I received the Nitecore Tini from Nitecore for the review.
The Tini is a new EDC keychain sized flashlight, with a TIR optic and a XP-G2 emitter powered by a integrated li-ion battery, rechargeable via micro USB.
Being a review sample, the Tini was provided without any packaging.
I don’t usually start reviews with size comparison pics, but in this case I am making an exception to show how compact the Tini is, with a normal sized lighter
and with the well known Nitecore TIP 2017 version. Not only is shorter, but also thinner.
The tip has an aluminum body, with black anodizing. I like how Nitecore mixed the color, with the light having a black background with clear, polished contrasting elements.
On one side there are the 2 electronic switches
and on the flat profile there is the micro USB port, protected by a rubber cover.
The light has a rounded profile, and at the opposite side of the LED there is a lanyard hole, that on my sample came with a preinstalled splitring. The light can’t stand with the splitring in it.
The Tini has a flood tir optic to focus the XP-G2 S3 into a flood beam, suitable for very close distances.
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UI
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Beamshots at 0.5 meters from the wall
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Output and runtime
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My thoughts
The light is well made and finished.
In my opinion the Tini is a smaller, classier version of the well known and appreciated Tip. The light has a more eye catching design, and could easily be mistaken for a car key or a gate key.
The tradeoff to this size reduction is obviously going to be in the output and runtime departments. Even the charging port has some issues, due to the limited space and the steric hindrance from the micro USB rubber cover will make pugging in the micro port a little hard on some cables.
To keep the general aesthetic details, the Tini has 2 plastic switch covers that are very close, quite small and slippery, so if you wear gloves or you are in a hurry, you could need a few more seconds to operate the light.
The switches also offer very little resistance to pressure, and for limiting the events of accidental activation, Nitecore made the light both turn on constantly with a long pressure, and added the chance to set the light to self turn off after 30 seconds.
Although I found easier to activate and deactivate a lockout, like on the TIP, I can also see the convenience of allowing the light to turn off itself within few seconds, without the need of playing around with the small switches.
I like the direct access to lowest and highest mode.
Despite the smaller size, the light still packs a lot of output for its size, and I like the TIR lens which makes the light look IMHO cooler, and makes sure the beam is spread over a wide area.
I would have liked this light with bigger buttons, a clip and with a NW otption. Also, I would have preferred that after the 30 seconds of Turbo the light stepped back to high mode, and not the previous used mode as, for example, if you let the Tini in low mode when it steps down it will seems as if it is turned off.
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Thanks to: AntoLed for the camera help and the luxmeter.