Friends+Design
- Fresh, bright and vibrant design, with a very shiny, reflective rear panel - you'll see light play across the surface when using this phone, giving the feeling of depth
- The distinctive new camera bump design plays into the theme of symmetry - this is a nice design touch that sets the Redmi Note 9 series apart and make this phone and its siblings recognisable
- The front of the phone looks modern and definitely defies expectations for its price category
- Fingerprint sensor is integrated into the power key and it is extremely fast at unlocking the phone
- Xiaomi's trademark infrared emitter is on the top, and can be used to control several home appliances
- There's also a notification and charging LED hidden in the earpiece, a rarity to find in modern smartphones
- At 8.8mm thick and 209g in weight, the Redmi Note 9 Pro is bulky and unwieldy
Display
- Bright, crisp and large 6.67-inch IPS display with a tall 20:9 aspect ratio - the panel delivers punchy and vibrant colours and the large screen work nicely for consuming videos and games
- It is a standard 60Hz panel and doesn't have a high refresh rate - this is a missed opportunity that puts the Redmi Note 9 Pro on the back foot compared to its peers
Software
- MIUI is one of the more refined and smooth Android skins around, and has a lot of customisation/theming options - there’s ample features for power users - from gestures to the ability to switch around button layouts as well as a robust home screen customisation experience, you can really make the phone your own
- It still continues to pack a lot of bloat though - you get many pre-installed applications with wide-ranging requirements for user permissions
Performance
- Class-leading performance for the price backed by the snappy Snapdragon 720G - the Redmi Note 9 Pro is more than powerful enough to handle anything from basic calls and messaging all the way up to heavy 3D gaming, with no trouble whatsoever, multitasking is also smooth and trouble-free
Camera
- Decent quad cameras for the price - a 48MP primary shooter, an 8MP ultra-wide angle lens, a 5MP macro camera and a 2MP depth sensor
- In daylight, the primary camera takes reasonably good shots - Xiaomi has opted for a very natural-looking colour science, the colour temperature and white balance are spot-on which is very good to see and the dynamic range isn’t too bad either (though, there is a certain softness to images, which can be fixed with a software update)
- The ultra-wide angle mode works well to capture a wide frame without much effort and the quality is decent
- Xiaomi has done a particularly good job at optimising the portrait mode and the phone does a fantastic job at edge-detection, creating a natural-looking blur
- The macro camera delivers much higher quality shots than from most other 2MP macro cameras
- The 16MP front camera is fairly good in the daytime as well as at night - details are good, and portrait shots had nicely blurred backgrounds
- Low light photography is average, images are grainy with digital artefacts and splotches creating a nearly unusable shot
- Overall, this is not the best camera setup at this price and this time Realme has done a better job which with its Realme 6 which offer better cameras at this price
Battery
- Very good battery life with the 5020 mAh battery - with ordinary use, the Redmi Note 9 Pro easily lasts through a full day and nearly half of the second day before needing a recharge
- Decent fast charging with the 18W fast charger in the box, takes nearly 2 hours to fill the phone completely (though, this isn't the fastest charging phone and the Realme 6's 30W charging is much better)
Verdict
- The Redmi Note 9 Pro which succeeds at delivering value, a decent camera, class-leading internals and beautiful design for the low price is certainly tempting - if flat-out performance at a low price is what you want, the Redmi Note 9 Pro delivers the best bang-for-the-buck
- However, the Realme 6 out-specs the Redmi Note 9 Pro with its high refresh-rate 90Hz display panel, as well as the inclusion of a 64MP camera that genuinely takes better images, and the phone supports faster 30W charging as well
