You’ve probably never heard of Kazam Mobile before, I hadn’t until they showed at the office and left one of their shiny new Tornado 348 mobiles with us to test. Now I know you’re probably thinking that it’s a brand new telecoms company to the market, they’re untrustworthy, their phones will never compare to Samsung and Apple, but let me tell you, you’re wrong. Just as I was.

On first impression the box it came in was extremely slim compared to other manufacturers on the market. That’s because the message behind the Tornado 348 is slimmer is better. The Kazam phone comes in at just 5.1mm thick, which trumps all over Samsung’s S6 (6.8mm) and Apple’s iPhone 6S (6.9mm). The dimensions are  139.8 x 67.5 x 5.15mm and weighs only 95.5 grams.

It’s coated front to back with Gorilla Glass 3 which makes it extremely tough. There is a lovely aesthetic when looking at the phone. It gives it a styling that is similar to Sony’s Xperia range.

There is no deny that style is what Kazam are aiming for with their new flagship phone. It’s as if the iPhone and the Sony Z came together and had a baby. It’s definitely taken some inspiration from these two mobiles which isn’t really a bad thing. Sure the specs aren’t great, there are much faster phones out there on the market, but Kazam isn’t really aiming for that, which also keeps costs down too.

You’re able to find a Kazam Tornado 348 on the market for around £249 which I think is a very fair price in the current mobile phone market. inside you will find a half decent 1.7 GHz octa-core processor with an ARM Mail 450-MP4 graphics chip, 1GB of RAM memory and 16GB of internal storage. It was more than enough to keep up with my daily routine apps such as social networking, but I noticed a bit of a downfall when playing newer Android games. Don’t worry, Clash of Clans ran fine.

One downfall I will mention now is that it doesn’t have any room for expandable memory. There is no microSD card slot, which could have made a huge difference. With file sizes and apps getting bigger all the time, people who spend their life on their mobile phone will find this is very limiting. Music also tends to fill a device very quickly, and with music libraries as big as mine for example, 16GB is definitely not enough. We’ve had no conformation on if Kazam will be releasing bigger storage options later on.

A great feature to the mobile is its 720p Amoled display. It shows colours very accurately when watching media and also for displaying photos. It comes in at 4.7 inches, which is a tad smaller than the iPhone. Having this size makes it extremely comfortable to hold. I could easily stretch my thumb across to the other side of the screen, something that becomes difficult with the likes of a bigger display.

What’s nice about the Kazam Tornado 348 is it’s completely clean, no bloatware Android KitKat operating system. It feels great knowing that there is no chance of a provider’s or even manufacturer’s own software getting in the way of processes you carry out on your mobile. Full customisation to the way your home and menu screens look is still there which I adored. There is minimal processes running when you first turn on the phone meaning it runs faster, and it also saves space on your limited storage capacity.

Another sacrifice due to the thin design is battery life. The phone houses a  2050mAh battery which if you limit your usage you’d easily get just about 24 hours use out of the device. Anything demanding like gaming or watching videos and you will see your battery drain very quickly. This is due to the Amoled screen that Kazam has decided to go with.

One of the most important features to people now a days with mobiles is the camera, and don’t worry, you’ll be able to get some pretty decent Instagram shots with this. There are 8 mega-pixels on offer to you on the rear camera, and 5 mega-pixels for all of your selfies. There is also some expected camera features available such as a smile shutter and a panoramic picture mode.

There are some superb features stuck to the Kazam Tornado 348 like that name for example. Such a cool sounding name. But seriously now, the phone has a beautiful design to hold and to look at, and the screen is definitely its best feature by far, followed by the empty Android KitKat software. However, the design has unfortunately flawed some of the more, in my opinion, crucial parts of a mobile such as the limited storage space and the battery life.

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Other than that, I hope that Kazam sticks around for a while. It was a delight using the phone and for £249, I think that if you’re looking for an upgrade and don’t want some crazy powerhouse mobile, then this is definitely an option you should consider.

You can find out more information and where you can purchase the mobile directly from the Kazam website.