Nokia 7.2 review: A fair mid-range phone, but not an exciting one

The Nokia 7.2 has most of the features we've enjoyed in HMD Global's phones this year, but with so much competition at its price point, there's not much here to make it a compelling option.

Android One for guaranteed updates
Clutter-free UI
Snapdragon 660 is a reasonable mid-range choice
128GB of onboard storage

Battery endurance isn't great
Design feels a little plain
Lots of competition at this price point

Alex Kidman

Last Updated Feb 3, 2021

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Display

Display Size

6.3 inches

Resolution

1080 x 2160px

Pixels per inch (PPI)

383.3 ppi

Camera

Rear camera megapixels

48MP + 5MP + 8MP

Rear camera aperture size

f/1.79 + f/2.2

Video recording

N/A

Front camera megapixels

20MP

Front camera aperture size

f/2.0

Physical Dimensions

Dimensions

159.88mm x 75.11mm x 8.25mm

Weight

180g

Connectivity

NFC

Yes

Wi-Fi

802.11 a/b/g/n/ac

Network category speed

Category 6

Power, storage and battery

Processor

Qualcomm Snapdragon 660

RAM

4GB/6GB

Operating system

Android 9

Internal storage

64GB, 128GB

External storage support

Up to 512GB

Battery capacity

3,500mAh

Device features

Headphone jack

Fingerprint sensor

Water resistance rating

N/A

Wireless charging

Launch price (RRP)	$0
Launch date	2019-02

Go to Nokia's site More info

Where to buy

HMD Global is the company responsible for all of those Nokia phones we've seen on store shelves in recent years. While it's experimented with "classic" feature phones such as the Nokia 2720 Flip, the vast majority of its output has been low-cost Android handsets.

It feels harsh to say this, but in many ways, the Nokia 7.2 is yet another one, and that's about it. However, an upgrade from 2018's Nokia 7.1 was bound to grab my attention, simply because that handset was one of HMD's best last year.

The Nokia 7.2 is a solid and reliable handset in most respects, but the market has changed in 12 months, and the existence of so many high-quality competitors at its price point sadly makes the Nokia 7.2 less compelling than its predecessor.

Design

6.3-inch LCD display with teardrop notch
PureDisplay does punch up video nicely
Rear fingerprint sensor
Google Assistant button
No storage expansion

The Nokia 7.2 ships in Australia in a choice of three colours: Charcoal, Cyan Green or Ice. I've been testing out the Charcoal colour, which may as well have just been called black, because that's what it is.
The Nokia 7.2's design story is one definitely told in two distinct chapters. At the front, it's very much the Nokia standard design, with smooth rounded corners, a 6.3-inch LCD display and a teardrop notch for the front-facing camera. Like HMD Global's other Nokia phones this year, you don't have the choice to "black out" the notch with a top bar, which still annoys me.
The Nokia 7.2 uses an LCD display, boosted by what HMD Global refers to as its "PureDisplay" technology, designed to punch up SD visuals to a near-HDR level of quality. It's a nicer display than you'd expect out of an LCD, but predictably it still lacks the colour edge you get from a nice OLED screen.
The Nokia 7.2 has a businesslike design that eschews the glossy rippling colours we've seen from brands such as Huawei, realme or Mintt, and there's bound to be some appeal there if you're not the extroverted type.
The power button and volume controls sit on the right-hand side, while the left-hand side houses a dedicated Google Assistant button, which is one of those features you'll either adore if you use it frequently or curse when you mistake it for the power button. There's a headphone jack at the top of the phone, slightly offset to the right.
Flip the Nokia 7.2 over, and the style story changes. My first impression of the triple camera array on the back was that this didn't look much like a Nokia phone. What it looks like is the design Motorola used to use for its Moto Mod capable handsets such as the Moto Z3 Play, because it's got quite the protruding camera bump. Before you ask, no, I don't think it's Moto Mod compatible.
Just underneath that camera bump sits the rear-mounted fingerprint sensor, which works quite well. The one design win here is that the prominence of the camera bump makes it very easy to find the fingerprint sensor without looking, and with little risk of smearing your fingerprints over the lenses.

Camera

Triple lens camera, but it's really dual lens
48MP quad pixel primary camera shoots well
Decent photos, but others at this price range offer more flexibility

HMD Global made a big splash earlier in the year with the Nokia 9 Pureview, arguably the most camera-centric phone of 2019.
The Nokia 7.2 isn't quite so bold, and you wouldn't entirely expect that at this price point. Its headline feature is a primary 48MP lens at the rear, with a secondary 8MP ultra-wide lens and tertiary 5MP depth sensor. Like so many cameras in the mid-range, that depth sensor does what its name suggests, so you don't shoot directly with it. Instead, it's there to judge depth and add appropriate bokeh to your shots, particularly portrait shots. In practical terms, this is a dual lens camera with standard and ultra-wide modes.
You can shoot at 48MP if you must, but it's not the primary shooting mode for the rear cameras. Instead, it uses quad pixels to effectively increase the underlying sensor size at a cost of overall resolution. That 48MP sensor, most of the time, is actually only shooting at 12MP. This is a fairly common technique even in the mid-range, and it can have some definite benefits when it comes to light balancing and focus for most shots.
The Nokia 7.2 is a pleasant enough camera for basic photographic purposes, but it's stymied somewhat by the fact that we've seen so many competitors go further and better around the same price point. While it's a touch more pricey, the Google Pixel 3a still stands as our pick of the best of the mid-range, but even competitors such as the realme XT offer more photographic flexibility.
The Nokia 7.2 is a fine camera phone, but that's about all it is. That would have seen it at or near the top of the mid-range camera tree 6 to 12 months ago, but now it's just adequate, rather than exciting.
Nokia 7.2 sample photos

Performance

Snapdragon 660 provides adequate power for a mid-range phone
Android One means guaranteed upgrades

Adequate is also exactly the word I'd use to describe the Nokia 7.2's overall performance. The model mostly sold in Australia is running on a Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 processor with 4GB of RAM, and at the time of writing, Android 9 ("Pie") onboard.
That's a recipe for decent mid-range performance, but again we've seen a bit of a push of late in making more out of mid-range phones than the Nokia 7.2 entirely delivers. That's seen in the way it compares at a benchmark level, at least to some extent.
Here's how it compares using Geekbench 5's CPU test. We've only got a small pool of test phones that have run this test, and it's sadly not comparable to the older Geekbench 4 CPU results.
Nokia 7.2

The Nokia 7.2 fares a little more competitively when you look at 3D performance, although like most mid-range phones this isn't a graphics powerhouse.
Nokia 7.2

Those benchmarks actually paint a slightly worse picture of the Nokia 7.2 than its real-world performance presents, however. For a mid-range phone it's fairly responsive across most apps, and it has the distinct advantage that it's an Android One phone.
So what does that mean? Android One phones get their upgrades direct from Google, and they're shipped with a minimum of pre-installed bloatware. This means no annoying ad-filled "free" games you never wanted, no intrusive spyware (beyond that which Google wants there, anyway) and a guarantee of at least two year's worth of operating system upgrades.
While the Nokia 7.2 I tested was running Android 9, it should see Android 10 directly and Android 11 at some point during its lifespan. That's not a claim that many of its competitors would make, and it does point to potential future gains in performance and maybe even lightly in features depending on what Google puts in Android 11.

Battery life

3500mAh battery drains faster than we'd like
USB-C wired charging only

The 3500mAh sealed battery in the Nokia 7.2 is again reasonable without being exceptional in this price bracket.
With the shift to Geekbench 5, we've had to abandon Geekbench 4's battery test, instead flipping to a YouTube based test, running a full-screen video at maximum brightness with moderate volume for an hour. That gives us a comparative picture of how well a phone manages its battery relative to its competitors.
Unfortuanately for the Nokia 7.2, while its PureDisplay technology does make our test video look a little better than you'd expect out of an LCD panel, it does so at a serious battery cost. Here's how it compares:
Nokia 7.2

My experience with handsets under this test is that anything under 90% indicates a handset that may not last a full day's usage under moderate load. That's very much the story of the Nokia 7.2, which can be pushed to a day's runtime, but not always.
You'd be best advised to have a charger handy if you've got a big night planned after a day's work to be sure. It's no surprise that there's no wireless charging on board, as that's still very rare at this price point, but pleasingly it's using the newer USB-C charging standard rather than Micro USB.

Verdict

One for the Nokia fans only

The Nokia 7.1 stood out even amongst the many phones HMD Global produced in 2018, but that's not the story of the Nokia 7.2. It's not just HMD Global's output, but the many alternative options you've got at this price point that deliver more than the Nokia 7.2 can provide.

There's still plenty of appeal in a cleanly designed Android One phone, and if you're a fan of Nokia's design and products, it's a perfectly acceptable handset – but that's all.

Pricing and availability

Price: RRP $549
Where to buy: Amazon | The Good Guys

Alternatives

If your budget can stretch a little further and you want guaranteed updates, the easy recommendation is the Google Pixel 3A.

If you're after a clean Android experience, for a little less than the cost of the Nokia 7.2, you could consider the Motorola Moto One Vision.

If you're after a phone with some serious camera chops, albeit one with heavily modified Android OS, consider the realme XT.

You could save yourself a chunk of change and step down in price where there's a whole host of options, including the Huawei Y9 Prime 2019.

Specifications

Display

Display Size

6.3 inches

Resolution

1080 x 2160px

Pixels per inch (PPI)

383.3 ppi

Camera

Rear camera megapixels

48MP + 5MP + 8MP

Rear camera aperture size

f/1.79 + f/2.2

Video recording

N/A

Front camera megapixels

20MP

Front camera aperture size

f/2.0

Physical Dimensions

Dimensions

159.88mm x 75.11mm x 8.25mm

Weight

180g

Connectivity

NFC

Yes

Wi-Fi

802.11 a/b/g/n/ac

Network category speed

Category 6

Power, storage and battery

Processor

Qualcomm Snapdragon 660

RAM

4GB/6GB

Operating system

Android 9

Internal storage

64GB, 128GB

External storage support

Up to 512GB

Battery capacity

3,500mAh

Device features

Headphone jack

Fingerprint sensor

Water resistance rating

N/A

Wireless charging

Latest mobile reviews

Alex Kidman

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A multi-award winning journalist, Alex has written about consumer technology for over 20 years. He has written and edited for virtually every Australian tech publication including Gizmodo, CNET, PC Magazine, Kotaku and more. He has also been the Editor of Gizmodo Australia, PC Mag Australia, CNET.com.au and the Tech and Telco section at Finder. Alex has a Bachelor of Arts from the University of New England and a serious passion for retro gaming.

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Nokia 7.2 review: A fair mid-range phone, but not an exciting one