At first glance it is reminiscent of an iPhone: the all-round aluminum frame with a vertical edge is amazingly similar to the current Apple smartphones.

With a screen diagonal of 6.44 inches, it is exactly the middle between an iPhone 13 and the iPhone 13 Pro Max.

We're talking about the V23 5G from the Chinese manufacturer Vivo, which we tried out for a while.

The camera hump on the back is also borrowed from the Apple world.

Here three optics are arranged one below the other.

The most spectacular detail, however, is the back of the gold-colored version.

Depending on how you hold the device, the color changes from gold to a shimmering blue-turquoise.

But not only that, the back can be decorated with ornaments by placing a template and illuminating the back with UV light.

The irradiated areas are dark for a few hours.

Such photochromatic surfaces are known from self-tinting spectacle lenses, which also react to UV light.

Michael Spehr

Editor in the "Technology and Engine" department.

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The chameleon from China looks good and is of high quality, but is not protected against water.

For a price of a little more than 500 euros, the Amoled display also amazes with rich colors and strong contrasts.

It achieves good brightness and offers a refresh rate of 60 Hertz and 90 Hertz.

The resolution is 2400 x 1080 pixels, which is slightly less than the iPhone 13.

In terms of working speed, this android also does not keep up with its rivals from the Apple world.

A mid-range processor is used here, the Dimensity 920 from Mediatek.

It has two ARM Cortex cores with up to 2.5 gigahertz, and the "system on a chip" supports 5G, Wifi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2.

Two SIM cards can be used in the holder.

The internal memory is plentiful at 256 gigabytes, but cannot be expanded with memory cards.

12 gigabytes of RAM is also a nice extra.

The device comes with Android 12, over which Vivo uses its own Funtouch operating system attachment.

The software looks pleasing and simple, no comparison with the annoying stuff that Samsung, among others, plays.

The number of apps that cannot be deleted is also limited.

A biometric fingerprint scanner is embedded under the display, it works much better than the one in the Google Pixel 6 Pro.

In addition, there is biometric face recognition, which quickly captures your own face during the first scan, but works rather poorly when unlocking the device.

The camera department on the back consists of a main camera of 64 megapixels, 25 mm focal length and f/1.89 aperture and a 120-degree ultra-wide angle lens of 8 megapixels, 16 mm focal length and f/2.2 aperture.

There is also a macro for shots from a distance of 4 centimeters with 2 megapixels, a focal length of 24 millimeters and an aperture of f/2.4.

The recordings are pleasing, but the zoom is missing.

The special feature are the two front cameras on the front.

One has a focal length of 23 millimeters and a 50 megapixel sensor with eye recognition.

The other is an 8-megapixel, 105-degree ultra-wide-angle lens with a focal length of 18 millimeters.

A double LED flash should provide better illumination for portrait shots, and the option to adjust the color temperature of the flash is unique.

Coupled with the multiple self-portrait features, the Instagram generation gets plenty of opportunities for hours of selfie experimentation.

In addition to the usual camera tricks, there are also functions for automatically generating a narrower face, for reducing the size of the chin and for nose editing.

The shape of the mouth and the distance between the eyes can also be changed via software.

If the self-loving person also wants to optimize their posture, the Vivo software is also helpful: Optimal poses are suggested for the right selfie and placed over the motif in an augmented reality display.

You can gossip about all this, but if you spend a little longer with the selfie functions, you will be impressed by the surprisingly good results.