Poco M2 Pro has been launched in India for a starting price of Rs 13,999 and looking at its specs it looks like it could be a strong rival to Redmi Note 9 Pro and Realme 6 which are expected to be similarly priced. label There are two great products. However, just writing the specifications on paper doesn’t really speak to the potential of the smartphone. We have reviewed it to see how the Poco M2 Pro performs in real life. Let’s see if the Poco M2 Pro really is as good as it seems.
Design of the Poco M2 Pro
Little wants to assure people in India that the M2 Pro is an indigenous phone. To do this, the company has put special labels on the front and back of the box. However, the strange thing is that the charger that comes with the phone bears the Mi logo and when you turn on the phone, the MIUI logo appears.
The Poco M2 Pro offers an attractive design and is well built, but it looks similar to the Redmi Note 9 Pro (Review). Everything is completely identical, including the screen, buttons, ports, hole punching, and rear camera bump. Poco has used a new pattern on the bottom of the phone. Some minor changes have also been made to the camera module. The M2 Pro has a P2i water repellent coating, which is said to be splash proof. Little M2 Pro feels a bit heavy and big in the hand. The fingerprint sensor is located in the power button and also unlocks the phone with a simple touch.
Performance of the Poco M2 Pro
MIUI and app performance were excellent during our review. This was largely due to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G chipset. This is the same processor used in Redmi Note 9 Pro and Realme 6 Pro. I am testing the intermediate variant of the Poco M2 Pro which has 6GB of LPDDR4X RAM and 64GB of UFS 2.1 storage and is priced at Rs 14,999. Out of this, the phone comes in a 4GB RAM + 64GB storage variant and a 6GB RAM + 128GB storage variant, which are priced at Rs 13,999 and Rs 16,999 respectively.
Navigation through the MIUI interface was quick and multitasking worked well. The loading of the app in general was fast. Game performance was also great. I played some graphics heavy games and everything ran smoothly with decent graphics. I didn’t notice any heating issues, even after gaming for long periods of time. Game Turbo is a useful feature that gives you shortcuts to record screen etc. while playing the game.
The video experience is also good on the screen of the Poco M2 Pro. However, the single speaker is not very impressive. If you use wired headphones, you can enable software enhancements for audio, but there is no feature available to increase speaker volume.
Poco M2 Pro Cameras
Poco M2 Pro has four rear cameras, in which the main sensor is 48-megapixel. This includes an 8-megapixel wide-angle lens, a 5-megapixel macro camera, and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. You get a 16-megapixel hole-punch selfie camera. The Poco M2 Pro has the same version of the MIUI camera app that comes with the Redmi Note 9 Pro. The only real difference in functionality between the two is that you can use night mode for the selfie camera on the M2 Pro.
There are also some nice features, like the ability to shoot Full-HD video with the macro camera, and its output was surprisingly good. Video recording can also be done in Pro mode, which allows you to set the exposure yourself and also gives you the ability to record in LOG format.
In daylight, the Poco M2 Pro’s main camera takes decent photos. Details were sharp in landscape shots, and colors were vivid. The included Pro Color switcher gives you better color when you need it. Close-ups look good too, though the camera app tends to display brighter colors a bit more than the actual scene. The wide-angle camera produced very weak colors and details compared to the main sensor. Portrait mode worked well and set the background blur level well.
The main and wide-angle cameras struggle in low-light conditions. The camera app did a good job of suppressing noise (less grain), but photos overall seemed underexposed. Apart from this, the lack of detail is also visible when zooming in. Night mode wasn’t effective either, with only a few photos showing any improvement.
Selfies taken in good lighting looked decent. Details and skin tones were generally good. The shots were decent as long as there was enough light around.
The M2 Pro supports video recording up to 4K 30fps. Videos shot at this resolution have a warm color tone and colors appear too sharp. There is no stabilization at this resolution. Coming in at 1080p, video stabilization is better here, and colors were more natural. Video quality isn’t great in low light, and videos are a bit grainy.
In general, the Poco M2 Pro’s cameras performed well in good lighting conditions, but struggled to deliver decent results in low light conditions.
Poco M2 Pro Battery
I really liked the battery life of the Poco M2 Pro. The 5000 mAh battery lasted a full day comfortably even with gaming and camera use. With light use, I was able to get through the second day. The phone lasted just over 17 hours on our HD video loop test, which was good. The included charger charges the battery with a 33W output. With this charger, the phone battery is 95 percent charged in one hour.
Verdict
I think the Poco M2 Pro is a good addition to the sub Rs 15,000 smartphone segment and I have no problem recommending it. From almost every angle, you might think it’s similar to the Redmi Note 9 Pro (Review), of course, with more charging output. Also, it should be a lot easier to buy than Xiaomi’s flash sale system. Poco M2 Pro offers good build quality, a sharp display, solid battery life, and good performance. Cameras aren’t too bad, as long as you’re filming during the day.
However, I would not say that the Poco M2 Pro is the only option in this price segment, as it is similar to the Redmi Note 9 Pro, which has been sold in the country for quite some time. The Realme 6 (Review) also remains a solid choice as it remains the only sub-Rs 15,000 phone to come with a 90Hz display.