Last Updated on June 12, 2021 by TM

The much talked about Tecno Camon 12 Air is here. We’ve all waited patiently to see this phone launch in Nigeria. We are glad it finally came.

Tecno recently opened her new flagship store at Ikeja City Mall in Lagos, Nigeria where they launched the Camon 12 Air for the African market.

The Camon 12 Air is a big upgrade for Tecno, this is because it is their first ever punch hole display smartphone. This is by far one of the remarkable achievement they will forever remember.

Prior to her launch, if someone had told me Tecno was going to launch a smartphone with a punch hole display. I will simply reply by saying. Yeah! In the year 2020 right?

But that didn’t happen Tecno didn’t see any reason to hide her newest design yet, not to talk about postponing her release when it is ready for the market. Particularly here in Nigeria, where the demand for better features on smartphones just keeps increasing.

Key features

Launch Date: October, 2019
Display-size: 6.5inch IPS LCD
Resolution: 720 x 1600p
OS: Android 9.0
UI: HIOS 5.5.2
Battery: 4000mAh
Rear Camera: 16MP + 5MP + 2MP
Front Camera: 8MP
RAM: 3GB
ROM: 32GB 
Chipset: MediaTek Helio P22
Network: 4G LTE

Availability & Price

The Tecno Camon 12 Air comes in two colors: Ocean blue & alpenglow gold, it is available in online and offline stores in Nigeria. Price starts at $116.

See Lowest Price

Design

The Tecno Camon 12 Air comes with a gradient design, it has a macroscopic carving texture that makes it feel kind of premium even though the body is made of plastic.

To describe the design of the Tecno Camon 12 Air, the best word to use is “traditional”. This is because the Tecno Camon 12 Air has nothing new at the back except when you flip it over to the front. Which is where the biggest upgrade is.

Am talking about the punch hole display for the selfie camera. Other than that, the notch is completely gone there is no bezel, not even a little at the top. Just screen and nothing else other than the small bezels you will find at the bottom.

Aside the punch hole in front, everything else design wise! looks very traditional. Nothing much have changed. The placement are still the same. There is still a fingerprint scanner at the back.

When it comes to size, the Tecno Camon 12 Air is not that big, it comes standard with a 164.2 x 76.1 x 8.15mm dimension which is not larger than what you can handle. A single hand grip is enough.

Display

The display on the Tecno Camon 12 Air is a 6.55 inch IPS LCD display that is large enough to cater for your viewing pleasure irrespective of the angle you are viewing from.

The display design is by far the biggest upgrade on this very smartphone, many would have thought it will be impossible to have a punch display appear on a budget phone like this in Nigeria.

But Tecno were intelligent enough to produce a smartphone that will surprise everyone. This is the first of it’s kind remember, History will have it that the Tecno Camon 12 Air changed a lot.

The display comes with a 720 x 1600p resolution which is very much in line with majority of the smartphones we are seeing in her price point in Nigeria.

It has a 90% screen ratio which is very okay for watching movies and playing games. There is nothing standing in the way other than the expansive viewing experience you stand to enjoy.

Camera

The camon series have always been a camera smartphone right from day one, the Camon 12 Air still keeps thing up by bringing a clear photography experience to the table.

On the Tecno Camon 12 Air is an 8MP Selfie camera that is clear and bright. It comes with no flash light in front but her absence won’t change anything at all.

This is because there is a screen flash that does all the magic. The selfie camera have 3D stereoscopic facial beauty, video beauty and AI beauty mode.

There is also a mosaic algorithm that makes photos appear much clearer and brighter on the selfie camera.

At the back, there is an AI Max Triple camera that is made up of a 16MP main, 5MP wide and 2MP depth with quad flash. The 16MP main lens focuses more on AI scene detection and AI HDR.

That is not to say that all of them work separately. They all work as a team even though they have distinctive roles. There is even AI optimization on the camera.

The rear camera also have an ultra clear shot, 120° super wide angle, 2cm macro photography and bokeh effect that assist with highlight on the main portrait and blurs out the background.

Battery life

The Tecno Camon 12 Air comes with a 4000mAh battery that is long lasting. It can survive up to 7 hours screen on time in Nigeria.

This is sufficiently okay for an average user who do some really light task in Nigeria. Such kind of person can get up to two days of use.

Software & Spec

The Tecno Camon 12 Air comes with Android 9.0 Pie OS based on HIOS 5.5 User Interface with over 220+ AR Stickers.

The Tecno Camon 12 Air now runs on a 2.0GHz quad-core processor. It has a MediaTek Helio P22 Chip and a power VR GE8 320 GPU.

You will also find a 3GB RAM and 32GB ROM storage configuration inside which can be expandable via microSD just incase you need more space.

My Thoughts

I am more than happy to see another big upgrade coming to the Camon series this year. First, it was an in-display fingerprint scanner and now this one.

Even when 2020 is around the corner, Tecno was still able to introduce a punch hole display to us in Nigeria. I will call this democracy because everyone can now enjoy this premium upgrade.

Things are also getting a little bit interesting too. Remember Infinix unveiled her punch hole display smartphone. The S5

Which is no doubt the number one competitor to the Tecno Camon 12 Air in Nigeria. We are gradually transiting to a new era in the coming year.