ZTE Grand S vs. Google Nexus 4

Today was Chinese OEM ZTE’s turn to debut its new devices and, as expected, the Grand S was given its first outing. It’s already being dubbed ‘the thinnest smartphone ever made’ but can it hold up against the LG Nexus 4, one of the most hotly anticipated and cheapest premium devices of Q4 in 2012?

Internals & Features

The Nexus 4 may have had an attractive price-point but it doesn’t lack power. The device has a 1.5GHz quad-core ‘Krait’ processor an Adreno 320 GPU and 2GB RAM. It comes with either 8GB or 16GB of on-board storage (with no SD slot), although getting your hands on either seems to be easier said than done with LG producing just  400,000 units in its first run and no further stock in sight.

On the upside, should you get your hands on one, the Nexus 4 has an 8-megapixel camera with lots of features, including ‘Photosphere’, which allows you to capture a 360-degree, multi-directional panoramic images.

The ZTE Grand S, may be slender but it’s packing a lot into that space. The device has a 1.7GHz quad-core Snapdragon S4 processor and 2GB RAM, as well as 16GB of onboard storage and a micro SD slot for further expansion.

Impressively, the ZTE Grand S has a 13-megapixel camera too which can capture full 1080P video, as well as a front-facing 2-megapixel secondary snapper.

Winner - ZTE Grand S

Display

LG has given their Nexus 4 a 4.7-inch True HD IPS Plus capacitive touchscreen which operates at a resolution of 768 x 1280 and offers a pixel density of 318PPI.

ZTE has upped the ante though, giving its Grand S what has been called the world’s first truly HD mobile display. In simple terms, the 5-inch display is full 1080P screen and has a pixel density of 440PPI, which gives you over 100 pixels per inch more than the Retina Display on an iPhone 5. You can’t even begin to imagine how sharp the display on this device is!

Winner - ZTE Grand S