S58: A phone for when the going gets tough
Doogee S58 Pro
The S58 Pro is a niche smartphone designed for stamina and ruggedness for those who love outdoor adventures or work outside for a living. The case is engineered to withstand hard knocks and falls featuring deep ridge bumper corners and industry-leading high strength rubber materials able to withstand drops, water and extreme temperatures.
The S58 Pro features an industrial design right down to the physical screw heads on each side and on the back. The design is more function over form and something you’ll either love or hate. I fall into the former category.
The S58 Pro is bulky but this is for a good reason. There’s the IP68 waterproof and dustproof, which means it can be submerged up to a maximum depth of 1m underwater for up to 24 hours or 1.5m depth for 2 hours.
The back is made up of plastic composite materials with glass that protects the triple-cameras. The 5.71-inch display has Corning Gorilla Glass HD+ and although it comes with a pre-installed screen protector and a ridge that rises above the screen. I think this could be a weakness in what otherwise is a fairly indestructible phone.
The S58 Pro features a 360-degree anti-fall angle four-corner tire pattern protection, using what Doogee says is high-strength rubber that is usually seen on off-road vehicle tires with many rigid layers and a silicone lining to give excellent shock absorption performance. This makes it practical for intensive outdoors and activities and weather conditions.
Doogee claims all-round protection from damage if dropped (1.5m drop-proof). The phone can also withstand extreme temperatures between 70°C to -55°C so is perfect for use whether skiing or on a desert safari!
The rear fingerprint sensor uses tried and true technology that just works. Again, this is an essential feature for contactless payments for the contemporary mask-wearing times we live in. In my use, I found it fast and reliable. There’s also a face unlock option and this works well but is less secure if that’s something that worries you.
The S58 Pro has a massive 5,180mAh battery with support for fast charging but no wireless charging feature. Battery life is easily good enough to see you through two-days and beyond with medium use. It has a standby time of 550 hours, 16 hours video playback, 12 hours gaming, 42 hours music and 24 hours calling.
The MT6762V CPU is coupled with 6GB of RAM and 64GB of storage which runs along nicely. Although this is a budget chipset, everything ran without issues and I had no problem running games on it either. 64GB of storage is the minimum I’d recommend in a 2020 smartphone, but this can be upgraded via micro SD card up to 256GB.
The 5.71-inch IPS display features a water-drop cutout for the front selfie camera. The screen corners are round but strangely, the top corners have a larger radius than the bottom two. It doesn’t get super bright but the viewing angles and colours are pretty decent.
Something you don’t see too often anymore is an FM radio. This works with the included USB-C to 3.5mm headphone jack. You’ll need your own headphones but it is a nice feature for those who want to be able to tune in while they tune out in the wilderness in areas with insufficient data coverage.
The large red-edged button on the left side is a custom button. You can be configured with three different functions. I set it to launch the flashlight with one click, open the camera with two clicks and a long press to open an app. Although it’s not necessarily a downside, the phone has to be unlocked for the custom button to work.
The S58 Pro comes with a fairly stock version of Android 10. NFC is an essential part of life this year and you get full support for Google Pay here so you don’t have to worry if you forget your debit card. Featuring four satellite navigation systems to give more precise positioning reassuring users they will never get lost. There’s also support for Bluetooth 5.0 for improved streaming speeds and longer transmission distances.
The S58 Pro features a triple camera setup (16MP+2MP+2MP). The 2MP cameras are for macro and depth sensing. I can see a use for the depth camera for things like portrait mode but a 2MP macro camera is a waste of time. If it had a longer focal length and high resolution it could be useful — 2MP is too low a resolution for anything very useful.
Around the front is a 16MP selfie shooter that features beauty and bokeh modes. The latter doesn’t do a great job of isolating the face from the background and in normal mode, details are soft especially in low light. In good light, the main camera can capture decent images.
One feature I didn’t get to try is the underwater camera mode for swimmers and divers to capture videos while underwater. I can see how this could be an attractive option for some.
The Doogee S58 Pro is a unique phone that tics a lot of boxes for its intended users who don’t want to spend flagship prices.
The Doogee S58 Pro is available in Army Green, Fire Orange and Mineral Black from Gearbest and AliExpress for $199.99 and from Amazon UK for €215.
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