Lava Agni 4 review: Premium vibes at a low premium price

What if we tell you that the Lava Agni 4 is probably one of the hottest smartphones to be launched in India recently? Well, you better believe it. With a single move, Lava – a homegrown brand – has proved to the world that it is possible to make a phone with high-end features and no bloatware and yet, be priced low enough that many people can afford it even in 2025. Lava did the impossible completely. We are not kidding.

Agni 4 is a big step forward for Lava. The company has taken its biggest leap so far after three fire appliances. The Lava Agni 4 tops all the charts when you look at the spec sheet: it has an aluminum frame, a good processor, an AMOLED display, and the fastest storage and RAM options available at its price point. But as nice as the details are, they don’t always tell the whole story. It uses all the specifications that matter. We spent some time with it here at India Today Tech and here’s what we think about it.

lava fire 4 design

The Agni 4 comes in white and black color options. The latter – which we have for review now – is more prone to staining. But it looks good. Well, so is the white version.

The design is dominated by the capsule-shaped camera module. While this Nothing Phone is more understated than something like the 3A Lite, it stands out with the Agni branding.

During my usage, I did not use a case on the Lava Fire 4. And when you don’t use the case, you feel the difference between the metal frame compared to the plastic one. Aluminum carries a higher premium. The form factor of the Agni 4 also isn’t too wide, making it easier to use alone. Initially the device seems heavy, but after a few days I got used to it.

The device is made from materials we typically associate with flagships. On the same lines, the Fire 4 doesn’t come with a headphone jack or a slot for expandable storage via microSD, another ‘premium’ touch.

Lava Agni 4 Display and Sound

The Lava Agni 4 features a 6.67-inch 1.5K AMOLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate. During my time spent with the device I found the display to be quite vivid. Color accuracy is quite good, and the screen is fluid thanks to the high refresh rate.

The maximum brightness of the Agni 4 is 2,400 nits. This is sufficient even in open daylight. But the screen isn’t very bright compared to rivals at this price.

Lava Agni 4 comes with stereo speaker setup. The speakers are loud and provide a good listening experience. I enjoyed streaming movies and watching videos without using earphones.

lava fire 4 performance

This is arguably the most important factor when it comes to the Fire 4 when you look at its specifications, as I mentioned earlier. While using the Fire 4, I encountered minimal issues in everyday use. The phone can switch between apps easily and feels fast. (Full disclosure: The unit we received for review initially had some overheating and early battery drain issues, which later turned out to be QC related. Lava replaced it immediately and the new unit works fine.)

I played Call of Duty Mobile and BGMI on the device. COD Mobile runs smoothly on very high graphics and max framerate i.e. 60fps. Or you can reduce the graphics to run at Ultra framerate, which will give you 90fps. The gameplay is good, the screen is responsive, and for the most part you don’t feel jittery.

Notably, the device barely generates heat while playing, and our review unit remained cool even after a half-hour gaming session. The Lava Agni 4 uses a 4,300 sq mm vapor cooling chamber. So, for the price, the phone can be a capable gaming machine.

On Geekbench, Agni 4 has a single-core score of 1,390 points and multi-core score of 4,269 points. This dimension is comparable to the 8350 chipset and is quite good at this price.

Now, the UFS 4.0 and LPDDR5X RAM gets your attention when you run benchmarks or download large files. The Fire 4 was quite fast in completing the benchmarks, especially when we consider its price.

lava fire 4 cameras

Now, let’s come to the camera. The Lava Agni 4 gets a 50-megapixel main sensor with optical image stabilization (OIS) and an 8-megapixel ultrawide – no unnecessary macro lens here.

During my usage, the main sensor was okay, but nothing special. During the day, I found that images were sometimes oversaturated, and the color of the sky appeared brighter than it actually was. The camera takes 50-megapixel photos by default without any pixel binning.

Apart from oversaturation, most of the photos came out good, but you can get better cameras at this price. Portrait mode isn’t the best either, especially with edge detection. Night mode does its job and gives you good shots, but you are disappointed when it comes to the Agni 4’s camera.

The 8-megapixel ultrawide is fine, but you’ll see pixels if you try to zoom in on an image taken by this sensor. There’s also some noticeable lag when you switch from main to ultrawide and vice versa.

The front camera of Lava Agni 4 is also a 50-megapixel sensor. Pictures come out quite sharp when there is good lighting. Edge detection is good when it comes to selfies in daylight. However the images are not consistent. At night, images are again hit or miss, and you lose detail.

For video, you can record up to 4K at 60fps with the main camera. In this phone you get 2K video recording support. With OIS, video recording is quite stable, and you won’t notice shakes. Electronic Image Stabilization (EIS) support is also available in it. The ultrawide is capped at 1080p, while the selfie camera can also record in 4K at 60fps.

lava agni 4 battery

The Agni 4 has a 5,000mAh battery. It’s not the biggest battery pack ever, but the device has a good capacity. For me, the phone will usually last a whole day with about 6 hours of screen-on time. This included social media, web browsing and a lot of video streaming.

Even while gaming, the Lava Agni 4 didn’t run out of juice quickly. So, for most users, the Fire 4 can easily last a day. But we expect more at this price.

On PC Mark, the Fire 4 refused to even reach 8 hours in the battery test for some strange reason. However, as I mentioned, real world usage is fine.

Lava gives you a 66W fast charger in the box with the Fire 4. The charger is fast, and you can charge it quickly on the go. Typically, the device will be fully charged in an hour.

Lava Fire 4 UI and Air AI

The Lava Fire 4 comes with Android 15 out of the box. Lava promises 3 years of OS updates and 4 years of security patches. Although Android 16 would have been better.

The Agni 4 has a clean UI without bloatware. Apart from Google, Lava is the only major player left in the smartphone market that does not preinstall bloatware apps at the moment. But that’s the only real standout feature of the Fire 4’s UI.

The interface is stock Android, and it comes with a few features, like call recording and app cloning without announcement. But it looks a bit basic compared to other Android skins.

However, the Fire 4 does have an action key that you can customize, like opening an app or taking a screenshot. I found it especially useful as a camera button when taking photos. But you’ll need to use it regularly first, otherwise you may forget it’s there. The button is placed near the bottom of the phone, ensuring you don’t accidentally click it.

You also get Air AI, Lava’s own AI app. The Vayu AI Dog widget is placed on the homescreen upon startup and looks adorable. You can ask AI to open apps, search the web, etc., things we do with personal assistants. But it cannot do in-depth research, such as doing SIP calculations. Considering that Gemini has already talked to you on the phone, you’ll probably stick with it.

But where Vayu AI comes in handy is its AI personalities – like a math teacher, an English teacher and a horoscope. If you need help, these personalities seem to make you more comfortable. But I found it a little strange that the math teachers were almost role-playing with me when I asked for basic help – with messages like “smiling at you” or suggesting user prompts that included things like “gather the courage.” Like, okay, I know it’s probably for kids, but the app also has male and female “companions” in the same menu.

Lava Fire 4 Verdict: Should you buy it?

The sole 8GB/256GB variant of the Lava Agni 4 is priced at Rs 24,999. You get a lot for the price – a premium build, a powerful chipset, a good display and fast charging. But you make compromises with the camera, and the user interface lets you down if you prefer more customization.

If you’re a power user who wants good performance on a budget, the Lava Fire 4 is a good choice – the Dimensity 8350 SoC, 4,300 sq mm vapor cooling chamber, fast RAM and storage, all do wonders for performance, at least for this price. But if you want a good set of cameras or more customization options in the UI, you may want to look elsewhere.