When it comes to low-light shots, the M4 Aqua tends to use shutter speeds a little too slow for handheld shots. None of the images we took in low-light conditions were sharp as a result, but they aren't awful either. A lot of smartphones are programmed in such a way, so we won't lay into the M4 Aqua too much here. Everything runs smoothly and in our use it's not had any issues switching between tasks and apps, which is great. Storage is where the M4 Aqua lets itself down a little. There is 8GB on board, but you get less than 4GB on the device itself to actually fill due to the operating system install.

However, there's microSD card support for storage expansion up to GB, which we'd certainly recommend using. This limited on-board storage isn't really an issue when it comes to videos and photos as the microSD can help out, but it is a problem if you want to download more than a couple of big gaming apps, for example, as these need to run on the core storage. Fewer Sony bloatware apps and a little more space would have been more welcome.

Battery life wins the M4 Aqua back a few points though.

We consistently got between one and two days of juice before we had to pop the phone on charge, depending on what we did or how busy our days were. You'd have to really go to town to not get at least a day out of the M4 Aqua - it isn't the kind of phone that will die on your train journey home each and every time.

There is one thing that is noticeably missing and that's PS4 Remote Play, which is used for PlayStation 4 owners who want to play their games over network using their Xperia smartphone or tablet as a second screen. It's a unique feature to Sony's flagship range of smartphones so it would have been great to see it on the mid-range, but we understand why it isn't available given the power on board. Everything else runs like pure Android would, you just have the Sony overlay on top with a few additional apps, like an Office suite.

Despite us preferring a cleaner interface, the Sony skin is pleasant to look at and it delivers a good user experience overall. Any first-time phone user will be happy with it, as will more seasoned users. We love the look of the M4 Aqua and how, despite being predominantly plastic, it offers much the same design as Sony's flagship Xperia devices.

It's a charming smartphone, especially in the coral colour as reviewed here, which almost tricks you into thinking it's part of the flagship line thanks to its metallic coat of paint. However, the lack of internal storage, along with an average display and average camera do bring it down a peg or two. Overall the Sony Xperia M4 Aqua is a good mid-range smartphone, made even better by full waterproofing. That's one feature to make it standout in among the madness of the mid-range market, and therefore well worthy of consideration.

Dynamic range on the wide-angle here lags a bit behind, the shadows are too dark. Details are again outstanding. Details on the left building are excellent and the Sony camera manages to preserve the texture better than any other phone.

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Excellent detail overall. The wide angle has good exposure and dynamic range, but again the phone loves its warm colour temperature too much.

This scene again makes the fish-eye lens distortion much more pronounced. The telephoto lens also is near too high exposure on the background. The wide angle results were interesting as two consecutive shots ended up quite different in the HDR processing. One shot the background was again too overexposed, and in the other it was brought down.

Sony Xperia XZ Premium

The Xperia 1 is one of them and the result is far too gray, with only the wide-angle getting some sort of more reasonable colours. All three cameras are very much struggling with dynamic range and the highlights are blown out. The Xperia continues to have outstanding detail quality throughout the scenes and modules. Here the phone again manages to beat every other device out there. I did a quick panorama test with a limited set of phones, and discovered that the Sony has massive issues here. The exposure is for the sky and the scenery is just vastly underexposed and too dark.

Other phones are able to maintain a fuller dynamic range even in the panorama mode. On the front, the XZ2 is dominated by a tall, display surrounded by bezels that are reasonably slim but not as minimal as those of the Galaxy S9. Mercifully, Sony hasn't copied the iPhone X's notch as so many phone-makers have been eager to do, and the newest member of the Xperia family is a much cleaner-looking device for it and, ironically, a more distinctive one, too.

The XZ2 is also Sony's first phone to ship in the U. Nevertheless, I'm dismayed to report that Sony's execution still misses the mark. The scanner is now on the back of the phone, as you'd find on most Android handsets. But in an effort to stop users from having to reach too far, the sensor has been placed near the center of the body and much lower than on other devices. Within seconds of using the XZ2 for the first time, I immediately became aware of the folly of this decision.

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I'd call my hands average-size, and even I have to awkwardly curl my index finger around to press on the sensor when trying to cradle the phone with one hand. In both hands, it's a little more comfortable, but you shouldn't need to use two hands to unlock your phone. To make matters worse, the single camera lens is exactly where you'd expect the fingerprint sensor to be. And it's the same diameter. And it's encircled in trim that comically makes it much easier to locate. If you thought the Galaxy S8's scanner placement was obtuse, you're going to love smudging the XZ2's shooter ad infinitum until the muscle memory kicks in to avoid it.

Sony also loses points for creating the slipperiest smartphone I've ever encountered. It's a good reason to spring for a case, though. Android devices outside of Samsung's flagships tend to have terrible accessory support — so good luck finding one.

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While Sony has gone to great lengths to make the exterior of the Xperia XZ2 look less dated, the same consideration hasn't been extended to the 5. There are actually a few more pixels than full HD on the XZ2 because of the display's wider aspect ratio, but the density is exactly the same, as is the support for HDR content. Sony has provided three display modes out of the box, with the standard setting striking a nice balance between ultrarealistic and ultrasaturated.

Visibility is maintained well at off-center angles, and the panel gets bright, though not necessarily as bright as other LCD-powered phones, like the LG G7. That last point is rather disappointing, because the greatest boon to LCD technology in comparison to OLED is supposed to be its brightness. That's bad news for the Xperia XZ2, which topped out at a respectable but hardly pace-setting nits on our light meter. Although you'll find Sony's image sensors in the best phone cameras, the company's own handsets have never been especially gifted in terms of photography.

And just as in many of Sony's phones, there's a dedicated two-step shutter key on the side for users who prefer that tactile sensation. Without a second lens, the Xperia XZ2 can't pull off the kind of bokeh-effect portraits that are all the rage right now. That's a debatable loss, but what stings a little more is the lack of optical zoom. The single-lens Galaxy S9 has similar limitations, so I took both phones out on an expedition to see how they compared. The Xperia impressed me on an overcast spring morning in Bryant Park, where it pulled out lush shades of greens from the lawn and trees encircling it.

The buildings have a bit more warmth to them, too. And while some might attribute the XZ2's brighter sky to overexposure, I can say it's a bit truer to actual conditions. The added sharpness of Sony's MP sensor in comparison to the MP one on the Galaxy S9 also preserves detail in the texture of the grass.

However, Samsung's handset delivered more natural hues when I closed in on a tulip outside a restaurant near the park. A disparity in focal lengths explains the slightly different perspectives both phones opted for here, though the Galaxy S9 deserves more credit for minimizing noise throughout the background — a testament to Samsung's post-processing software that exposes flaws in Sony's own. The Galaxy S9 also proved to have the advantage in low light, producing a shot in our studio that was surprisingly clear and bright even though all the lights were turned off. The Xperia XZ2's attempt was significantly darker across the entirety of the frame, and its autofocus took much longer to latch on to objects in the foreground.

Another area where the Xperia XZ2 definitely needs work is its selfie game.