Friends+Design
- Looks stunning, with an all-glass design - Xiaomi has gone the extra mile here and really knocked it out of the park in terms of an exquisite design
- Excellent, flagship-worthy, premium build quality
- Great hand feel
- The front and the back are fitted with Corning's Gorilla Glass 5 with an additional 0.8mm-thick layer for extra durability
- The LED notification light sits comfortably on the chin - it can only be seen when it lights up, it's really subtle
- Splash resistant body
- The capacitive fingerprint sensor is easy to reach with your index finger and it also has a different texture, so it's hard to miss - plus it's quick
- Apart from the quick fingerprint sensor, the phone also has decently quick AI face recognition (under good light)
- At 186g, it's a bit on the bulky side
Display
- Big 6.3inch LCD screen with fairly thin side bezels - and a small, unobtrusive notch
- Good overall display quality, with especially good brightness levels - though it's not quite as good as the AMOLED panel on the Galaxy M30 - that's the one area where the Samsung phone takes a clear lead
- You also get software tweaks to adjust the contrast and colour temperature, which is nice
Software
- Xiaomi's custom skin overlay, MIUI, has come a long way and the latest version takes a more simplistic and clean approach
- There is also an option to chose between the standard navigation buttons and navigation gestures
Performance
- The powerful Snapdragon 675 SoC makes sure that the device runs super smooth without performance drops even with complex games - everything is fast and lag-free - this is best-in-class performance for this price segment
Camera
- The primary camera is the rear dual camera setup is a huge 48MP sensor - which shoots 12MP at default settings (there is a way to shoot in the sensor's full 48MP resolution if you prefer that, but you'd have to go to the camera's Pro mode for that)
- In daylight, the performance is good, as expected - there's plenty of detail, contrast is good, colors are punchy, and noise is virtually non-existent
- The actual benefit though of the large sensor is that users get sharper 12MP photos with less noise even at high ISO values compared to the regular 12MP sensors - what that means is that the night time shots are the real strong point of the phone, and are surprisingly good for a phone at this price point - there's no prominent noise, details are good and light sources appear to be rather well-preserved
- Additionally, the Night mode really makes a difference by restoring the highlights and bringing out the shadows - the result is nicely balanced and subjects look more detailed
- Portraits with the dual rear cameras are also very good - comparable to much more expensive handsets - the detail is nice while the edge detection is stellar - indoor portraits are good too
- With the front camera, the selfies turn out to be quite nice as well - there's enough detail from the 13MP snapper and its focus sweet spot is almost a full arm's length so you don't need to get really close to the phone to get the sharpest possible result - the portrait mode also seems to do quite well despite the hardware limitations of the front camera (no secondary unit for depth sensing)
- Overall, the cameras on the Redmi Note 7 Pro are top-notch, and this is now the camera package to beat in the under Rs. 20k price segment
Audio
- Despite having just a single bottom-firing loudspeaker, the handset impresses with a loud sound - and it sounds clean at high volumes as well
- Audio quality via headphones is very good too - and loudness remains just as impressive when headphones come into play - one of the highest in the market, let alone the price range
Connectivity
- Has a modern USB Type-C port
- Like other Redmi phones, the Note 7 Pro also packs a handy IR blaster, which can be used for remote controlling home appliances via the Mi Remote app
Battery
- Excellent battery life, as has been the hallmark of the Redmi Note series - the 4000 mAh battery paired with the fairly efficient Snapdragon 675 SoC makes sure that it easily overtakes some upper-mid-range and high-end smartphones when it comes to endurance - you will comfortably get a 1.5-2 days of use
- While the smartphone supports Quick Charge 4.0, the included adapter maxes out at 5V/2A, and though it has a decent charging speed (about 57% in 1 hour), you will have to look for a QC 3 or QC 4-capable brick to enjoy true 'fast charging'
Verdict
- The Redmi Note 7 Pro is yet another winner from the Xiaomi camp, again going on to redefine the expectations of a budget phone
- It's main competition will likely come from the Realme 2 Pro - and here the Redmi Note 7 Pro takes the lead with more premium glass build, faster processor, better battery life and more capable camera
