yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] benjmiester:
Well crap, I'm planning on buying one of these on tmobile and I live in an already mediocre signal area. I get about -122 to at best -106 at home though I just use wifi. Have you noticed any real world issues with the speed? Is -114 the best it gets in a max signal area?
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] techboydino:
I am on Tmobile as well which makes this disappointing. A few of the other issues noted didn't really sway me but this could be a dealbreaker for me. As I have a S7 and am happy with it, short of small(ish) display, I cannot deal with poor signal on either cell or WiFi where as now it's pretty fantastic. I have 2 weeks to decide as Newegg still claims to be shipping the gray model then. Thanks for sharing.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] runderekrun:
Ahhhhhhhh. I still haven't received my phone but between this and camera issues I'm feeling very concerned about my purchase.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Yaya444:
Axon 7 has weak Wi-Fi performance. 5ghz

fluctuates like a bouncing ball. Really hope it's not a bad antenna design with this phone.

Anyone else tested wifi ?

The guy from the zte webinar didn't even know it's AC capable phone. This doesn't inspire confidence.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] bkakus:
My WiFi was running around 60mb on a 100mb link.

PLUS, I am only 3 feet from the router, nothing in between them.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] robstunner:
Yep, same here. In the same places I used to get no service with 2014 devices (like the s4 era stuff) I get no service with the Axon 7. Most of my previous devices (s7e, n6p, 5x, n6, blah blah blah) all retained at least a weak signal in those areas. Wifi seems actually better than my S7 Edge Exynos though.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Yaya444:
That's good but not much of a test for a Wi-Fi device.

You need to move at least 20 feet from the router.

All devices get good Wi-Fi performance if your a few feet from the router.

I have tested 50 dollar phones that get better Wi-Fi performance than this $400 phone.

---------- Post added at 10:39 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:27 PM ----------

Actually I'm testing this phone in the same area as several older and newer devices with no dead spots.

The axon 7 is quite weak by comparison. No other device tested fluctuates signal strength when holding device still.

Very strange occurrence.

Could be a bad antenna design or maybe a few bad units. Hope it's a firmware fix!
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] obladi64:
It sounds badly. Radio volume can be pop up in the software but to tell true it does not help too much in practice without a good antenna. Also battery drain will be increased dramatically. It is hard to imagine such software bug which causes weak signal strength in both wifi and LTE signal cases. So it could be antenna issue most likely and if antenna design is bad that's it. Move on!

It would be good to read opposite experiences which can keep the hope.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Yaya444:
It must be the lower end QCA6164. Max I can connect with axon 7 is 433Mbps. That is if I stand 1 to 3 feet from the router. More of a problem is the poor weak signal as you move away from router. Then connection is down to 190Mbps after 10 feet to 20 feet.

Must be a bad antenna system in this phone.

Most important part of a mobile device is connectivity. This phone is clearly weaker LTE and Wi-Fi than other phones.

Not everything that shines is gold
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] tele_jas:
In my daily use, I don't notice any difference in wifi strength or speed vs my Nexus 6P or my Moto X Pure. In my back room, I still get as good or better speeds on speedtest.net using the app to test. I know this doesn't rate the db, but I notice no real difference.

It also stays connected about 70 yards up the street, about on par with my last few phones.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Yaya444:
Do you mind telling what type of router you're Using? Qualcomm chipset routers work best with

This phone. Mine is a Netgear r7000 and it's not using Qualcomm chipset.

---------- Post added at 03:58 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:58 PM ----------

Do you mind telling what type of router you're Using? Qualcomm chipset routers work best with

This phone. Mine is a Netgear r7000 and it's not using Qualcomm chipset.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] tele_jas:
Netgear r6250
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] runderekrun:
How is your LTE reception/speed versus 6P?
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] tele_jas:
Once again, I don't have actual db numbers, but my "bars" show lower but my connection is just as good and fast, or even slightly better in certain areas.

At my work, I had 4-5 bars of LTE on my 6P.... On the Axon 7, I have 2-3. But, the LTE speeds on the Axon 7 are on par to what the 6P was, and actually slightly better.

At home, I had 1-2 bars on my 6P - It's the same on the Axon 7, but when I go to the back of the house I would drop signal on almost all phones (except my Moto X Pure), but the Axon 7 will still let me carry on a conversation and not cut out.

So, I don't know what the actual numbers are, but I know I get signal where I didn't before and it's typically on par with, or better than my 6P.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] runderekrun:
Thank you.

Other accounts on the ZTE forums are saying that is substantially worse than 6P or even the mediocre Oneplus One. This gives me hope at least.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] matthewpreiss92:
WiFi is longer range on my 2.4ghz axon 7 vs my g3.

Haven't tested the data connection thoroughly enough to OPIN on that.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] taijo:
What is a recommended test for wifi and LTE data speeds? - speedtest.net app?
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Yaya444:
That is a good app for the wan but, what about a lan testing app. Anybody know of an Android app for wifi testing the local area network?
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] maximosm:
Do we know the maximum speed that connects at an ac1900 router? I have the oneplus 2 now and it connects at 433Mbps

Στάλθηκε από το ONE A2003 μου χρησιμοποιώντας Tapatalk
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Yaya444:
I returned mine but I was the first to do WiFi tests 4 weeks ago. Axon 7 only connects at 433Mbps due to the lower Qualcomm WiFi version in the soc.

All the best.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] hardspartan360:
That's not true. I have an Axon 7 and it connects Up to 866mbps

Enviado desde mi ZTE A2017G mediante Tapatalk
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Yaya444:
I was using the USA variant. It will not connect at higher than 433Mbps using a r7000 router. All my other similar mobile devices can connect at 866Mbps.

Aida64 reported the battery in the Axon 7 being 3100mah but zte says it's 3250mah. Maybe Aida is not reporting accurately Or maybe Zte is not truthful.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] test878:
My aida64 is reporting 433 on a US model, with an r8000 router. So I am having the same issue.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] TeutonJon78:
There are two Qualcomm VIVE chipset that can be paired with the 820 -- https://www.qualcomm.com/products/vive/chipsets -- scroll down to the chipsets for devices. One tops out at 433 and the other tops out at 866. It going to depend on which version of the chip they used. My guess for a "budget flagship", they used the lower of the two chipsets. The best bet would probably be to pull info from the kernel or from something like lspci.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] test878:
Good find, weird that they seemingly chose the better wifi/bt module for the global/eu version but gave the U.S. the worse of the two. Wonder if it was due to issues with the U.S. network bands? Apparently the OP3 also uses the same QCA6164A 433Mbps chip. Next up is to determine where the cellular issues are coming from ~.~
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] peramikic:
Per kernel source, only QCA6174 is mentioned so it might be a flag that sets the limit peak speed. Since kernel was B18, it is the US version one. There are multiple version of the firmware files thouhg

define QCA6174_VENDOR_ID	(0x168C)
#define QCA6174_DEVICE_ID	(0x003E)
#define BEELINER_DEVICE_ID (0x0040)
#define QCA6174_REV_ID_OFFSET	(0x08)
#define QCA6174_FW_1_1	(0x11)
#define QCA6174_FW_1_3	(0x13)
#define QCA6174_FW_2_0	(0x20)
#define QCA6174_FW_3_0	(0x30)
#define QCA6174_FW_3_2	(0x32)
#define BEELINER_FW	(0x00)
#define AR6320_REV1_VERSION 0x5000000
#define AR6320_REV1_1_VERSION 0x5000001
#define AR6320_REV1_3_VERSION 0x5000003
#define AR6320_REV2_1_VERSION 0x5010000
#define AR6320_REV3_VERSION 0x5020000
#define AR6320_REV3_2_VERSION 0x5030000
#define AR900B_DEV_VERSION 0x1000000

static struct cnss_fw_files FW_FILES_QCA6174_FW_1_1 = {
"qwlan11.bin", "bdwlan11.bin", "otp11.bin", "utf11.bin",
"utfbd11.bin", "epping11.bin", "evicted11.bin"};
static struct cnss_fw_files FW_FILES_QCA6174_FW_2_0 = {
"qwlan20.bin", "bdwlan20.bin", "otp20.bin", "utf20.bin",
"utfbd20.bin", "epping20.bin", "evicted20.bin"};
static struct cnss_fw_files FW_FILES_QCA6174_FW_1_3 = {
"qwlan13.bin", "bdwlan13.bin", "otp13.bin", "utf13.bin",
"utfbd13.bin", "epping13.bin", "evicted13.bin"};
static struct cnss_fw_files FW_FILES_QCA6174_FW_3_0 = {
"qwlan30.bin", "bdwlan30.bin", "otp30.bin", "utf30.bin",
"utfbd30.bin", "epping30.bin", "evicted30.bin"};
static struct cnss_fw_files FW_FILES_DEFAULT = {
"qwlan.bin", "bdwlan.bin", "otp.bin", "utf.bin",
"utfbd.bin", "epping.bin", "evicted.bin"};

#define QCA6180_VENDOR_ID	(0x168C)
#define QCA6180_DEVICE_ID	(0x0041)
#define QCA6180_REV_ID_OFFSET	(0x08)

6164 is not in the source code at all

There are also def's for QCA6180, but no info on it on the net, and it's only few entries.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] peramikic:
Can someone who is rooted run dmesg in a terminal and post output, it should show us the chip and possibly even the firmware. It would be good to get both U and G versions
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] TeutonJon78:
Where in the kernel dump did you find that?

Also, since they are basically the same HW but different specs, I wonder if they could be running essentially the same FW/API and then the final speed is just limited by the chip itself. Kind of like how Intel and GPU makers bin less performant chips as a lower model. Maybe some part of the radio is slightly busted so they become the 6164A version but with the same firmware. It definitely an odd situation.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] peramikic:
The file is here drivers\net\wireless\cnss. If it's limited it will probably be in the radio firmware and there are apparently 5 FW versions.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] tree_fingers:
Can anyone else confirm or have evidence that the international version has better wifi performance? Also I wonder if Canada is getting the US or International version because it always seems to vary per manufacturer.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] test878:
It's been confirmed already. People have flashed the global rom onto the US model, and it completely fixes the wifi speed.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] randye:
Too check the LAN I use iperf. Google iperf.fr
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] chpimentelpr:
My Wifi works just fine, same as my Note 5 . Cellular signal is slightly lower on the Axon 7, hope they can fix it with a radio update at some point.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] obladi64:
I was a bit nervous when I ordered A7 reading few (many) complaints about Wi-Fi and lte capability. It was so unbelievable that ZTE could release phone with such problem. Anyway I ordered it from Amazon and I got it yesterday. (A2017G/B03)

Of course I would have liked to check it immediately. Recently we have used Samsung Galaxy Note 3 and S4. Actually we are satisfied with both phones very much so far. We haven't had any signal or Wi-Fi issue for years. So I compared A7 to them. We were in a place where gsm/3G/4G signal strength was very poor. Practically it meant zero inside the building and very poor in outside. My first experience was that I got signal inside sometimes with A7 but apart from this gsm and data capability was the same around the house. It is poor of course.

Later at home I did some measurement by using Network Signal Info. I put phones next to each other. Both got SIM from same provider (Vodafone) and they connected to same tower (LTE). Signal strength was between 70 and 80 dBm during the test and from time to time I exchanged phones in position. I did test horizontal position as well as vertical position. Well I would say that A7 and Note 3 performed on very same level. May be Axon was better with 1 or 2 and rarely 3 dB more times than vice-verse but it was hard to diagnose. Also the position was very important. Phone which was in a particular position performed better almost always. I repeat the test with S4 too. May be it is better than other two but I have to emphasize that differences were very-very tiny. Rather I would say that 3 phones have same signal receiver capability.

Wi-fi. I can say same. ZTE has same signal strength and data transfer rate as Note 3 but I have to emphasize here as well that many-many things can impact the result included the position of the tester near to the phones.

I copied files from to PC via Wi-fi and Total Commander showed same rate as in case of Note and S4 earlier.

Finally. My opinion is that ZTE is not worse than the average at all. What is more it performs very well even if some phones are better. I think it can do what Snapdragon makes available.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Life Engineer:
http://www.phonearena.com/news/ZTE-...on-7-hints-at-working-on-Nougat-build_id85609
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] blair287:
WIFI is ok cellular on the other hand sucks big time.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] skullmurdoc:
For me :

Wi-Fi is very strong compare to my LG G3.

Cellular data is weaker but is still on 4G LTE
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] maximosm:
For europe model compared with Op2 its the same. Compared with zuk z1 WiFi of z1 is 15% better.

Στάλθηκε από το ZTE A2017G μου χρησιμοποιώντας Tapatalk
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] Rigby J:
The wifi range is pretty anus IMO
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] thom168as:
I have no complaint with the wifi, though the 2G reception is bad sometimes.(not sure why)
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] mateo85:
Why my WiFi icon flicking constantly to 4g when it's connected with router any idea?
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] bossei:
To add wi-fi performance on this isn't great. My N6p is way better. When u set up WhatsApp and restore my data on the 6p it's done within seconds. It took minutes and painful minutes on the axon 7. Disappointing
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] presley07:
My axon 7 does a really great job at both wifi and cell signal much better than my 6p sorry to say because I love my 6p before I got the axon 7 , I am with att at the moment, camera wise the 6p still better
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] n0gg:
I have got the german model A2017G and can say that my wifi Signal ist better then with my moto x play. Absolutly no Problems with Signal here...

Gesendet von meinem ZTE A2017G mit Tapatalk
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] xdamict:
Any links no how to do this for the USA based phones?
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] craftingcaleb:
Signal Strength

I would think that in a max area, with light usage from other phones that you would have no problem with higher numbers. Depending on your service provider and tower. T mobile should be fair but I would suggest Verizon if you do not live in T mobiles 4G service areas as Verizon has more coverage area.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] benjmiester:
It ended up just being that I had this metal parking roof right in front of my apartment. It blocked my signal quite a bit along with OTA TV signal. It got much, much better after I moved. TMobile can be very fast indeed. Now I get up to -73 db (remember lower/more negative is better for signal strength)

It's faster than my medium tier cable modem!
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] XDA_RealLifeReview:
We know how much you like to stream, ahem, "videos", and so cellular data is mega-important. Rate this thread to express how you think the ZTE Axon 7's LTE performs. A higher rating indicates that it's fantastic: throughput is excellent and signal strength is top-notch.

Then, drop a comment if you have anything to add.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] runderekrun:
I was on my way up northern Michigan and my wife drove for a bit and I compared the axon to her Moto G (2016) and it they both had to about the same signal. Both had issues shedding weaker towers. Now that we are up at the cabin both phones have very similar signal. So I think the axon is at least as good as a Moto G (2016).
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] murkwell:
On what network?
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] runderekrun:
cricket (att)
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] runderekrun:
Now that I am back at a keyboard I can expand a bit. I was testing via running speed tests. When I first started the Moto G was destroying the Axon. I started getting a sunken feeling, but then I noticed the Axon shifted off a tower only getting HSPA ("4G") to one using LTE so I reran a few speed tests and the Axon trounced the Moto G, as it was still stuck on the under performing tower. So that's when I thought maybe a rural roadtrip, with an iffy signal to begin with, wasn't the best way to test this. Once we arrived at the cabin we both had between 1 and 2 bars of HSPA connection that would only work in specific corners of the cabin effectively. Seemingly the same.

I know this isn't an empirical test. I wasn't comparing the actual db numbers or anything. But to my eyes, Axon is about on the same level as the Moto G (2016). I don't know how good the Moto G actually is but I remember reading it had good signal when I was originally reading reviews for it.

Once again this was all tested on the Cricket (via AT&T) network.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] cctbrkr:
Up in Canada on Rogers and am having severely low signal rate. Cannot find service in any basement ive been in throughout the city. Signal of around -120dBm inside buildings. The signal seems very erratic and jumps from 96-143dBm extremely quick. I seem to think there may be a modem problem with this network. If anyone else is on Rogers please chime in on your findings.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] test878:
The signal strength is worse than my s4, I checked the db and it is 5-10db worse, but occasionally will jump to being on par to the s4. Tested on tmo lte, neither phone was being held. Not sure how the rating is 4.5/5 as a reddit post agrees that there is some issue.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] vision33r:
The signal quality is definitely not stable, had a few minor call drops if I am not in certain parts of my house and inside stores which can be tough on signals but it's nowhere near as strong as my other test phones such as the S5, Note 4, and S6 Edge+. I was dropping calls earlier this week and switched back to Note 4 and I was able to talk everywhere w/o dropped calls. This is on Tmobile and signal is decent in my area. Then on WIFI strength, the Note 4 beats it by 20-30% throughput. That's a 2014 device.

My problem with all these Chinese brand phones is they have great specs but software is lacking. Looks like I maybe back to my workhorse Note 4.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] thebest:
So I used this phone to drive Uber in Los Angeles all last night and had some pretty major problems.

GPS Signal would randomly shift positions so Google Maps would keep rerouting during trips. This didn't always happen, but happened enough to be annoying.

I'm pretty sure I lost a bunch of trip requests because they just never got through to my phone.

This is either because the OS wasn't allowing the notifications to come through correctly, or because of the network performance.

Interestingly I was streaming podcasts the entire time which came through fine for the most part, but they would cut out every once in a while if I ended up in areas with 1bar (which happened often last night).

This is a pretty major problem for me, I don't know if something like Cyanogenmod will fix me not receiving requests, but the cellular and GPS performance are very clearly performing poorly.

Edit:

Cellular performance is now much better after the update.

I would say it's on par with average smartphones (I still lose reception where most people do), and it no longer just drops and stays of signal for no good reason.

GPS performance is OK, it tends to shift around while I'm driving a bit (thinking I'm on the street next to me).
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] M_Stoobs:
Antenna Strength

Has anyone been able to confirm that this is due to a bad physical design of the antenna and not a software issue?

I was ready to buy this device until I saw these reports of bad signal strength
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] joaste:
Hi guys,

Can any European users comment on radio signal performance? Could the issue be limited to the US version? :confused:
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] joaste:
To asnwer my own post, it seems some amazon.de customers are returning the phone due to very poor reception.

I was soooo looking forward to buying this phone and am shocked that ZTE would put it on the market with such a problem. Time will tell if it is hardware related (which it probably is), but most likely my money will go to another brand. I sooo wanted good sound :crying:

EDIT: please, any feedback from European customers?
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] beastarh:
There are some reviews about the cellular strength on a german forum (android-hilfe.de/thema/empfang-des-axon.792336/) but without any comparison to other phones.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] ((RayDar)):
Radio Performance

The Pocket Now review of the Axon 7 mentions potential radio issues and compares it to other phones.

Axon 7 Signal Strength

It doesn't look good.

I wonder if the new "Mini" version of the phone has the same issue and if not, perhaps they corrected a hardware flaw.

There is a new software update for the Axon 7 coming soon. I hope it addresses the signal strength issue, but I wouldn't hold my breath. We may have to just wait for the Axon 8.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] ismailonrails:
when new software coming.

When new Axon 7 update coming? any link for that please
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] DerangedGinger:
Note 3

Cellular: -93 dBm

Wifi 5ghz: - 46 dBm

Axon 7

Cellular: -118 dBm

Wifi 5ghz: -59 dBm

Can't perform an LTE speedtest on the Axon 7. It won't hold a connection long enough. Web pages constantly fail to load.

Signal strength is significantly worse than my 3 year old Note 3. So much so the phone is unusable at home.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] ludovicien:
I commented elsewhere on this as I'm mainly sending the phone back because of the very poor camera and the disappointing audio.

The radio however is the worst I've had since 3G was launched. I've been all over Brussels today and barely seen a 4G signal. I'd forgotten 3G existed until today. I managed to get the Axon to connect to 4G by toggling the mobile data on and off but it quickly went back to 3G.

My bedroom is in the basement but thanks to a nearby base station I get four bars 4G on my Honor 7. The Axon get one-two bars on 3G.

I'm bailing out now. I'm not waiting for a software update to fix the radio and I'm not sure the camera *can* be fixed, it's that bad.

The lovely screen apart, the A7 is a downgrade from the much cheaper Honor. Shame.

Grey Axon 7 purchased from Amazon Germany.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] williamthardy:
LTE: Nexus 5X: -105 dB, Axon 7: -113 dB

Forcing 3G on both phones: Both about -95 dB.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] ludovicien:
European version

Indoors in a café. Both of our phones are on the same network using the same base station. The Nexus 5x shows -106dBm on LTE while the Axon 7 shows -111 dBm on HSPA and is unable to load a page.

A bad camera, broken audio and a weak radio now seem a heavy price to pay for a nice screen and a top of the line chip.... it was too good to be true.
[ZTE Axon 7 Real Life Review] jpde:
When I was walking home from campus today, I had 4G with a maximum of 2 bars missing (one missing most of the time, sometimes full bars) 90% of the 3km trip. Don't have any other LTE phones to compare it to, so take that with a grain of salt.