Tecno Spark 20 review – A worthwhile but familiar successor

The Tecno Spark 20 arrives a year after the Spark 10 arrived on South African shores and set a new benchmark for the brand’s budget phones, especially over the more lightweight Spark 10C. A year later, the Spark 10 is a little cheaper, which only provides more bang for your buck. The Tecno Spark 20 enters as an upgrade in a challenging, crowded budget phone market. But how much of an upgrade is it? Let’s open the hood and determine exactly for whom these changes are for.

Good looking out

Firstly, the Spark 20 possesses a much higher build quality than its predecessor. Most notable is the metallic edge, which gives the phone a sturdier feel. The Magic Skin leather(ish) back panel adds another layer of grip comfort while adding a classier look. It also comes upgraded with dual stereo speakers that play videos and voicenotes with more bass and clarity, while eliminating the annoying sibilance on phones with poor speakers.

Beyond the material, the Spark 20 is identical to the Spark 10 design-wise. Though the Spark 20 is a couple of millimetres shorter, they share the same 6.6in 90Hz IPS LCD screen, with a ring light and fingerprint scanner under the volume keys. The display is Corning Gorilla Glass 5, which claims to be twice as scratch-resistant as its competition, and strong enough to withstand drops onto rough surfaces from as high as 1.2m. At a mere 720p resolution, it’s nothing to write home about and faces tough competition in this price range. We don’t love that it’s the same hardware as the previous model.

New dog, old tricks

Another aspect of the Tecno Spark 20 that has remained the same as the Spark 10 is the 5000mAh battery with its 18W fast charge. This is one aspect in no rush to improve. 2.5 hours will give you a full charge, which, with casual use, averaged around a full day’s use for us, though gaming will likely impact that more than any other activity. If you’re not much of a mobile gamer you’ll get plenty out of the battery. It doesn’t take much to charge, and the HiOS 13’s various software efficiency features mitigate power usage a lot more to make to ensure you make it to your next charge without a depleted battery.

The 50MP rear camera and 32MP selfie camera are the same as the last model, but the Spark 20’s HiOS 13.5 brings improvements to picture quality. The Tecno Spark 20’s cameras claim a lower aperture for nighttime photography, but it’s hard to tell the difference. The 32MP front camera exceeded our expectations. It takes effective nighttime selfies. It’s no world-beater, but it is better than many front cameras in this price range. You’ll likely get the most mileage out of it if you’re darker-skinned and struggle to get good lighting at night. Though you can do worse than the Spark 20 for photos, it’s far from its best feature.

Under the hood

HiOS 13’s Dynamic Port feature, billed as a game-changer by Tecno’s marketing, is anything but. It’s a glorified notification feature that doesn’t do much to enhance an already impressive 90.52% screen-to-body ratio.

We were particularly impressed with how the OS handles accessories. We attached a drawing tablet to the Spark 20 and were honestly blown away by the results. The OS features OTG (On-The-Go) settings that make using a connected tablet — already an unusual choice of peripheral — a seamless creative experience. We tried the same drawing tablet on an Android OS 13 slate and the results were less encouraging by comparison.

Though the Tecno Spark 20 claims 16GB RAM, the reality is closer to 8GB, the other 8GB being expandable like a Windows page file. We’ll take it, though, and since we never experienced any lag playing heavy mobile games, nor when watching 1440p videos on the highest brightness, it must be working. The internal storage is doubled from the Spark 10 to 256GB, giving you ample room to carry any documents and large files without worrying about that ‘storage full’ notification for some time.

Tecno Spark 20 verdict

There’s little the Tecno Spark 20 does exceptionally, but it is a decent all-rounder. It has a high build quality, bolstered by its metallic edge, and leather back panel, which along with the Gorilla Glass 5 screen makes for a sturdy piece of machinery that should hold up pretty well over time. An energy-efficient fast-charging battery means you’ll never be out of touch for long.

While its camera is far from elite, it can be sneakily decent in certain conditions, especially at night. The Tecno Spark 20 also pairs well with accessories like a drawing tablet, keyboard, or stylus. It all adds up to a phone that offers loads of value at its price range. A year ago when the phone launched at R11 000, we would’ve advised you to save your breath and stick to the Tecno Spark 10, but at R7,000 it’s a whole lot of bang for your buck — especially if you’re willing to settle for the more lightweight Spark 20C which, at R3,000, should be a no-brainer for the budget South African consumer.