Our Verdict
For the price, the HMD Pulse Pro is a decent enough bit of kit. It’s not going to blow your mind, and if you’re a keen mobile gamer, it’s not going to keep up with demanding titles either. However, it handles the day-to-day relatively well, and it's design is nice and classy.
- Affordable
- Repairable at home
- Nice design
- Decent battery life
- Middling performance
- Poor cameras
- Lackluster display
If you’re looking for a smartphone under $200, there aren’t loads of options. You’ve got the Samsung Galaxy A15 5G, the Motorola Moto 5G, and now, with HMD dropping the Nokia name and stepping out as its own brand, the HMD Pulse Pro. With HMD a pretty unknown quantity outside of its acquisition of Nokia, we thought we’d get our hands on a Pulse Pro to see how it fares.
At the budget price point, there’s only so much you can expect from a phone, but even with that in mind, the HMD Pulse Pro is a mixed bag. The display is nice enough, and the design makes it seem more expensive than it is, but elsewhere, it’s not offering quite as much as other players in the affordable arena. So, could this thing still be a contender for our list of the best budget gaming phones? Let’s find out.
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Price and availability
Unfortunately, the HMD Pulse Pro isn’t widely available in the USA, with HMD opting to release the Vibe instead. In the UK, you can pick one up directly through the HMD site for £129.99, the equivalent of around $170. When using the HMD site, you can pick between three colorways: Glacier Green, Twilight Purple, and Black Ocean. For this review, I have the Glacier Green version.
Specs
Features and software
The HMD Pulse Pro comes with Android 14 ready to go out of the box, which is a win considering not every budget phone I’ve tried out in the last year does. It’s not strictly vanilla Android 14 though, with a few customizations from HMD to separate the device from others at the price point. One of these changes is the swapping of classic app icons for monochrome ones, and honestly, I don’t really get it. I thought it might be a bug at first, and had to do a bit of Googling to find out that’s how it’s meant to be.
The big selling point of the Pulse Pro is repairability, a factor that HMD is clearly trying to make its own. While most phones would have you traipsing down to your local, often over-price, repair shop, HMD has designed the Pulse and Pulse Pro with DIY repair in mind. You can order parts from the iFixit, whether it be a new screen, battery, back cover, or charging port. I can certainly see how this might attract tech DIY enthusiasts, but given I don’t fall into that category, I honestly don’t know if I’d bother fixing such a budget phone when a new display alone is around half the price of the thing itself.
While it’s not exactly a feature, the lack of 5G capability is a bit of a letdown. Sure, not everyone can make the most of 5G internet, but the rollout is happening fast, and this puts the Pulse Pro in danger of becoming outdated quicker than necessary. Combine this lack of 5G with the relatively sub-par IP52 rating, which means you might have trouble with anything more significant than the smallest of water droplets, and there’s something of a practicality issue. However, the Pulse Pro offers three years of security updates and two years of OS updates, which slightly levels out the IP rating and 5G concerns.
Design
I have to say, the Pulse Pro is a pretty stylish bit of kit for its price. Its glossy finish makes it look more expensive than it is, its camera bump is subtle and doesn’t take up too much room, and it feels pretty comfortable in the hand. The plastic build makes it a touch slippery, but not so much that it slides around any surface you put it on. Just make sure to pick it up with a firm grip.
Annoyingly, both the plastic back and display are absolute smudge magnets, so if you pick one up, it might also be worth keeping a microfibre cloth to hand so the thing doesn’t look like a fingerprint Jackson Pollock painting. It’s nothing a case wouldn’t solve, but it can be irritating nonetheless – especially when you’re trying to take some nice pictures of it for a review like this.
Display
The Pulse Pro comes with a 6.56-inch IPS LCD screen capable of 90Hz refresh rates. It’s fine for a bit of streaming video content, but as I’ve become accustomed to OLED displays, it can be a bit annoying to find a viewing angle that makes the screen pop. It doesn’t help that the thing has a peak brightness of 600 nits, which can be a little tricky to discern if you’re under any sort of even semi-harsh lighting.
While the display isn’t bad at all for a budget phone, the bezels are pretty chunky, especially at the bottom of the screen. You’re also not going to get high-definition visuals as the Pulse Pro tops out at 720p, which isn’t great if you’re a fan of watching movies on your phone but it shouldn’t be too much of a problem if you’re watching some YouTube or Twitch content.
Cameras
This section shouldn’t take too long, as the HMD Pulse Pro has three cameras – a 50MP wide, 2MP depth, and 50MP selfie – but they’re not up to much. As ever, I’ve used my dog as a subject model for a camera quality example, and the definition just isn’t there, as you can see in the image below. Admittedly, shots look a little better if there isn’t a subject, but if there is, you might have to prepare for some light blurring, even if whoever you’re taking a photo of isn’t quite as fluffy as my boy.
The 50MP selfie camera is the biggest disappointment, though, proving that a high megapixel count doesn’t always mean high-quality images. All the pictures I captured using it looked washed out and lacked any depth. They were also grainier than I expected, and even with plenty of modes to tinker with, I couldn’t get any selfies I thought were worthy of uploading to social media.
Performance
In terms of day-to-day performance, the HMD Pulse Pro is capable. It isn’t going to blow your socks off, but no one really expects that given the price point and the Unisoc T606 chipset, a relatively low-powered SoC even when it first arrived back in 2021. It can be a bit slow when switching between apps, but it’s usable. It might just be a little janky if you’ve got multiple apps open simultaneously.
Normally, I’d talk about gaming in the second part of the performance section, but this thing just isn’t made for it. Sure, it can handle a bit of Candy Crush or Royal Match, your classic casual mobile game, but don’t pick it up thinking you can play something like Honkai Star Rail or Diablo Immortal on this. I tried HSR at the lowest possible performance settings and it’s barely playable.
Battery
The Pulse Pro is pretty strong in the battery department, offering at least a day of relatively frequent use before running out of juice thanks to its 5,000mAh battery. You’re rarely going to make it to two days unless you’re using your phone for the bare minimum, but a solid day of charge isn’t something to grumble at.
In terms of charging speed, the 20W capacity goes from flat to 100% in around two hours, or about 25% every thirty minutes. These are the results from our testing, at least, though you might get it charged quicker with a beefier charger (though the Pulse Pro doesn’t come with one). A two-hour full charge isn’t awful, but it’s around an hour slower than the Samsung A15 5G using the same charger, so that’s worth keeping in mind if you’re someone who regularly finds themselves needing a quick boost before leaving the house.
Should you buy the HMD Pulse Pro?
If you’re looking for a no-frills budget phone that has enough battery to keep you going through the day and looks a little more expensive than it is, the HMD Pulse Pro is a solid pick. It’s not going to change your life, but nothing at this price point is. It’s also a decent option for tinkerers, with HMD trying to make a name for itself as the brand that puts repairability first. Still, by the time you’re reading this, the Skyline should soon be available, and that takes DIY repair to the next level.
The big caveats with the Pulse Pro are the cameras and performance. Neither are all too impressive, and while you can’t expect too much from this low price point, there are better budget offerings out there. That’s not to write HMD off, there’s definitely a lot the brand is doing right in terms of pricing structure and repairability, but we’re looking forward to checking out the latest from the company, the Skyline, to see if it learned any lessons from the middling reception of the Pulse and Pulse Pro.
Alternatives
If you’ve read this HMD Pulse Pro review and decided it’s not for you, check out our suggestions for alternatives below.
Samsung Galaxy A15 5G
The big dog of the under $200 price point is the Samsung Galaxy A15 5G. For the same price as the Pulse Pro, you’re getting a better display and more capable cameras. It’s still a budget phone, so it’s not going to blow your socks off, but there’s a reason it’s the most popular phone at this price point. The only downside is a lack of an IP rating, but you can always opt to pick up a screen protector and case.
TECNO Spark 20 Pro+
While the Samsung Galaxy A15 5G might be a more popular budget option, the TECNO Spark 20 Pro+ is my favorite budget phone currently on the market. It’s got a fantastic display and its MediaTek chipset is a bit more gamer-friendly, even if it still can’t deal with the most demanding games. The only caveat to the Spark 20 Pro+ is that it’s not widely available in the US and Europe, so you’re going to have to look at eBay to get your hands on one. For more details, check out our full TECNO Spark 20 Pro+ review.