The VANKYO Leisure 470 is a portable entry-level projector with a 720p native resolution. You can use it to mirror videos from your phone, play media from a USB flash drive or SD card, or plug in various devices via HDMI, VGA, and a 3.5mm AV input. It can project images from 30 to 110 inches and has a built-in 3W speaker.
Our Verdict
The VANKYO Leisure 470 is poor for watching movies in a dark room. It has terrible color accuracy that you can't fix with calibration and has limited coverage of the Rec. 709 color space used with SDR content, so colors aren't properly displayed. There's noticeable vignetting in the corner of the screen, and it's so dim that you can't use it in a room with any ambient light. Fortunately, it has very good contrast, so blacks are deep in darker scenes.
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Decent portability due to its size and weight.
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Very good contrast for deep blacks during dark scenes.
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Not useable in a room with lights due to its awful peak brightness.
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Poor brightness uniformity with noticeable vignetting.
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Inadequate coverage of the Rec. 709 color space used in SDR content and terrible color accuracy.
- 4.5 Movies
- Updated Jul 31, 2024: We've converted this review to Test Bench 0.9. We've overhauled our Contrast tests, as we now measure contrast at various average pixel levels (APL). You can see the full changelog here.
- Updated May 23, 2024: Mentioned the newly-reviewed WiMiUS P63 in the Brightness section of this review.
- Updated Feb 23, 2024: Review published.
- Updated Feb 21, 2024: Early access published.
Differences Between Sizes And Variants
We bought and tested the VANKYO Leisure 470 projector. VANKYO has a wide selection of projectors available, including an upgraded version of this one known as the VANKYO Leisure 470 Pro that has a native 1080p resolution, is smaller and lighter, can project a larger image, and is brighter.
Compared To Other Projectors
The VANKYO Leisure 470 is a bad projector, and we don't recommend buying it. Despite having very good contrast, it's so dim that it's unusable in a room with any lighting, and the colors are dull and severely inaccurate. There is also the cheaper Vankyo Leisure 3, but that model is even dimmer and has a much worse contrast. If you need something much brighter with better overall colors and are willing to spend a bit more, the Epson EpiqVision Flex CO-W01 has great value for the price, although it is bulkier and heavier. If portability is your main concern and you don't care too much about picture quality, the KODAK LUMA 150 is much smaller and is powered by an internal battery.
Check out our recommendations for the best cheap projectors and the best projectors under $500. If you'd prefer to shop for more expensive products with better image quality, look up the best 4k projectors instead.
The VANKYO Leisure 470 is better than the VANKYO Leisure 3. Both projectors don't get bright enough for use in a room with any lighting and have dull and inaccurate colors, but the Leisure 470 has deeper blacks thanks to its much better contrast, so it looks better in a dark room. The Leisure 470 is also more versatile since it has two HDMI ports, whereas the Leisure 3 only has one.
The Epson EpiqVision Flex CO-W01 is better than the VANKYO Leisure 470 in most ways. The Epson gets significantly brighter than the VANKYO, so colors pop more, and you can use it in a room with some lights on. Colors look better on the Epson thanks to its better color gamut and color accuracy, and you have calibration options to improve accuracy even further. However, the VANKYO is smaller and lighter and comes with a carrying case, so it's a bit easier to bring around with you, and it has better contrast for deeper blacks during dark scenes.
The WiMiUS P63 is better than the VANKYO Leisure 470. The VANKYO is even less accurate than the already terribly inaccurate WiMiUS, and it doesn't have an integrated smart OS, while the WiMiUS comes with Android TV built-in. They're both dim projectors, but the WiMiUS is slightly brighter than the VANKYO. They're equally portable; the VANKYO is smaller than the WiMiUS. However, the latter compensates with auto vertical keystone correction and a nifty digital focus, making adjusting the projector from a distance easier.
The VANKYO Leisure 470 and the KODAK LUMA 150 are similar projectors. Both are very dim and have dull and inaccurate colors, but there are some differences. The Kodak is the better choice if you're after portability since it is a lot smaller, lighter, and is powered by an internal battery. On the other hand, the VANKYO has deeper blacks, thanks to its higher contrast ratio, so it looks better in a dark room. The VANKYO also has a higher native resolution, so its image is sharper than the Kodak.
Test Results
The projector has decent portability. It's lightweight, compact, and comes with a carrying case, which makes it easy to carry around, but since it lacks an internal battery, you need to plug it in. It has no automatic keystone adjustment, so you must manually adjust the screen geometry every time you move it. It also doesn't have auto-focus, so you have to manually focus the image. It has an adjustable front foot that you can use to help raise or lower the projector. It also has a built-in 3W speaker, but it's not very loud.
The VANKYO Leisure 470 has a native 720p resolution but can display images with a resolution of up to 1080p. It uses an LCD panel with an LED backlight, so you will likely never need to replace it.
Unfortunately, the VANKYO Leisure 470 projector has awful brightness and poor uniformity. There is noticeable vignetting, with the sides being much dimmer than the center. It's not nearly bright enough to be used in a room with ambient light, so it's only really suited for a dark room. If you're looking for a similar yet slightly brighter projector, look up the WiMiUS P63 instead.
The projector has a very good native contrast ratio. Blacks are deep in darker scenes, but that's mostly due to the projector being so dim.
Unfortunately, this projector has terrible accuracy out of the box. Blues and greens are significantly overrepresented in whites, and reds are significantly underrepresented in bright whites. Gamma is completely off the mark, so all scenes are severely over-brightened. Colors are also so inaccurate that purples and cyans are blue, many reds are purple, and some yellows are green. The color temperature is no better, with the entire image being drastically cooler than the 6,500K target.
The accuracy is still terrible after calibration since the projector has very limited calibration features. The color temperature is a little closer to the target, but it's still very off. White balance is still terrible, with blues and greens massively overrepresented in whites, and reds underrepresented in bright whites. Gamma is the same, so the entire image is still significantly over-brightened. Color accuracy didn't change much; purples are blue, some reds are purple, and some yellows are green.
The color gamut of the projector is inadequate. It doesn't even cover close to the full range of colors in SDR content, and colors are displayed incorrectly, so whites and purples are blue, and blues are misrepresented completely. Its coverage of the wider Rec. 2020 color space is very limited and is also significantly inaccurate across the board.
- Power cable
- Remote
- Carrying case
- HDMI cable
- Composite adapter
- Cleaning kit
- Documentation
The projector doesn't have a built-in smart interface, so you must connect an external streaming device if you want to use it for streaming shows and movies. Fortunately, its built-in Wi-Fi lets you view content from your phone via screen mirroring.
