.

Connectivity

Alcatel GO FLIP V offers high call quality and Voice HD calling. This is supported by the fact that the phone runs on the LTE network. Aside from callings, 4G capability lets you browse the internet with ease too using the phone. Even better, you can share the connection with up to 10 devices via hotspot.

Wi-Fi on GO FLIP supports Voice over Wi-Fi (VoWiFi). It’s where you can call a device using the Wi-Fi as long as both are connected to the same network. There are also Bluetooth and location services, but the phone comes with no NFC feature.

Battery

Alcatel GO FLIP V boasts a long-lasting battery that gets users throughout the day. On paper, the general specifications are as follows: 1350 mAh in capacity, up to 300 hrs standby time, and up to 6.5 hours talk time. No fast charging is available and you will need three hours to charge the battery until it’s full.

The reality for the battery is not as advertised but neither is bad. Especially because there are many external factors that can influence battery endurance. In general, you can get through one day without charging with normal use. If you use the phone very rarely, you can easily stretch the battery life to a couple of days.

Wrap-up

Overall, the general outlook on this Alcatel GO FLIP V review shows many positives. GO FLIP V can be your choice for something compact and reliable.

It doesn’t disappoint when it comes to essential features (calling, texting, and accessibility features). It also has a few added surprises here and there such as Intuitive UI and tools/productivity apps.

The price won’t break your bank although it is slightly expensive for a basic phone. At $99.99, you can also choose to pay on an installment ($4.16/mo for two years). We think this phone will suit a certain group of people who like simple gadgets. Let us know your opinion through the comment section below.