While we have seen a lot of “mini” iterations of popular flagship smartphones, these devices tend to fall in the midrange category. Sony is the lone holdout in this regard, with their Compact devices only shrinking in size, while retaining the specifications and features of their flagship counterparts, which is the case with one of Sony’s latest offerings, the Xperia X Compact ($425-$500, depending on where you look).
While the Xperia X Compact is technically a smaller version of the Xperia X that was announced back at MWC this year, it borrows its design language from the flagship Xperia XZ that was launched alongside it at IFA 2016.
You will have a far better audio experience with the Xperia X when plugging in a pair of headphones. The Xperia X Compact has built-in support for Hi-Res Audio like FLAC, ALAC, DSD, and LPCM, but if you don’t have audio in these formats already, the device can also upscale any compressed audio files to give it a hi-res sound.
The Xperia X Compact comes with a 2,700-mAh battery, which allows for surprisingly good battery life, helped along by the relatively lower resolution display that it has to power. The battery comfortably provides a full day of use, and even with heavy usage that involved a lot of gaming and watching videos on YouTube, I rarely had to charge the device in the middle of the day.
Read more of Lanh Nguyen’s hands-on Xperia X Compact review on Android Authority.