Nubia Z70 Ultra Review: Smartphone Cruiserweight Hits Hard

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Last year’s Nubia Z60 Ultra may not have made many end-of-year tech lists, but it certainly caught the attention of those in the know. It was a big, bold flagship phone with some serious high-end specifications for a decidedly less-than-flagship price.

What it lacked, ultimately, was the level of refinement we’ve come to expect north of £600/$600. All the Nubia Z70 Ultra had to do was sharpen up on the minor details, and we could have the kind of flagship killer we last encountered when OnePlus first burst onto the scene.

With a cutting-edge Snapdragon 8 Elite chip providing an early glimpse at the chip that will likely dominate 2025, an appealingly fluid and unobstructed display, an eye-catching variable aperture camera, and an absolutely ginormous battery, the Nubia Z70 Ultra captures the attention right out of the box.

In the event, it’s a phone that offers a broadly familiar selection of strengths and weaknesses, but it’s undoubtedly a more precise effort than its predecessor. Nubia isn’t quite there yet, but it’s getting closer.

Design & Build

• Hefty but distinctive design
• Huge slab of a camera module
• Additional hardware buttons

The Nubia Z60 Ultra left us a little conflicted with its blocky looks and distinctive finish options. The Nubia Z70 Ultra follows suit, but with a few small refinements.

This is still a brick of a phone, and it even has a fractionally larger 164.3 x 77.1mm footprint. However, at 8.6mm thick and with a weight of 228g, it feels slightly easier to live with.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

The design language is very similar, with a pronounced square camera module that takes up the top third of the rear surface. The circular main camera stands out even further from this raised area, and in the unlikely event that you missed it, Nubia has helpfully ringed its star snapper in red. Subtle it ain’t.

My model comes in a classically sober black, with a stealthy dark frame to match. However, you can also specify it in a slightly sickly pale yellow with a metallic frame.

The top-spec model also comes with the option of a Starry Night design, which applies some Van Gogh-esque galactic swirls to the back of the phone, complemented by a blue frame. It’s a little busy for my tastes, but I’m never going to complain when a company tries something bold with its colour options.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

I also have no complaints about the soft-touch glass finish of the rear panel either – it feels good and successfully fends off fingerprints. There are other signs that Nubia has upped its build quality game, with an IP69 rating joining the more common IP68 rating. This means that it can survive exposure to high-pressure water jets as well as prolonged immersion – car wash attendants take note.

The front of the phone is much more understated than the rear, with hardly any bezels to speak of and no display notch whatsoever. This is as close to an all-screen phone as it’s possible to get – at least when you view it head-on.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

The Z60 Ultra was one of precious few Android phones to feature a physical slider switch, though it’s here set to launch the camera rather than as an iPhone/OnePlus-style mute switch. This can be changed in the Settings menu, but it feels a little sloppy given the fresh addition of a physical camera shutter button this time around.

As well as launching the camera, this two-stage physical button can be used to lock focus and then take shots, much like the Sony Xperia 1 VI.

The Nubia Z70 Ultra is a pleasure to use, with a Camera Control button positioned perfectly where your forefinger rests, unlike the iPhone 16.

The screen on the Z70 Ultra is a standout feature, with a 6.85-inch 1.5K AMOLED display and an enhanced 144Hz refresh rate. The stereo speakers provide decent sound quality, though only one speaker is front-firing. The screen brightness has been increased to 2000 nits, making it bright enough for most scenarios.

The phone is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite chip, offering excellent performance and up to 24GB of RAM and 1TB of storage. It may not match the Redmagic 10 Pro or Asus ROG Phone 9 Pro in benchmark tests, but it outperforms flagship phones from 2024 like the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra and OnePlus 12.

The Nubia Z70 Ultra runs games like Genshin Impact and Wreckfest smoothly on maxed-out settings, making it one of the fastest phones in 2025. The camera setup includes a 50Mp main camera with variable aperture, a 64Mp 3.3x telephoto lens, a 50Mp ultra-wide lens, and a 16Mp in-display selfie camera. It would have been easy and acceptable for the company to stick with the same setup for the follow-up and allocate its limited resources elsewhere. However, Nubia has not rested on its laurels with the Z70 Ultra’s camera. The device features the same 50Mp Sony IMX 906 main sensor as the Z60 Ultra Leading Edition, along with a new variable aperture.

In the Pro photography mode, users can adjust the aperture from f/1.59 to f/4.0, offering fine control over light and depth of field. This feature shines when capturing close-up subjects in Pro mode, allowing for more detailed and well-lit shots, especially with food photography.

While similar features have been seen in more expensive premium flagships, the Nubia Z70 Ultra offers a solid implementation at a more affordable price. The camera performs well in good lighting conditions, with detailed and colorful shots, and the Night mode produces clear images in low lighting.

However, the ultra-wide camera on the device shows a drop in sharpness compared to the main sensor and telephoto lens. The selfie camera also falls short in detail and skin tone accuracy, although it is an improvement over previous models.

Some aspects of Nubia’s camera UI, such as default beautification effects and watermarks, can be annoying. The handling of focal lengths in the camera app may also be confusing for some users.

In terms of battery life and charging, the Z70 Ultra features a large 6150mAh battery and 80W wired charging. The device’s stamina is impressive, lasting through intensive usage for more than a day without needing a charge. However, the PCMark battery test score is lower compared to previous models and rival flagship phones, likely due to the higher resolution and faster display. Throughout my testing, I consistently ran the screen at its unusually high 144Hz peak refresh rate instead of the default Auto or a more standard 120Hz, both of which would likely extend the battery life. Nubia has also increased the wired charging speed to an impressive 80W, and includes the fast charger in the box, which is a rarity these days. Using the included charger, I was able to charge the Z70 Ultra from empty to 38% in 15 minutes, 67% in 30 minutes, and a full charge in about 50 minutes. However, the absence of wireless charging is disappointing, especially considering that many cheaper phones offer this feature.

In terms of software and features, Nubia has introduced the new Nebula AIOS, but it still has the same old issues with clunky UI design and unnecessary preinstalled apps. The software runs over Android 15, but doesn’t feel like a significant improvement. While the UI is relatively smooth and reliable, there are numerous minor annoyances like the default web browser, the Z-board screen, and camera watermark. The slider switch duplicates the function of the new camera shutter button, and there are still typos and translation errors present in the software.

The Nubia Z70 Ultra is priced competitively, starting at £649/$729 for the base model with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. There are also higher-tier models available with more RAM and storage at reasonable prices. The phone is available for purchase directly from Nubia’s website as well as Amazon UK and Amazon US. However, it’s worth noting that the phone is not available on contract, so you’ll need to buy it outright and pair it with a SIM-only deal.

Overall, the Nubia Z70 Ultra is a great value smartphone with powerful performance and a competitive price point. The Snapdragon 8 Elite chip delivers excellent performance, and the 1.5K 144Hz OLED display provides sharp visuals and smooth gameplay. The Z70 Ultra boasts one of the largest batteries on the market, providing a full two days of usage on a single charge.

While the camera system may not be the absolute best available, the strong main sensor with a variable aperture helps the Z70 Ultra compete effectively.

Nubia still has some areas to improve upon to receive a full recommendation – the selfie camera is subpar, the design is blocky and could use refinement, the software is still a work in progress, and there is no wireless charging.

However, for users looking for a high-performance smartphone without the hefty price tag, the Z70 Ultra is definitely worth considering.

**Specs**

– Android 15
– 6.85in, 1.5K, OLED, 144Hz, flat display
– In-display fingerprint sensor
– Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite
– 12GB/16GB/24GB LPDDR5X RAM
– 256GB/512GB/1TB storage
– 50Mp, f/1.59-f/4.0 main camera
– 50Mp ultra-wide camera
– 64Mp telephoto camera
– Up to 8K @ 30fps rear video
– 16Mp front-facing camera
– Harmon Kardon stereo speakers
– Dual-SIM
– Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/ax/be/7
– Bluetooth 5.4
– 6150mAh battery
– 120W charging
– 164.3 x 77.1 x 8.6 mm
– 228g
– Launch colours: Black/Yellow/Starry Night Edition Please rephrase this sentence.