CAT S62 Rugged Cell Phone Unlocked (128GB, 4GB) 5.7″ IP68 Waterproof Android Smartphone, 12MP Dual Camera, All Day Battery, NFC, Fingerprint Unlock, Snapdragon 660 Nano Slot(Black) New

Instructions for sim placement.
Everything was perfect.

Review Update – Originally scored a 1 Star as the phone quit working.
The vendor replaced it for me within 5 days.
Last purchased Feb 15, 2024 – 3 months ago. Woke up to it hooked to charger constantly rebooting itself. Tried 3 different charging cable

This seller doesn’t know what they’re talking about
The phone is a great phone. CAT is a great company. This seller is a part of the flood of garbage that ruins Amazon. The page claims this phone is compatible with AT&T. That’s a bold faced lie. The phone I received is locked to T-Mobile. After visiting an AT&T store, a T-Mobile store, and a cell phone repair store, I have found no reliable way to remove the lock. Do not buy from this seller.

Camera sucks , Spots (Dust) on sensor and is only 12mp not 48mp as described
Listed by seller as water proof rugged with 48MP camera. It is only 12MP and has dust on the sensor or back side of lens. Picture attached shows spots against blue sky. The finger print unlock is a 50/50 shot.
Also wireless charge feature only works on one of multiple charges.

The phone works well and it really is rugged. I’ve had it a few months now and it looks almost like new.
It came brand-new sealed in box, setup was easy, and it works considerably better than my previous Samsung A5. It is a bit bulky but does not require a case for protection – it’s actually less bulky than a slim phone in decent case. The battery life is not great but it will go for a few days with battery saver on. I’ve been recommending this to people who are unhappy with their more expensive phones.

What’s Included:
The phone comes with a USB-C to USB-C charging cable, USB-C wall adapter, a USB-C to USB-A dongle, SIM eject tool & a user manual.
First Impressions/Design:
The face of the phone has a 0.7mm raised lip to protect the screen. It’s actually made of metal to help with the ruggedness/durability. The camera lenses are also recessed slightly from the body by 0.6mm to provide added protection if you lay your phone down flat either face up or face down.
There are 2 contact points on the back cover. I believe these are charging contacts when placed into a dock or some sort.
The sides/edges are all aluminum. It provides a very premium look/feel to the phone. Unfortunately, the aluminum feels smooth/slick in the hands and therefore not very secure when held, but the rounded edges does make it comfortable to hold.
The back cover is made of plastic with a knurled patch on the lower half to provide added grip. I do wish the same material wrapped around the sides so the phone would feel more secure in my hands.
The phone weighs approx. 258g, which is actually not that bad as my Samsung S23FE with case is actually 259g, so it’s not as heavy as expected.
The buttons all feel like metal, which adds to the phone’s premium feel. They have knurling on the power and feature button to provide a different feel vs the smooth volume buttons. It may provide extra grip when pressing, but I think it’s more to differentiate between the buttons.
The position of the volume/power buttons seem to be reversed vs other mobile phones I’ve used/seen. The power button is on top while the volume is on bottom. This is definitely a bit confusing and something I will need to get used to.
All the buttons are very tactile and provides a slight click when pressed so you know when you pressed a button.
The bottom of the phone contains the USB-C charging port as well as the single down firing speaker.
The left of the device houses the cover for the SIM & MicroSD tray and an orange feature button. When I took the phone out of the box, I noticed that the SIM tray cover was open. I just thought it wasn’t closed when shipped but found out quickly that it automatically reopens on its own after 20-30mins. Seems there’s a slight defect with the product as this will affect the water resistance of the phone. The feature button can be setup for different functions depending on how it’s pressed. It can be setup to open specific apps and the system provides a list of options.
Comes with a USB-C wall charger, which is rare to see these days.
Boot-up/Setup:
On first power on, you see a T-Mobile logo. Setup is similar to any other Android phone. Once setup is complete, reboots/power on only takes approx. 30secs to get into the OS, which is significantly faster than current flagship phones.
The screen is clear but does seem a bit dimmer than other rugged phones I have tested even with the brightness at 100%.
The phone came with Android 10, but it did detect and installed Android 11 without issue.
When checking the settings, it indicated that the phone was locked to T-Mobile. When I selected the option to permanently unlock, it unfortunately produces a “Server Error: Error Code 255”. I inserted my active SIM card and still shows as locked. I read some other product reviews, and someone indicated that the phone showed locked but was still able to make calls and access cellular data. I didn’t even try to test, but with the SIM installed, it actually worked properly. I was able to make calls and surf the internet without issues, so it does look like the phone is unlocked even though the phone reports it as locked to T-Mobile.
It was able to achieve an LTE+ connection and running a speed test was able to hit over 30mbps download speeds.
I’m not a fan of the stock Android OS interface as it feels clumsy (to me) vs the custom interface provided by Samsung, including the applications. Customization is a bit limited in some areas (e.g. changing the lock screen wallpaper & home screen wallpaper to match).
Fingerprint Reader:
The fingerprint reader on the back detects my fingerprint very quickly and approx. 98% of the time. There were a few times it did not detect, some because I didn’t contact the full sensor while others just didn’t read it. Overall, detection is good and the screen unlocks quickly.
I find the actual fingerprint sensors better than the on-screen sensors. This is a defined location that is fairly hard to miss while you may miss the on-screen sensor depending on how you hold the phone. They’re also affected by screen protectors. I would probably prefer if the sensor was on the power button as that doesn’t require the phone to be picked up in order to unlock like the sensor on the back of the phone.
Speaker:
The single down firing speaker at the bottom of the phone is surprisingly powerful. It doesn’t contain a lot of bass, but depending on how the phone is positioned, you can get some very loud audio. Holding the phone in portrait (upright) the speaker will blast the audio towards you. Placing the phone flat on the table in portrait or landscape (upright/sideways) will cause the audio to reflect off the table and back up at you making the audio louder. But, if you hold the phone in landscape (sideways) with your hand (not on the speaker side), it won’t reflect the audio back at you and you lose a good 25% of the volume level. And, if you accidently cover the speaker with your finger, you lose a good 75% or more, so be careful not to cover the speaker grille.
Cameras:
The rear of the device shows 2 camera lenses, but the system only reports as 1 camera mode, so I’m not sure what the 2nd lens is for. I went through all the modes and found that only the bottom lens is real & functional. Another bad item is that the lenses are made of plastic. It’s more shatter resistant in a fall, but prone to scratches.
The product specs indicate the main camera is 48MP, but the actual camera’s settings indicate it’s actually 12MP using quad pixel technology. Basically, it uses 4 adjacent pixels to make 1 image pixel called pixel binning, so the image quality is supposed to look better using a lower megapixel camera sensor. The front camera is correctly labelled as 8MP.
Taking pictures with the main camera and I found that it doesn’t handle exposure correctly. When focusing the camera on a brighter light source, the entire image will dim and depending on how bright it is, will dim down to the point the surrounding image is so dark you can only see the bright source. I found later that this is when in room light situations. When outside on a sunny day, it does a better job.
Pictures are surprisingly decent. I compared images with my Samsung S23FE and took a photo of a seat cushion, I found this phone capture clearer/sharper images of the surface of the cushion while the Samsung blurred the surface via its software processing to give it a softer/blurrier look.
Videos on the main camera are not the best only recording at only 1080p @ 2MP. As mentioned above the auto exposure is not great and darkens videos when you don’t want them darkened. You can see a lot of shimmering/noise around surface edges (trees, buildings, cars & people) and pretty much anything that moves.
The front camera is spec’d at 8MP. Selfies are ok but contains a lot of noise throughout the image. It looks to be over sharpened to try to increase the detail levels. Something in a pinch and it’s fine, but I wouldn’t use this for my main camera while on vacation as permanent memories is where you want as much quality and detail as you can get, and this front camera will not provide that level of detail. Again, this mainly depends on how much light there is, the brighter it is the sharper the image.
I did notice that for some reason when recoding videos with the front camera in Portrait orientation, my head/face is squished down so my face is wider than it should be. Details around me seem OK, but there’s no real comparative vs a face. I placed just my hand and the same issue. I tested in Landscape orientation and found everything looked correct, so there’s definitely something wrong with the camera or software that just doesn’t like portrait mode in the front selfie camera. That’s a disappointment as this is probably the orientation most will use when taking a selfie as it’s the easiest position to hold the phone.
Main Camera Photo Details:
– Dimensions: 3000 x 4000
– Mega Pixels: 12MP (Quad Pixel)
– Resolution: 72dpi
– Bit Depth: 24
– File Size: 4.42MB
– File Extension: JPG
Selfie Camera Photo Details:
– Dimensions: 2448 x 3264
– Mega Pixels: 8MP
– Resolution: 96dpi
– Bit Depth: 24
– File Size: 2.36MB
– File Extension: JPG
Main Camera Video Details:
– Dimensions: 1920 x 1080 (or 1080 x 1920 in Portrait Orientation)
– Mega Pixels: 2.1MP
– Video Bit Rate: 9671kbps (may go up/down depending on environment lighting conditions)
– Frame Rate: 30fps
– Audio Bit Rate: 101kbps
– Channels: 2 (Stereo)
– Audio Sample Rate: 48kHz
– File Size: 8.54MB for 7secs of video
– File Type: MP4
Front Selfie Camera Video Details:
– Dimensions: 1920 x 1080 (or 1080 x 1920 in Portrait Orientation)
– Mega Pixels: 2.1MP
– Video Bit Rate: 8962kbps (may go up/down depending on environment lighting conditions)
– Frame Rate: 30fps
– Audio Bit Rate: 94kbps
– Channels: 2 (Stereo)
– Audio Sample Rate: 48kHz
– File Size: 15.5MB for 13secs of video
– File Type: MP4
Performance:
I ran a few benchmark tests to see how it stacked up. I was surprised to see it didn’t perform that well vs other older model phones.
– 3DMark Sling Shot Test: 1863 (a Samsung Galaxy S7 from 2016 had a rating of 2908)
– AnTuTu 3DBench Lite v10.2.1:
o Marooned – OpenGL ES 3.0 (Onscreen=9.54fps, Offscreen=8.81fps)
o Coastline – OpenGL ES 3.0 (Onscreen=9.89fps, Offscreen=8.71fps)
– GeekBench6: CPU-Single Core=318, Multi Core=1239 / GPU=252
– PCMark: Work 3.0 Performance=6178 (Samsung S7 from 2016 had a rating of 5021)
The performance numbers weren’t great as it has trouble outperforming a phone released 2016. Yes, it was a flagship phone at its release, but I would have hoped something released in 2021 would beat something that came out 7 years earlier.
Based on the gaming numbers, the phone is not meant for gaming. Very basic stuff will work, but not more graphics intensive games as it was only able to get just below 10fps.
Using it to view videos on YouTube and surf the internet is perfectly fine. There is some lag when loading additional videos/graphics but is still ok.
Moving around in the phone, swiping screen, taking photos, switching menus all seem fine. There is some lag for the camera to load images from the gallery and open the editor, but again, this is not a flagship phone.
Using my USB-C power meter, I was able to find out that the phone will draw a maximum of approx. 17W while charging. It’s not a fast-charging phone, but still reasonable.
Battery runtime on the phone dropped approx. 10% when performing the benchmark tests. After approx. 4 days, with light usage taking photos, moving around on the phone menus and setting it up, watching YouTube and listening to music, the battery finally dropped down to approx. 14%. All that time the phone was connected to WiFi but had no SIM card. The phone seems to drop almost 6-8% every day while on standby with the screen off and minimal to no use.
Durability Test:
I tested the ruggedness of the phone by performing a couple tests, a water dunk as well as a drop test. This always makes me nervous but it needs to be done.
I was probably more worried about the water dunk test because of the issue with the SIM tray cover popping open on its own after some time. If water was going to get in, this is where it will happen. Luckily, the cover has been staying closed for longer with more use and me pressing down on it every time I use the phone. This is definitely something that needs to be addressed in the factory.
For the water test, I filled a container full of water and dropped the phone in while it was recording a video. I was happy to see that it successfully passed the dunk test. The touch screen worked but did have some recognition issues when I touched the screen while there were water drops moving around on the screen. I needed to wipe off some of the water before it registered my swipes. The speaker was probably the only thing affected by the water as it cut the audio volume way down. Luckily, this was only temporary as once the water was cleared out (or dried up) the output volume returned.
The drop test was next. This is always an iffy one, if the design is lacking then that means the phone will crack/break and that’s it for the phone.
I setup the phone in my kitchen at approx. countertop height (36”) and started the recording on the phone. I held it on the corner to try to get the phone impact the hard tile floor on its edge. The phone drops and it struck the corner and survived. Looking at the phone I could see a ding on the corner/edge. On closer inspection, the dent was at the top edge towards the screen and there was a dent. It moved closer to the glass, but not enough to cause an issue. The phone was still working, and the video was still recording, so it looks like it withstood the abuse.
Pros:
– IP68 & MIL-SPEC 810H Certified for water/dust resistance and drop/impact resistance.
– Gorilla Glass 6 for the screen glass.
– Very nice looking design with an all-aluminum frame.
– Comfortable to hold with the rounded edges.
– Durable, can take a drop from at least countertop height onto hard tile with only a scuff/dent in the frame but the phone was still 100% functional.
– Supports a MicroSD card up to 256GB for added storage.
– Surprisingly comes with a USB-C charging adapter & USB-C to USB-C charging cable. Not only that, it also comes with a small USB-C to USB-A dongle so you can plug your phone into any computer/wall adapter using the USB-A connector. This is definitely a welcomed bonus.
– Not as heavy as expected at only 258g as current flagship phones are slightly lighter but can’t take a hit like this phone.
– Photo quality from its main 12MP camera (not actually 48MP) is actually not bad.
– Audio is fairly loud for a single down firing speaker.
– Decent battery runtime
Cons:
– One major QC fail is with the SIM Tray cover. It’s supposed to keep the device watertight, but unfortunately, there’s a design issue or a problem with the one on my phone as it doesn’t stay inserted into the phone. I noticed this when I opened the box but just thought it was left that way during packing, but after approx. 20mins, the cover pops completely open exposing the innards to water, dust and dirt. QC definitely needs to be improved at the factory to prevent major issues like this.
– The back cover is plastic, which helps its impact resistance, but I found knocking on it, it sounded a bit hallow.
– OS is limited to Android 11 and doesn’t look like it will be getting any more security updates.
– Processor is a few years old, so not the best performer.
– Front selfie camera quality lacking in normal light conditions. Photos are usable but has a lot of noise. Better quality appears when photos taken on a very sunny day.
– No 3.5mm headphone jack that is available on other rugged phones.
– Camera is marketed as a 48MP camera, but it’s actually a 12MP sensor, so a bit misleading.
– Videos taking using the main rear camera only records at 1080p @ 2.1MP, which produces average quality images with a lot of noise.
– Front camera can’t take proper videos in Portrait orientation. The video is compressed so items seem wider than they should be. It does work fine in Landscape orientation, so a problem with the camera or software.
Final Impression:
Overall, the CAT S62 rugged phone worked well. Comfortable to hold, doesn’t look like a rugged phone, but capable of being dunked in water and dropped onto the floor without major damage (slight ding). It’s not a gaming phone or anywhere near a flagship but if you don’t have a flagship phone next to it to compare, the phone does work fairly well opening/switching apps, watching videos and moving around on the phone menus. Photos aren’t the best but is actually ok. Videos on the other hand are a bit sub-par in my opinion. The major flaw for my phone was the issue with the SIM slot cover opening up on its own after some time. This can really affect its waterproof status and damage the phone, so better QC is definitely required.

Nice phone. I like the shape how you can pre program a button.
But won’t recommend to anyone. Poor signal. People can almost never understand when we talk on phone. The phone is slow.
Battery last only one day even when I’m not using it