Redmi Note 9: design
Redmi Note 9 comes with the company’s Aura design. It looks similar to its other siblings in the series, but unlike them, the Redmi Note 9 does not feature a side-mounted fingerprint scanner. Instead, you get a traditional rear fingerprint sensor. The big screen has been included in Redmi Note 9 and therefore using this phone with one hand is not that easy. Yes, though the power and volume buttons are well placed, making them easy to reach. Like most Redmi phones, the Note 9 also has an infrared blaster.
The thickness of Redmi Note 9 is 8.9mm and the weight is 199 grams. It is heavy compared to other smartphones in this price range. Xiaomi says it has used P2i nano-coating on the device, along with rubber seals on the ports, to provide some protection against liquid exposure. Xiaomi has also included a 22.5W charger in the box (although charging support is currently limited to 18W – more on that later).
Redmi Note 9: specifications and software
Redmi Note 9 is the most basic model in its series, so Xiaomi has chosen MediaTek Helio G85 chipset for this model. It is an octa-core processor with two 2GHz Cortex-A75 cores and six 1.8GHz Cortex-A55 cores. For graphics, you get ARM Mali-G52 GPU set to 1GHz.
The Redmi Note 9 has a 6.53-inch screen with Full HD+ resolution (1080×2340 pixels) and Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection. There are three variants of Redmi Note 9: 4 GB of RAM with 64 GB of storage, 4 GB of RAM with 128 GB of storage and 6 GB of RAM with 128 GB of storage. The price of these variants is Rs 11,999, Rs 13,499 and Rs 14,999 respectively. We had the top model for review.
The Redmi Note 9 comes with a dedicated microSD card slot. You get two nano-SIM slots and support dual 4G and VoLTE. There’s Bluetooth 5, 802.11n Wi-Fi, and a four-satellite navigation system. The battery capacity is 5,020 mAh. The Redmi Note 9 is also capable of 9W reverse charging via the USB Type-C port.
In terms of software, there is not much new. The Redmi Note 9 runs MIUI 11 based on Android 10 and our unit had the June security patch. The phone comes with tons of pre-installed apps and also suggests a few other apps to download during setup. It also shows ads on the lock screen. While this is an option that is enabled by default, we disabled it when setting up the phone.
We also get spam notifications from some of the pre-installed apps. Among these, Mi Video and Get Apps were at the forefront and surely all these things definitely affect your experience a bit.
Redmi Note 9: performance
The Redmi Note 9’s performance gave us no reason to complain. The MediaTek Helio G85 chipset is a capable processor and can handle our daily tasks with ease. App load times were decent, and with 6GB of RAM, we were able to easily switch between different apps comfortably.
We also liked the Redmi Note 9’s screen. It has good viewing angles and gets quite bright when needed. You also get options to change the color output. However, it is not the same as the AMOLED screen included in the Samsung Galaxy M21. Its rear fingerprint sensor was also fast. Other than this, Face Unlock was also accurate and fast.
The Redmi Note 9 can run games like PUBG Mobile and Asphalt 9: Legends without any problem. In PUBG Mobile, the phone runs the game on Medium settings by default, but we were able to run it on High settings without much of a performance drop. However, after playing the game for 20 minutes, the phone started to feel warm to the touch. Other than this, there was a 10 percent drop in battery life. Asphalt 9 ran smoothly at default settings and we only noticed a slight lag on a few tracks.
I really liked the battery life of the Redmi Note 9. It can easily last a day and a half on a single charge. Even if you are a heavy user, the 5020 mAh battery should last more than a day. It managed to last 15 hours and 45 minutes in our HD video loop test.
After the release of Redmi Note 9, there was some controversy regarding the power of the included charger. The Redmi Note 9 comes with a 22.5W charger in the box, but the device itself is tuned to 18W. This means that even if the charger is higher wattage, the phone will still charge with a maximum input of 18W. W. Xiaomi told Gadgets 360 that the Redmi Note 9 currently has a “software lock”. It still needs to go through some lab and field tests to charge it at higher power, which might not be possible due to the lockdown. Xiaomi says that the company plans to release a software update in the future that will allow the Redmi Note 9 to charge at 22.5W.
Currently, the phone charges up to 29 percent in 30 minutes and up to 60 percent in an hour. The device takes more than two hours to fully charge. If Xiaomi has unlocked full charging speed, it should take a little less to charge.
Redmi Note 9: cameras
The Redmi Note 9 has a quad-camera setup that includes a 48-megapixel main camera, an 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera, a 2-megapixel macro camera, and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. For selfies, it has a 13-megapixel camera on the front. The camera app is quite similar to other Redmi phones.
In addition to the normal shooting mode, the app has a Pro mode for stills and videos, which allows you to control everything from exposure to ISO and so on. There’s also a document mode that lets you crop photos and convert them to black and white.
Redmi Note 9 uses AI, which detects the outdoor scene and sets the camera accordingly. In daylight, the phone takes decent photos. However, the AI makes the photo much sharper. Photos taken at the full 48-megapixel resolution showed better detail and weren’t as sharp. There was a slight drop in quality for images taken with the wide-angle camera.
Speaking of close-ups, the AI recognized the subject quickly, but there were sometimes issues with focus. The pictures were good though and had a natural blur effect too. There is a Pro Color option, which increases the contrast in the output. The macro camera allows you to get very close to the subject and take great pictures in favorable lighting.
Portrait mode managed to separate the subject and the background. Edge detection was also very good. I couldn’t find any way to set the blur level before taking the photo, but the device gave me the option to change the beautification level.
In low light, outputs were decent, but graininess became visible as you zoomed in. The camera app managed to keep the noise down. In night mode, it takes longer for the camera to capture an image and you have to be very still during that time to get good images. However, there was no significant difference in output even after this.
Selfies taken in daylight were decent with good detail. You can also take portrait photos on the selfie camera, but here we don’t have the option to set the blur level. The Redmi Note 9 did a good job of detecting edges here. However, the quality decreased in low light.
Verdict
The Redmi Note 9 starts at Rs 11,999 in India and is much higher than the Redmi Note 8, which is priced at less than Rs 10,000. However, due to the recent rise in GST and the depreciation of the rupee, the price has definitely increased. The base variant of the Redmi Note 9 offers good value for money with its Full HD+ display, powerful MediaTek Helio G85 chipset, and 4GB of RAM. It offers a good battery life thanks to the huge 5020 mAh battery.
However, the variant we reviewed was the top-end variant. Starting at Rs 14,999, this variant competes with some powerful phones in the sub-Rs 15,000 segment such as the Realme 6 (Review), Poco M2 Pro (Review) and even the Redmi Note 9 Pro (Review). These models come equipped with better performance and features than the Redmi Note 9, which makes it a bit difficult to recommend this variant.<!–
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