I'm writing this review in September of 2017. Keep this in mind, as price and time are imperative to determine the value of any electronics purchase. At this moment. this device is selling for just under $200. It has a mid-range processor, but similar specs to other flagship phones from late 2016 and early 2017. Most mid-range phones at the moment won't have nearly as many of the features as you'll find here. Let's run through just some of them. Screen - The screen on this phone is a full HD (1920 x 1080) 5.2" AMOLED screen with Gorilla Glass 4. Many phones in this price range will have less resolution, smaller screens or an older version of Gorilla Glass. This screen is very nice, and matches that of many 2016 flagships. It's not 4K, but I doubt you'd need or expect that if you're looking at mid-range phones. Let's keep in mind that 4K resolution requires more processing power, which requires more battery power, so the improved resolution will generally kill the battery. In my opinion, 4K is rally unnecessary for smaller screens (anything handheld) since the pixels are so small anyhow. 1080 is a good standard. It will allow you to watch any HD movie without weird scaling issues, and can handle just about any app or web page made for a modern device. RAM/ROM - This phone has a built in 32 GB ROM and 3 GB of RAM. It wasn't long ago that iPhones came with just 16 GB of ROM and no expansion. This phone will allow for expansion of the 32 GB with an addition 128 GB is needed. I've found 32 GB to be a sweet spot, as I can install all of my apps on the base phone and use an SD Card for my phones and other media. This way, I can transfer these files easily when moving to another device or if I want to put them on a PC. A lot of sub-$200 phones have either 8 or 16 GB of ROM space, and this hinders your ability to run lots of apps. The 3 GB of RAM is also very nice. It allows the more resource-intensive apps to run smoothly without constantly having to swap memory to the ROM. Yes, 4, 6 or 8 would be fantastic, but on a mid-range phone, 2-3 seems to be standard right now, and this is the high-end of standard. Processor - OK, the Snapdragon 617 isn't anything to write home about, but it runs efficiently and doesn't overheat. I'm coming from a phone that had the beleaguered 810, which was prone to heat issues. Though this processor is slower, it actually handles itself quite well since it remains cool. Heat is the killer of performance and battery life, and I believe the 810 was the main reason my last phone failed. I have been using the HTC One M9 since December 2015. It was a decent flagship, but nothing stellar. This phone does 90% of what the HTC did. Sure, the M9 started up more quickly and had an infrared sensor (the Axon does not), and could handle 802.11 AC (the Axon 7 Mini goes up to 802.11 N) but that's basically all the flagship offered on the hardware front that this phone doesn't. WiFi/Bluetooth/NFC - As I just stated, this phone doesn't support 802.11 AC, but it manages to connect to my dual-band network without issue. The bluetooth connection in my car was a little different than other phones. After pairing to the car, I had to have the radio set to bluetooth audio mode before the phone would check that box, but it did work once I did that. No biggie, really, just a different approach than my 2 HTC phones or my Windows phone. The addition of NFC is nice. Many mid-range phones don't have NFC. What does that mean? Well, if I want, I can use Android Pay. That may not be a big deal for many people, but it's a nice feature usually relegated to flagships only. Operating System - The phone comes with Marshmallow installed, but updated to Nougat (7.1.1) as soon as I got home and checked for updates over WiFi. Oreo is just now becoming available for Google phones, so I have to give nod to ZTE for keeping this phone up to date with the latest Android patches. The ZTE enhancements are extremely limited, so the OS feels pretty much like out of the box AOSP. If you like that experience, you'll be fine with this. If you want, you can always add another launcher and get whatever look and feel you like. That's always been a hallmark of Android phones, and this is no exception. One last point on the OS that I noticed and was very happy with is the lack of bloatware. I only had to uninstall one app (Dropbox because I use Google Drive). I like this much better than having a bunch of vendor trash that offers no value to me. I do miss some of the "nice to haves" that HTC put into SenseUI, but I can live without them. HTC really does make a very nice Android experience, but it only runs on HTC devices and comes with the cost of those devices. Even their mid-range phones are twice the cost of this one and their flagships start around $600-700. Audio - As you've probably read from others, the audio for Axon devices is exceptional. The phones are load, and the Dolby features work through the device, headphones, and bluetooth. Even though my HTC devices had Boomsound, it wasn't supported through bluetooth. That means this phone sounds better through my car stereo than the more expensive phones did. Extras - I've read from some that the finger print scanner for this phone was problematic. That must have been a software issue that's been addressed by ZTE. The fingerprint scanner works very well for me and makes for a nice bonus feature that you'll rarely find on phones in this price point. Another little bonus is the warranty. This phone has a 2 year warranty! That's right. I thought the 1 year "Uh Oh" warranty from HTC was good, but 2 years is exceptional. Most phones give you 90-180 days. That shows me that ZTE stands behind their products. Even if there is a flaw, they're willing to fix it. So, to sum this all up, you get a ton of flagship features in a really nice phone for $200. I imagine in a few months, a newer version will come out, and if this phone were still priced at $300, I would have passed and said the best bet would be to either pay another $100 and get the full Axon 7, or save a few dollars and go the Moto G5 route. But, at $200, you just won't beat this phone for the rest of 2017. I was in a position where my phone died. I needed a replacement but wasn't ready to shell out $400-700. Especially at a point where the newer version of Android has just been announced. I'll want to wait a few month and see who will support Oreo and what features I can get for my money. That may lead me to another ZTE, back to HTC or Motorola or even the more well-known manufacturers like Samsung, LG, or even Nokia. But for the moment, this is a gem that you just can't beat. I highly recommend this phone.