Bigger than an iPad Pro, cheaper than most – Teclast T70 tablet review

Only few tablets come with screens bigger than 14 inches in size and for a price of below $400, the Teclast T70 barely faces any competition. Naturally, you'll have to make do with average performance and the occasional system stutter as a result of its low price.

Nevertheless, you shouldn't ignore the fact that the Teclast T70 suffers from some problems: Its touchscreen sometimes only responds after multiple taps and trying to stream at over 1,080p leads to a stuttery mess.

You also shouldn't get your hopes up with regards to software updates, and the tablet's WLAN internet connection isn't the fastest.

Its runtimes are fit for everyday use and its location services are precise enough, so you can use the tablet as a navigation device.

You should take some time to think about whether the Teclast T70's cheap price is worth all these limitations, or whether you should instead go for an older model from a different manufacturer for a few dollars more.

That being said, if you are desperately looking for one of the cheapest tablets to have a huge display, then you'll get a solid device nonetheless.

You can order the Teclast T70 from online retailers such as AliExpress, where it currently costs $318.82.

Teclast has gone for a metal case that doesn't feature any unsightly plastic strips to ensure better reception—instead, these are imprinted into the tablet's sides. The only available colorway is blue. Its camera module is set off by glass, which concentrically refracts light rays.

The tablet's case is well made: Material transitions and gaps are hardly noticeable.

Despite its size, the device is stable and only occasionally emits quiet creaking noises when twisted. However, weighing in at 960 grams, it is relatively heavy. It features no designated water or dust protection.

Even if the Teclast tablet is advertised as having 20 GB RAM: Only 8 GB are physically installed, the rest is supposed to be solved via a swap file, but we don't find this to be a sensible solution due to the much slower data storage. 256 GB of mass storage is at class level, other storage variants are not offered.

The Teclast T70 is equipped with Bluetooth 5.2 and also features a 3.5 mm audio jack. The tablet doesn't have an NFC chip.

The device's storage can be expanded via a microSD card and the reader proved to be quite fast during our test alongside our Angelbird V60 reference card: it could even keep up with card readers in significantly more expensive tablets.

The manufacturer has equipped its tablet with Android 14 from 2023. You shouldn't expect many updates: At the time of testing, the latest security patches were from August 2024, so hopelessly outdated.

It is nice that Teclast hasn't installed any third-party software ex works.

Unfortunately, we have hardly anything positive to report in terms of the tablet's sustainability: Plastic film is still used in its packaging and there is just as little information on its CO₂ footprint as there is on the materials the manufacturer has used.

The Teclast T70's communication features, which include Wi-Fi 5, LTE and satellite location services, are quite comprehensive for such an inexpensive tablet. However, the first cracks in the picture appeared in the Wi-Fi data rates we measured using our reference router, the Asus ROG Rapture AXE11000: Here, the Teclast tablet only managed just over 100 MBit/s in some cases. This is enough for surfing the web, but since there were occasional drops to just over 50 MBit/s, this will become noticeable during everyday use.

You can use the cellular network to access the internet, and there are even two SIM slots available to do so. However, its frequency support is limited, so accessing the LTE network may be restricted when traveling abroad.

On the other hand, the accuracy of its GPS positioning was quite good in our practical test: On our cycling trip, the Teclast T70 deviated only slightly from our actual route and once apparently showed us as driving through a house. That being said, if you don't require absolute accuracy, then the tablet can be used for navigation purposes.

You can use the Teclast T70 for telephone calls.

This can be done via the two microphones and the speakers, or via a headset. Its call quality using the internal sound system is good and we clearly understood the other party during our test. When we spoke, we had to make sure not to be too quiet, otherwise we couldn't be heard on the other end of the line.

The packaging contains a charger and a USB cable, as well as a SIM pin.

The Teclast tablet is covered by a standard 12-month warranty.

The Teclast T70's screen operates at a maximum of 60 Hz, so it isn't quite as responsive as others. Nevertheless, it's usually fine to operate. But if a lot of power is demanded of the tablet, inputs are sometimes no longer implemented, for example, the brightness control for the screen no longer works correctly.

There is no fingerprint sensor, but the tablet can be unlocked via facial recognition. However, as this is only done via the front-facing camera without a supporting sensor, it isn't quite as secure and isn't permitted by Android for some applications, such as unlocking online banking apps.

Teclast has installed the MediaTek Helio G99, a popular mid-range SoC, into its tablet. Unfortunately, it's already three years old and barely stands a chance compared to the performance of more expensive tablets. During everyday use, you'll have to make do with some occasional stutters, especially during more intensive tasks.

Video qualities above 1080p lead to heavy stuttering when streaming on YouTube. This is a shame, as it means you can hardly use the tablet's large screen for particularly sharp video material.

You can only expect 60 Hz gaming for graphically very simple games, as its GPU power is usually only sufficient for a maximum of 40fps.

When surfing the web, you'll often have to live with slow page loading on larger websites, even if your internet connection is good.

The device is equipped with UFS 2.1 flash storage. This is significantly slower than higher-priced large tablets, but still fast enough for reasonably quick data transfers during everyday use.

The device's SoC can be cooled reliably thanks to its large surface area—we noted a maximum temperature of 35.1 °C during our test. The stress tests revealed that its performance is only throttled to a very small extent.

The Teclast tablet comes with four speakers that produce a decent sound. They can get quite loud and even reproduce some bass frequencies. Nevertheless, music sounds somewhat distant and not as full as on higher-quality sound systems.

It's a shame that only the most basic codecs are available for audio output via Bluetooth.

The tablet's power consumption is low, especially under high load.

It can be charged at a maximum of 18 watts, which means it takes up to 4 hours to fully charge the device.

Although the tablet's 10,000 mAh battery isn't that powerful compared to similar tablets, it still ensures good runtimes: we measured 15:43 hours in the WLAN test, so you can easily surf the web for a whole day without having to plug it back in. You can even watch movies from its internal storage for over 17 hours, which is enough to watch almost 3 seasons of Breaking Bad, for example.