Redmi Note 9: design
Redmi Note 9 comes with the company’s Aura design. It looks like its other siblings in its series, but unlike them the Redmi Note 9 does not have a side-mounted fingerprint scanner. Instead, it gets a traditional back fingerprint sensor. Redmi Note 9 has a large display and hence using this phone with one hand is not that easy. Yes, although the power and volume buttons are fitted in the right place, making them not difficult to reach. Like most Redmi phones, the Note 9 also has an IR emitter.
The thickness of Redmi Note 9 is 8.9 millimeters and weight is 199 grams. It is heavy compared to some other smartphones in this price range. Xiaomi says it has used P2i nano-coating on the device along with a rubber seal on the port, to provide some protection against contact with liquids. Xiaomi has also included a 22.5W charger in the box (although charging support is currently limited to 18W – more on this later).
Redmi Note 9: specifications and software
Redmi Note 9 It is the most base model of its series, so Xiaomi has chosen MediaTek Helio G85 chipset for this model. It is an octa-core processor, which comes with two Cortex-A75 cores set at 2 GHz clock speed and six Cortex-A55 cores set at 1.8 GHz speed. For graphics, it has an ARM Mali-G52 GPU set at 1 GHz.
Redmi Note 9 sports a 6.53-inch display with full-HD+ resolution (1080×2340 pixels) and Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection. The Redmi Note 9 has three variants: 4GB RAM with 64GB storage, 4GB RAM with 128GB storage, and 6GB RAM with 128GB 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. It has two nano-SIM slots and supports dual 4G and VoLTE. There’s Bluetooth 5, Wi-Fi 802.11n, and a four-satellite navigation system. The battery capacity is 5,020mAh. The Redmi Note 9 is also capable of 9W reverse charging via the USB Type-C port.
In terms of software, there isn’t 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 a number of pre-installed apps, and also suggests downloading a few other apps during setup. It also shows ads on the lockscreen. Although this is an option that’s enabled by default, we turned it off when we set up the phone.
We also got spammy notifications from some pre-installed apps. Among these, Mi Video and Get Apps were at the forefront and definitely all these things affect your experience a bit.
Redmi Note 9: performance
The performance of the Redmi Note 9 gave us no cause for complaint. The MediaTek Helio G85 chipset is a capable processor and can handle our daily tasks with ease. App loading times were decent, and with 6GB of RAM, we could easily switch between different apps comfortably.
We also liked the display of the Redmi Note 9. It has good viewing angles and becomes quite bright when required. You also get options to change the color output. However, this is not the same as the AMOLED display included on the Samsung Galaxy M21. Its rear fingerprint sensor was also fast. Apart from this, face unlock was also accurate and fast.
Redmi Note 9 can run games like PUBG Mobile and Asphalt 9: Legends without any problem. In PUBG Mobile, the phone runs the game at medium settings by default, but we were able to run it at high settings without much degradation in performance. However, after playing for 20 minutes, the touch of the phone started feeling hot. Apart from this, the battery dropped by 10 percent. Asphalt 9 ran smoothly at default settings, and we only noticed slight lag on a few tracks.
I really liked the battery life of the Redmi Note 9. It can easily run for one and a half days on a single charge. Even if you’re a heavy user, the 5,020mAh battery can last you more than a day. It managed to last 15 hours, 45 minutes in our HD video loop test.
After the launch of Redmi Note 9, there were some controversies regarding the wattage of the charger included with it. The Redmi Note 9 comes with a 22.5W charger in the box, but the device is set to 18W. This means that even if the charger is of higher wattage, the phone will charge only with a maximum input of 18 watts. Xiaomi told Gadgets 360 that the Redmi Note 9 currently has a “software lock” installed. It still needs to go through some lab and field tests to be charged at higher power, which was not possible due to the lockdown. Xiaomi says the company plans to release a software update in the future that will allow the Redmi Note 9 to charge at 22.5 watts.
Currently, the phone charges up to 29 percent in 30 minutes and up to 60 percent in an hour. It takes more than two hours for the device to be fully charged. If Xiaomi has unlocked full charging speed, it should take slightly less time to charge.
Redmi Note 9: cameras
Redmi Note 9 has a quad-camera setup, which has a 48-megapixel primary camera, 8-megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera, 2-megapixel macro camera and 2-megapixel depth sensor. For selfie, it has a 13-megapixel camera in the front. The camera app is largely similar to other Redmi phones.
Apart from the normal shooting mode, the app also has a Pro mode for photos as well as videos, which lets you control everything from exposure to ISO etc. yourself. 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 adjusts the camera accordingly. In daylight, the phone takes good shots. However, AI makes the photos much sharper. Photos taken at full 48-megapixel resolution had better detail and weren’t as sharp. There was a slight drop in quality in photos taken with the wide-angle camera.
Talking about close-ups, the AI recognized the subject quickly, but sometimes there was trouble with focus. However, the photos were good and had a natural blur effect. There is a Pro Color option, which increases the contrast in the output. The macro camera lets you get very close to the subject and take good pictures in favorable lighting.
Portrait mode managed to separate the subject and background. Edge detection was also very good. I didn’t find any way to set the level of blur before taking a shot, but the device did give me the option to change the level of beautification.
In low light, the outputs were decent, but graininess became visible when zoomed-in. The camera app managed to keep the noise (grains) low. In night mode the camera takes longer to capture a photo and you have to stand very still for that long to get good photos. However, even after this there was not much difference in the output.
Selfies taken in daylight were good and had good detail. You can also take portrait shots in the selfie camera, but here we did not find the option to set the level of blur. The Redmi Note 9 did a good job at detecting edges here. However the quality dropped in low light.
Verdict
Redmi Note 9 Starts at Rs 11,999 in India and it redmi note 8 Which is much more than Rs. 10,000, which the company had kept under Rs. However, the price did increase due to the recent GST hike and weak rupee. The base variant of the Redmi Note 9 offers good value with its full-HD+ display, powerful MediaTek Helio G85 chipset and 4GB of RAM. It offers good battery life thanks to a large 5,020 mAh battery.
However, the variant we reviewed was the top-end variant. Priced at Rs 14,999, this variant competes with some powerful phones in the sub-Rs 15,000 segment, such as Realme 6 (review), Poco M2 Pro (review) and even Redmi Note 9 Pro (Review). These models come with better performance and better features than the Redmi Note 9, making it a bit difficult to recommend this variant.