Blackview BV8800 in for review

Say hello to the Blackview BV8800 a phone that's built to be as tough as any work requires of it. It's been tested for rain, sand, dust, shock, extreme temperatures, humidity, altitude, and immersion. It can withstand drops of 1.5 meters and can be submerged up to a meter and a half for up to 30 minutes.

Blackview ship the BV8800 (truly terrible name, btw) with a 33W charger, USB cable, Blackview stick-on token, and with a pre-applied plastic screen protector.

An absolute unit of a device, the BV8800 is 17.7mm thick and weighs in at 365g.

The display is a perfectly-acceptable 6.58-inch IPS LCD, which gets very bright when it needs to, and refreshes at a decent 90Hz. The screen is flanked by chunky black bezels and there's a raised, orange-accented lip of solid plastic that will protect the display from grinding on any surface.

There's a Helio G96 chip paired with 8GB of RAM. The BV8800 ships with 128GB storage, which is non-expandable. Performance is seemingly solid, if not quite as much as the body of the phone.

Another standout feature of the BV8800 is the battery. It's a mammoth 8,380mAh power pack that should provide ample endurance, but can also give power back, allowing the Blackview BV8800 to serve as an external battery for other devices.

The USB-C port on the bottom is protected by a flap that's a bit hard to undo with a fingernail. In fact, on occassion we had to resort to a pocket knife to get it pried open.

In contrast, the volume and power-button-slash-fingerprint-scanner are very easy to push and spongy-feeling.

There's a 50MP f/1.8 main camera with phase-detect autofocus on the Blackview BV8800, but that's not the most interesting camera on offer here. That's the 20MP IR camera that can practically see in the dark.

The fixed-focus IR camera is great fun to use, but can also be of help to field professionals that need its functionality. You can see in the camera UI screenshots below just how much of a dramatic effect it has.

Infrared camera in action

The Blackview BV8800 is a specific type of device aimed at a special type of buyer. It comes in three colors, but it's mostly a Black phone with special accents - either Orange, Green, or full-on Black. Normally $460, it's currently on offer at a special pre-order price of $300.