Everyone wants Filter blue light. Whether through your glasses, laptops, or smartphones, companies want to integrate blue light blockers on the trend to reduce wavelengths reaching your eyes. The claim is helpful to improve sleep and reduce eye fatigue, even though studies have not found these blockers effective.
TCL is such a company. It has been manufacturing phones and tablets with its “NXT Paper” LCD technology for several years, and the third generation in the TCL 60 XE NXT Paper 5G smartphone is 61% higher than the average tablet compared to the third generation of Blu-ray to block 61% of Blu-ray to “protect your eyes and relieve eye fatigue.” I’ve been using this $250 Android phone for over a week, but I don’t think the claim is made, but I’m still here to enjoy the matte paper-like screen. Don’t buy it for Blu-ray’s blockade commitment; the reason is that the matte screen looks and feels good.
Matte screen
Photo: Julian Chokkattu
The main attraction of 60 XE is NXT Paper Matte LCD. It has a pleasant paper texture without reflection. The colors are softer than phones with OLED screens, the text and app icons can be a bit blurry – I only really noticed this when comparing side by side with another phone.
The phone has a similar matte texture on the back, although it has a marble pattern to appreciate the luxurious look and comes with a smooth circular camera module. It looks “fancy,” a friend said, although I found it shaky on the cheesy. I don’t mind the marble pattern, but the camera module is not symmetrical and feels a little inappropriate. Still, it doesn’t look like other $250 smartphones. This is a plus sign.
However, return to the NXT Paper display. The right edge of the phone is an NXT Paper Switch, which is then swiped, allowing you to choose from three display modes: Color Paper Mode, Ink Paper Mode, and Maximum Ink Mode. I’ll understand what these modes do, but I want to point out that the switch feels cheap and has a slight rattling. Switching mode also goes rhythm – some tunes and animations are played every time, and I can’t find a way to disable this feature. (You can at least set it so that you can enter a specific mode when flip the switch, not every time you choose.)
Color Paper Mode keeps the color saturated and soft, almost like a colored ink e-book reader. Ink Paper Mode strips all colors and turns black and white, with a smaller color temperature on the screen. This is still LCD, but in my opinion it’s better than trying an Android phone with E Ink. You get a similar paper reading experience and a matte screen, but unlike the smallest phone or the Boox Palma 2, it’s not frustrating or slow. The 120 Hz screen refresh rate and a decent CPU make it like a regular phone.
When reading, I like to switch to both modes, whether it’s via Chrome, Google News or scrolling via Bluesky. I usually turn it off and use standard modes when refreshing Instagram reels, although if you like a slight look, there is nothing to stop you from watching videos in those modes.
