Earlier this year, Poco launched its first-ever Ultra phone, the Poco F7 Ultra. It was an impressive device for its $649 price tag. Still, it wasn’t in the league of mainstream flagships like the Galaxy S25 Ultra, which costs over twice as much. Its successor, the Poco F8 Ultra, closes that gap with premium features like a larger display and a massive battery. It also introduces a unique selling point that I’d never expected to find on a phone: It sounds fantastic.
Poco says the F8 Ultra is its “official entry into the premium flagship segment” and the price increase reflects that. The Poco F8 Ultra costs $729 and is cheaper than the recently announced OnePlus 15, which starts at $900. It isn’t comparable to the likes of Oppo Find X8 Ultra, the Xiaomi 15 Ultra or the Galaxy S25 Ultra (all of which cost over $1,000). However, no phone I’ve tested comes close to the F8 Ultra’s audio quality.
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The Poco F8 Ultra has three speakers: a top and bottom speaker, along with an additional Bose-branded subwoofer located adjacent to the rear cameras. It allows for a full 2.1 stereo output (the 2 stands for the two speakers and .1 for the subwoofer), which in real life sounds bigger than expected. It adds a pleasant amount of depth and bass to the audio.
Poco F8 Ultra’s Sound By Bose partnership is a winner in every way. It’s even branded on the phone’s camera plateau.
You can choose from two Bose-tuned sound profiles: “dynamic” and “balanced.” Default EQ presets are “immersive” (which adds a slight echo for a 360-degree effect) and “voice” (which enhances vocals). You can further customize the equalizer under the “custom” setting.
I used the “dynamic” profile for its added bass. It makes music sound rich with its wide soundstage, and there was no distortion over the phone’s speakers, even at high volumes. The “balanced” setting sounds flatter in comparison.
I’ve used the Poco F8 Ultra to watch YouTube videos and a few Netflix shows. I even used it as a bathroom speaker (I like good music in the shower). It obviously isn’t the same as connecting your phone to a Bluetooth speaker, but it is surprisingly decent. In fact, I prefer consuming media on the Poco F8 Ultra now because it sounds better than most tablets, which are usually my go-to device at home.
Still, I’m not sure if the world is ready for phones with this level of sound quality. There’s already that one person on the subway playing media through their phone’s speakers, and this could make rides even noisier. If you’re in the privacy of your own room and enjoy watching videos without headphones or earbuds, the Poco F8 Ultra is made for you.
The Poco F8 Ultra fits in my hand like a pair of jeans
It feels like a jeans, but it isn’t made out of denim.
Turn the phone over, and you’ll notice another unique feature: It has a denim-like finish on the back that feels like a pair of jeans. Poco says the back is covered in “Xiaomi’s third-generation nano-tech material, providing durability against dirt and wear while boasting a tech-chic look,” so it isn’t a real fabric. I tested the durability with a few drops of cold coffee, and I’m glad to report that it wasn’t affected.
The F8 Ultra is comfortable to hold, despite the flat sides. With rounded corners and slightly curved sides on the back, it provides a comfortable grip, even when taking photos with it.
The Poco F8 Ultra has a big, immersive screen.
The phenomenal speaker system is accompanied by a 6.9-inch display with a 2,608×1,200-pixel resolution, supporting a 120Hz refresh rate, 3,500 nits of peak brightness and Dolby Vision. It has what’s called a HyperRGB screen, where each pixel has red, green and blue sub-pixels, rather than sharing red and blue with green. In my experience, the screen looks sharp, vivid and is easily legible in bright sunlight. However, the difference, especially with HyperRGB, is likely not noticeable to the casual user.
To facilitate all this media consumption, the Poco F8 Ultra has a 6,500-mAh battery (an increase from the F7 Ultra’s 5,300-mAh battery) with support for 100-watt wired charging. You’ll need to buy a compatible charger to reach that speed, as it doesn’t come with one. It also supports 50-watt wireless fast charging and 22.5-watt reverse wireless charging, which can be used to charge devices such as wireless headphones and other phones.
In my seven days of usage, I haven’t felt any battery anxiety. The new Poco phone easily lasted an entire day on a single charge.
The Poco F8 Ultra is powered by the most powerful Qualcomm chipset, the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. This is the same chipset that powers the OnePlus 15 and is likely to be found on the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra.
Poco’s new flagship is fast and snappy on its HyperOS 3 software. I haven’t had time to play games on it yet (I was engrossed watching my favorite movies, such as Last Christmas and Kal Ho Na Ho), so I look forward to seeing how it performs during intensive gaming sessions.
Poco F8 Ultra cameras
Poco F8 Ultra’s camera island isn’t inspired by the iPhone 17 Pro. The Poco F6 Pro had a similar camera module.
Let’s talk about the optics. The Poco F8 Ultra has an upgraded camera system with wide-angle, ultrawide and telephoto lenses, each with a 50-megapixel sensor. A trio of 50-megapixel cameras sounds nice, but the telephoto and ultrawide sensors are quite small.
Poco F8 Ultra rear cameras compared
| Lens angle | Aperture | Sensor size | Resolution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wide | f/1.67 | 1/1.31″ | 50MP |
| Ultrawide | f/2.4 | 1/2.76″ | 50MP |
| 5x telephoto | f/3 | 1/2.88″ | 50MP |
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Portrait photo shot on the 5x telephoto camera. It adds a nice bokeh with accurate edge detection.
The Poco F8 Ultra delivers very good images for the price. Unlike Xiaomi flagships, the Poco’s cameras do not benefit from Leica tuning. But the photos have a vibrant look with colors that pop.
During my testing, the F8 Ultra proved unreliable and occasionally struggled with photo processing. For instance, it processed the background in one shot and completely missed it in the second, resulting in an overblown white background behind me.
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There’s a weird processing difference and color shift happening between the ultrawide (left) and main camera shots (middle). The third photo is a macro shot. Notice the amount of details on the watch face.
The telephoto images have a good amount of detail, and I especially like the portraits I take with it. The telephoto lens doubles as a macro camera, but it sometimes falls back to the main camera in low light. As for the ultrawide camera, it delivers average-quality images that are prone to color shifting. It is also a 0.7x, or an 18mm-equivalent, which isn’t as wide as most other phones. The iPhone 17’s ultrawide has a 13mm-equivalent lens.
Overall, I like the photos from the main camera and the telephoto camera. It’s a capable camera system that I find more versatile than the similarly priced iPhone 17 and Galaxy S25.
Should you buy the Poco F8 Ultra?
The F8 Pro misses out on the fancy back panel.
I don’t think I’ve ever recommended a phone for its audio, but the Poco F8 Ultra is a true media powerhouse. The audio system is at the head of its class, and it also has a gorgeous display and a long battery life. That makes it my go-to phone for media consumption.
The Poco F8 Ultra starts at $729 for 12GB RAM and 256GB storage. There’s also a 16GB/512GB variant for $799.
If you’re still looking for something under $700, Poco also offers the more affordable F8 Pro, which starts at $579. It has a smaller 6.59-inch AMOLED display, 6,210-mAh battery and similar Sound by Bose speakers. Both phones have an IP68 rating for dust and water resistance.
The Poco F8 Pro is powered by last year’s flagship Snapdragon 8 Elite processor and has 12GB of RAM and either 256GB or 512GB of storage ($629). It has a downgraded camera system with a 50-megapixel main camera, a 50-megapixel 2.5 optical zoom telephoto camera and an 8-megapixel ultrawide camera.
Like all other Poco phones, the new flagship devices won’t be launching in the US.
