On Thursday – January 21, 2021, Hong-Kong-based smartphone brand Infinix officially announced the imminent release of a new Android smartphone for entry-level consumers here in the Philippines.

The Infinix Hot 10 Play dons an official price tag of PHP 4,299 — but on Infinix Day happening on January 23, 2021, it will go for a discounted amount of only PHP 3,790, exclusively via Infinix’s Store in LazMall on Lazada Philippines.

Available in two colorways, namely, Morandi Green and Aegean Blue, Infinix Hot 10 Play flaunts an eye-catching design language with an interesting back finish and it also features a slew of technical specifications that I think are good enough given its low price tag.

Clad in polycarbonate with metallic sheen, Infinix Hot 10 Play sports a very large 6.82-inch HD+ IPS display that’s great for enjoying visual content. This screen has a small waterdrop notch, thin bezels especially in the top and sides, and has a tall 20.5:9 Aspect Ratio.

For those who are interested in mobile photography, Infinix Hot 10 Play features a Dual Rear Camera Module made up of a 13 MegaPixel main camera that’s powered by AI plus a secondary Depth Sensor, enabling Portrait Mode for adding background blur to highlight the subject.

If you love taking selfies, this handset comes with an 8 MegaPixel front-facing camera housed in the display’s notch. This shooter is powered by AI, which automatically evens out your skin tone and highlights your good facial features to give you self-portraits that are instantly ready for sharing on social media.

This chipset is complemented by 2GB of RAM and 32GB of expandable storage, which I think are just right for a phone in this price category.

The real highlight or the strongest selling point of Infinix Hot 10 Play, though, would have to be its extremely large 6,000 mAh Li-Po battery pack. This is the basis of Infinix’s PowerMarathon Tech innovation that’s in this device. With such a large battery, this handset is easily capable of delivering two-days of uptime with regular use — and perhaps, even more for those who just use their smartphones for browsing social media accounts and snapping a few photos within the day.

With its release in the market, Infinix Hot 10 Play will go head-to-head with the best-selling Cherry Mobile Aqua S9, which is currently priced at PHP 3,999. In comparison, Cherry’s entry-level-battleship handset has more RAM, internal storage, and even more cameras — but has a slightly smaller (albeit still very large) 5,000 mAh Li-Po battery pack.