BlackBerry PRIV review: BlackBerry goes Android

A decade ago, when BlackBerry was a major player in the smartphone market, three key features stood out: its excellent email integration, its highly-customisable security, and the fact that it had a built-in actual keyboard that worked surprisingly well with two thumbs. Every smartphone platform can deal with email these days, so BlackBerry's hopes of remaining relevant with the PRIV, its first-ever device to run entirely on Android, draw heavily on those other two strengths: the keyboard and the security.

The BlackBerry PRIV debuted in 2015, but has only seen an official Australian release in 2016. Only Optus is offering the PRIV on contract down under, a far cry from the era when every telco would range it. How does it fare in a market where Android dominates but buyers have plenty of other choices? Is this the phone that former BlackBerry lovers should migrate to?

Here are the essential specifications for the BlackBerry Priv:

Upsides: Why you'd want the BlackBerry Priv

• That built-in keyboard: While manufacturers have experimented with slide-out keyboards for Android devices in the past, most have now abandoned them. If you want a premium Android phone with a physical keyboard, right now the PRIV is the only game in town. Like its many BlackBerry predecessors, the PRIV keyboard is well-designed and easy to type with, and a definite boon if you're regularly churning through large amounts of text on your phone.
• The full range of Android applications: For years BlackBerry promised that its QNX platform would enable BlackBerry devices running BlackBerryOS to also run Android apps, but it never got there properly (there was an option to run some Amazon App Store apps, but that was fiddly and annoying). No such problem with the PRIV, which can run any Android app, including the Android ports of BlackBerry staples such as BBM.
• Acceptable processor performance: BlackBerry isn't selling the PRIV as a high-performance device, and that shows in its benchmarks. It runs at about the same level as the Samsung Galaxy Note 5, which makes sense: both are phones promoted largely because of other design features.
  Here's how the PRIV compares to a range of popular premium handsets on our standard benchmarks:

  Handset	Geekbench 3 Single Core (higher is better)	Geekbench 3 Multi Core (higher is better)
  Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge	2169	6446
  Samsung Galaxy S7	2156	6240
  Google Nexus 6P	1251	4597
  Samsung Galaxy Note 5	1111	3686
  BlackBerry PRIV	1196	3396
  Apple iPhone 6S	2540	4410
  Apple iPhone 6S Plus	2491	4391
  Google Nexus 5X	1188	3198

Downsides: Why you might not want the Samsung Note 5

• Lacklustre battery life: The PRIV doesn't pull up well on battery benchmarks, which will be a disappointment to former BlackBerry owners, since all-day operation was always a key selling point for BlackBerry. While it does better than the iPhone 6s, it's well and truly whipped by more recent Samsung models. Here's how it rated using Geekbench's inbuilt battery test with the screen dimmed:
  

  Handset	Geekbench 3 Battery Test Duration	Geekbench 3 Battery Score
  Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge	11:55:00	7150
  Samsung Galaxy S7	10:01:20	6013
  Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge+	8:24:10	5041
  Apple iPhone 6S Plus	7:48:10	4681
  Samsung Galaxy S6	6:51:30	4115
  Google Nexus 5X	7:14:20	4062
  Google Nexus 6P	6:39:20	3754
  Sony Xperia Z5	5:41:30	3414
  LG G4	5:27:50	3224
  BlackBerry PRIV	5:25:40	3256
  Huawei P8 Lite	4:39:40	2768
  Apple iPhone 6s	3:52:10	2321
  Alcatel OneTouch Idol 3	5:42:00	2276

• Pointer and keyboard woes: When the keyboard slides out, there's a notable hollow behind it, which feels cheap compared to the solid build of the BlackBerry Bold and Q10 models. And while the keyboard retains the familiar BlackBerry design, it doesn't include the "berry" trackpoint for making selections on screen, so you often find yourself having to take your hands off the keyboard anyway.
• Security features are enterprise-level: The security options available with the PRIV will doubtless appeal to corporates, but individual users aren't likely to take advantage of it.

Who is it best suited for? What are my other options?

If the keyboard is important to you, then the PRIV is a decent but unremarkable Android phone. However, for the kind of money it asks, almost any other Android phone will offer better performance overall.

Where can I get it?

Local retailers are no longer stocking the PRIV, and you won't find it on any current plans from Aussie telcos. You can still purchase import models from overseas and grey-market retailers, however.