The Verge reviews the Nokia Lumia 920, scores it 7.9

The Verge have posted their review of the Nokia Lumia 920, and while overall they gave the phone credit for its great camera, screen battery life and software bundle, they marked it down as being heavy (a recurrent complaint) and not having a good enough ecosystem, writing:

Many of the frustrations we used to have in Windows Phone are now gone with this latest version, and Nokia has given the OS a very good stage with the Lumia 920. The speed and multitasking improvements, connections to Xbox and SkyDrive, and Start Screen experience are all much better, but there’s still a critical lack of apps and they too often feel as though they’re not as good as what’s on other platforms.

It’s fitting that I’m reviewing the Nokia Lumia 920 while Microsoft’s Build conference is going on here in Redmond. Microsoft has resolved many of the developer complaints with Windows Phone and is aggressively courting them to bring more and better apps to the platform. The work to bring Windows Phone 8 up to par is happening all around me — and it needs to keep happening. With its new core, Windows Phone 8 is in many ways a completely new platform that should enable rapid innovation — and users will need to continue to wait for it to come into its own.

The Lumia 920’s hardware and design is top-notch, the screen is lovely, and the camera is a marvel in low light — but you can’t ignore just how big and bulky the phone is. The software and hardware tradeoffs inherent in the Lumia 920 could be worth it if you’ve bought into the Microsoft ecosystem, but for most people I don’t think it’s a sure bet.

I think it is ironic that Windows Phone 8 is not getting credit for working well with the world’s biggest ecosystem of them all, Windows PCs, but be that as it may, a 7.9 score is still pretty respectable, and with numerous areas where the phone is a recognized clear leader, I think it is still a very respectable performance.

Read the full review here.