REVIEW: Alcatel A5 LED smartphone

You play music, it plays a light-show. With customised displays for notifications and social media alerts, the A5 joins the list of downright strange phones in 2017

You need a phone that lights-up when you play music? You probably don’t, but in an effort to stand-out in a crowded market, Alcatel just showed TravGear its new lightly-uppy LED phone, the A5 LED.

The screen is 5.2-inches and measures 1280 x 720 pixels, but on the rear are 35 LEDs under a metallic black or silver surface.

TravGear got a good close-up during a one-to-one demo with William Dowie, Portfolio Director, Global Marketing & Products Center of Alcatel, at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona a few weeks ago.

When the LED lights aren’t changing in response to the music, the A5 LED retains an unusual look.

But it’s that LED show that’s the gimmick’ elsewhere is Android 6.0 Nougat, an eight megapixel front camera and a 2,800mAh battery, so there’s nothing special.

Although there are some unusual choices for the covers, which essentially make it a modular phone. More choices for covers are incoming during the rest of 2017.

Yup, TravGear also got to look inside the A5 LED. It’s a battery.