KONKR Pocket Advance Review: A Superb $89 Starter Android Handheld

The KONKR Pocket Advance is a handheld that AYANEO (its parent company) revealed and teased for a good couple of months, with a quick price reveal of $89 - $129 and an even quicker shipping turnaround time of a few days.

It's a device I have been following closely since its reveal, watching hours of livestreams from AYANEO's CEO Arthur to get a better understanding, and now that's it arrived, I understand Arthurs prolonged hype for this device, because it's one of the best $89 Android handhelds I have ever reviewed, and I believe this could be the ultimate started retro handheld for those wanting to enter the scene with no experience.

• Release Date: Mid-August 2026
• Price: $89 - $129
• Where To Buy: AYANEO's Official Website
• Limited Editions: Pink & Onyx Ice

KONKR Pocket Advance Specifications

• 3.5" LCD display (960×640, 3:2)
• MediaTek Helio G90T CPU
• 3GB or 4GB RAM
• 32 GB or 64 GB Storage
• 4,000MAH Battery
• Active cooling fan
• Android 12
• Wi-Fi 5 and Bluetooth 5.0
• USB-C, microSD card slot, 3.5 mm headphone jack
• Dual speakers and rotor vibration motor
• Gyroscope
• 3.5mm Headphone Jack
• Available in Navy, Coral, and Grey
• 151.3 × 82.4 × 22 mm
• Approx. 224 g

Build Quality & Buttons

It's clear that this is designed to look as close to the original GAME BOY Advance as possible while attempting to cram in as many modern enhancements as possible without navigating away from the nostalgic design of Nintendo's most popular retro handheld. They've designed it well, and in the hand for the first time, it'll feel just like a GBA, taking you back to when you first peeled it out of the cardboard box back in the early 2000s.

It comes in an array of colours, here I have the Grey version, but it also comes in Coral and Navy to represent the GBA's original colours alongside a Pink edition that was announced, but itsn't shipping until the end of September.

The main shell has a textured matte feel to it, so it won't leave any fingerprints on it. There's no metal, no glass, because AYANEO want to make this as cheap as possible to make, and cheaper for customers to buy. This is made to be affordable, which means it misses some of AYANEO's signature premium touches, which I am okay with at this price. The side bumpers are a nice nostalgic nod, and so is the placement of the volume wheel and headphone jack.

Let's take a look at the buttons. The DPAD is of nice quality, doesn't click but instead has a very soft, padded feel to it, requiring little force to press, and offers good playability for those who will press this DPAD quickly, in fighting games, for example. Below that are two small silicone buttons for start and select. On the otherside the action buttons match the feel of the DPAD, light, soft, no clicking, minimal force. I like these, and they somehow add a premium, soft, quiet feel to the device. It's a genuinly a very quiet handheld compared to many in this price range, it almost sounds like a mechanical keyboard, but softer, and more silent.

Below that are two more small silicone buttons, this time a KONKR button, which pulls out the performance sidebar in the Android OS, allowing you to track performance and switch modes on the fly, like a normal AYANEO handheld. Then, below that, a menu button that allows you to switch between Android tabs quickly.

The Display

Between the buttons, you'll find a 3.5" LCD display with a resolution of 960 x 640 and an aspect ratio of 3:2, making it great for upscaling GBA games by 4x. It's the same display as the AYANEO Pocket Air Mini. It's an okay display; it's not going to blow your socks off, but that's to be expected in a $100 device. It's bright enough for outdoor use, crispy enough to make many of your retro games look good at 2x resolution and small enough to feel like a GBA, though you'll soon realise 3.5" can only get you so far when it comes to comfortable gameplay, but I'll talk more about that in a minute. And then it's wrapped in an oversized glass border on purpose to again look like the GBA with Pocket Advance branding. The LCD panel is a little reflective if viewed at different angles, but I think many of us know how to use these things by now... face on.

There's no ghosting that I can see, no light bleed, no dead pixels, great brightness levels, and even the lowest setting is great for playing at night without burning your retinas. It sits very close to the screen so there's no distance between the display and the glass cover. It's a very okay display for a $100 device. I have no issues with this fella.

The Sides & Edges Of The Pocket Advance

Around the edges, starting at the bottom, is a large Micro SD card slot that isn't shy at all, alongside two speaker grills, a USB-C charging port, a 3.5mm headphone jack and a volume wheel. This volume wheel is nice. I do like that it's kept to the original design, but it's very sensitive. So much so that I find my pinky finger will often move it accidentally, altering the volume without my consent.

Around the sides, nothing, just your GBA-styled bumpers, which I like. This makes me hope that AYANEO sell a modkit with a bunch of coloured bumpers and buttons to change, i think it would be fun to customise this slightly, and i think other customers would happily pay $15/$20 to get access to high-quality customisations.

On top, two oversized shoulder buttons which admittedly look completely different to the GAME BOY's; these are bigger, softer, and more comfortable and are a welcome quality of life upgrade that gives the handheld a slightly chubby charm to it. Though when pressed, L1 sounds a little different to R1, and even feels ever so slightly different, likely due to the conductive rubber underneath. When I took it apart, I couldn't see anything different between the two, so it could just be that one sits tighter in the shell than the other, but it is noticeable on my unit, and should have been checked by their quality control team. It annoys me that they missed this, as its very obvious at times.

There are also four more buttons on the shoulders, which do overwhelm the device, and I rarely use them for mapping, but they're there should you want to use them. These are the loudest buttons on here, are clicky, have less travel, and are a little too small to be used comfortably.

Between them is a big red ON/OFF button, which I like, again adding to the chubster vibe of the device, alongside a smaller mappable key that can be used for anything you like. I used this to save states in emulators, and it came in handy more than I thought. On the back, just a few embossed designs, ventilation and a sticker with some very odd pixel art on it. It's very close in both size, weight and thickness to a GBA, and it's somewhat impressive that they crammed it all in this shell size; it really does feel like a GBA.

Operating System & User Experience

I've reviewed so many AYANEO devices in my years, and the user experience is always the same, with minor refinements to their custom frontend as the years go on, but like many Android handhelds of this size, it's easy to use, and automatically reccomends emulators for you out of the box so you can simply press download and all of the required apps are ready to go, again making this a really good device for newcomers to the Android emulation scene.

A swipe down from the top gives you access to some Android settings, and the KONKR button lets you alter performance and fan modes. Though in some emulators like PS2, the sidebar wouldn't show itself when pressing the KONKR button, so you may need to tinker with button mappings on a deeper level when you come across a small bug like this. Though, as you'll see later in this review, you'll never play PS2 games on here.

Adding a custom frontend to this, like Socket, for example, turns this into a completely different device. AYANEO's frontend is okay, it's very modern, offers customisations and good library organisation, but a fun, chubby device like this needs something a bit more playful, so I found Socket went really well with this, and adds to the GBA charm. Many of you asked about this frontend in my Retroid Pocket Nova; it's in Alpha development and is behind a Patreon paywall, but it's a very promising upcoming frontend that takes your library less seriously with a focus on cartridge and box art.

A device like this could have easily used a Linux OS, and it would have likely been just as good, but the move to Android offers an added level of customisations that allows you to make the handheld more... yours. A display this small does make typing and web-browsing a little bit cumbersome, but my advice is to take a day to set it up, then set your frontend launcher as the default app to open it to and never use another Android application again.

Emulation Performance

Remember, that this is a $89 handheld (as of writing this review), it will retail for $109, this is a budget device, yet it's been packed with a good ammount of power in comparison to its competition in this category. Though, in typical AYANEO fashion, all of this power will rarely be used by the average gamer because it lacks an analogue stick, and the 3.5" display will make some consoles look far too cramped to enjoy.

I get a lot of push back by the community on this, but I'm standing firm. Ain't nobody buying this for Gamecube and PS2 emulation, unless you're really desperate to play those types of consoles on a form-factor like this. I tried some PS2 games, and it's just too much for this CPU. Yes, some very low-end PS2 games might be possible, but it's not enjoyable at all, games such as God Of War are a no-go even at Max settings using Vulkan. The same goes for Gamecube; you can map the D-PAD to trigger the analogue stick commands to get you to a point of some form of playability, but it's not enjoyable, even if frame rates are okay. You'll find some games that you may enjoy, but see this as an added, uncomfortable bonus.

This, for me, is a device to be used with consoles such as PlayStation 1, GAME BOY Advance, SEGA Game Gear, SEGA Mega Drive and more, the ones not needing an analogue stick, pretty much. That's as far as you want to go with this, and it can emulate those incredibly well at upscaled resolutions in a really nostalgic form factor, on a 3:2 display.

I also really enjoyed exploring Pokemon ROM hacks on here, too, which was very easy to do thanks to the Android OS, which has access to Google Drive and the internet for patching your ROM files. The LCD display, although not remarkable, works well, is very bright, fits many console resolutions naturally, and has touch screen capabilities for easy access to settings, making it an all-around pleasant experience for an array of emulations.

Some Android games do work, but you know me, I only dabble in Android gaming on devices with 5" screens or bigger, though again, it's possible and will handle a large ammount of Android games if you're happy to do so on a 3.5" display. The fans get loud, and the device gets warm if you're really pushing it to the max, but again, pretty normal stuff.

Battery Life

Battery life will vary here, and I say that every time, the 4000MAH will get you between 4 - 10 hours. Averaging around 6 for me, who sprinkles in an array of consoles and apps, which I think is fair for a device of this size. Charging isn't the fastest, coming in at 45 minutes to charge to around 80%, fast enough for me personally.

Comparing It To The RG34XX, & Pocket Air Mini

Many have asked on socials about how it compares to the $60 RG34XX, ANBERNIC's very own GBA-inspired device, and both are very similar, but the KONKR Pocket Advance exceeds in many ways such as screen resolution, sheer power, build quality, it runs on Android instead of Linux and it even has a bigger battery, though it is more expensive, so it all comes down to your budget.

Those of you who wish this device had an anlogue stick, AYANEO built the Pocket Air Mini for you, starting at $129, so for just $20 more, you can get the same power, a bigger, better display, added ergonomics and two joysticks, it's an incredible device, and one i highly reccomend, but admittedly it doesn't look or feel like a GAME BOY Advance at all and is a little thicker/heavier.

Overall Opinion

Overall, I really like this device. I think many will much prefer the AYANEO Pocket Air Mini, but for those wanting a device that looks like the GAME BOY Advance, this is the best on the market as of now, and the price tag is incredibly competitive, especially in a time where RAM pricing is ridiculous and wait times for other handhelds are trickling into the months. This is under $100 at the moment, ships quickly and is ready to handle lower-end retro emulation incredibly well while pairing with fun frontends naturally.

It's a device that doesn't want to be taken seriously; it's fun, playful, nostalgic, it wants to come with you everywhere, and because it's not made of metal and it hasn't damaged the bank account enough for my partner to notice I don't mine being a little bit adventurous with it, because dropping it, scuffing it and giving it a few dents won't make me cry in pain.

AYANEO took a risk here, and as of now, it has sold over 15,000 units worldwide already. The risk paid off, and I think this is going to become a very popular starter handheld for those that want to explore this incredible emulation niche without it costing an arm and a leg, while offering great build quality, good performance, a nice display and a nostalgic design. Yes, there are the imbalanced shoulder buttons, the fragile volume wheel and clustered, but those are minor flaws I can look past on a $100 device. Big respect to AYANEO for taking the risk here; it's a truly fun handheld to use, even if it's not going to power everything I want.