TCL aims to build a better budget phone with the 20 Pro 5G

TCL has announced the rest of its 20-series lineup, with the 20 Pro 5G leading the way. Along with the 20L and 20L Plus, the phone joins the two devices announced earlier this year at CES, the TCL 20 5G and 20 SE, all of which prominently feature the company’s display technology. TCL says the 20 Pro 5G and 20S (a regional variant of the 20L Plus) will come to the US this summer, though the company hasn’t confirmed prices yet.

The TCL 20 Pro 5G offers the most advanced specs of the bunch, with some refinements over last year’s good-not-great 10 Pro. It offers a 6.67-inch 1080p OLED with HDR10 support and includes the latest generation of TCL’s NXTVISION technology to identify on-screen content and adjust color, contrast, and sharpness accordingly. The 20 Pro 5G uses a Snapdragon 750G chipset — a step up from the 10 Pro’s 600-series processor — with 6GB RAM, ships with Android 11, and offers a 4,500mAh battery. Sub-6GHz 5G is supported, but TCL says it can adapt to include other 5G bands depending on the carrier.

The phone’s main camera uses a 48-megapixel sensor with a small but important addition: optical image stabilization. It’s a feature that should help reduce blur in lower-light conditions, and it wasn’t offered on any of last year’s 10-series models.

The standard wide camera is accompanied by a 16-megapixel ultrawide, 5-megapixel macro, 2-megapixel depth-sensing chip, and 32-megapixel selfie camera. For biometric unlock, the 20 Pro includes an in-display fingerprint sensor. We’re pleased to report that the 3.5mm headphone jack remains, and a microSD card slot is available for expansion on the 256GB of built-in storage. The 20 Pro 5G goes on sale tomorrow in the UK, Italy, and Portugal for €549 (about $655).

The TCL 20L and 20L Plus are more budget-oriented devices. They both offer a 6.67-inch 1080p LCD, a 5,000mAh battery, and a Snapdragon 662 processor. The 20L offers 4GB of RAM in its base model, while the Plus model starts at 6GB.

The 20L Plus also features a 64-megapixel main camera, while the 20L includes a 48-megapixel main sensor; both devices include an 8-megapixel ultrawide, 2-megapixel macro, 2-megapixel depth sensor, and 16-megapixel selfie camera. Both phones also use circular polarization display technology, so that the screen is visible from any angle when viewing it with polarized sunglasses.

The 20L and 20L Plus go on sale tomorrow in the UK, Italy, and Portugal, starting at €229 and €269, respectively.