Redmi Note 10 Pro Review – Mixed Opinion But Try Not To Skip

Gone are the days when the Redmi Note series were that powerful. With the latest Redmi Note 10 series, Xiaomi has launched four variants and the Note 10 Pro is one of the best in the series. Well, we got our hands on the Indian variant of the Redmi Note 10 Pro for testing and trial for about a week, and believe it or not, it is an impressive smartphone in almost all the sub-sections mentioned below.

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It is not a flagship phone but with all the specs on board, it is a flamboyant and cost-effective alternative at almost a third of the price of a flagship smartphone. But the question is, the phone looks dapper on paper but what about its practical usage? Well, that’s why we tested the phone in and out to check out its flaws, pros, and cons, and where it shines or shy so here’s everything you need to know about the device.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 Pro Indian variant is superb in terms of specifications and above all, it has one of the most competitive price tags associated with it. Redmi Note 10 Pro with 6GB RAM and 128GB storage is available in India at Rs 16,999/- while the higher 8GB+128GB storage configuration is on sale at Rs 18,999/- on Amazon India where you can avail further deals and discounts on it.

Get flat Rs 1,000/- discount on using ICICI Credit Card, cashback of Rs 3,000/- is awaited to eligible devices signed up on Jio network with the first-time recharge of Rs 349/-. Get the Dark Night, Vintage Bronze, or the Glacial Blue colour variant when you purchase it.

The unboxing experience is pretty old school and inside the box, you get the usual stuff that can be expected from a Redmi Note series phone. This includes the device itself, a fast 33W charger, a USB to USB Type-C cable, some documentation, and a translucent clear silicon back case.

Before we talk in detail about Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 Pro, let’s have a quick look at the key specifications. 

• Display: 120Hz high refresh rate FHD+ (1080×2400) AMOLED Dot display; 16.9 centimeters (6.67 inch)
• Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 732G 
• Storage: 6GB/8GB, 64GB/128GB
• Software: MIUI 12 (Based On Android 11)
• Rear cameras: 64 MP Quad Rear camera with 8MP Ultra-wide, 5MP Telemacro and Portrait lens
• Selfie camera: 16MP
• Battery: 5020 mAH battery with 33W fast charger
• Weight: 192g
• Dimensions: 164.50 x 76.15 x 8.10mm

Now, let’s move ahead and see what makes the Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 Pro a powerful mid-ranger.

I held the Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 Pro and my first reaction was, it looks like a glass and metal sandwich design. Perhaps, you will be blown away knowing that Redmi Note 10 Pro has a glass front, a curved glass back but a plastic mid-frame. It does look luxurious especially in Onyx Gray that I had while testing but other colours are worth trying as well.

The display is flat as you would get at this price tag. Turn the phone around and you will get a curved glass back that nicely moulds into your hand providing that is well-balanced. But hey, it is ginormous so you will have to take that into consideration. Also, the glass back makes it look premium but gives it that crazy slippery feel as well. It would fall up tables if placed with the slightest angle but that also makes sure you don’t have any problem sliding the phone inside and outside of your pockets.

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The camera module is what stands out the most. Protruding just a bit above the back panel lies the pretty out-of-the-box designed camera rig. It is a quad-camera setup arranged in a vertically placed rectangular bump above a vertical camera bump. Did you read it right? Xiaomi did something off here since instead of getting a single camera bump, Redmi Note 10 Pro gets a dual-camera bump which makes up for a busy design but overall, I would say it is at least something different than the ‘n’ number of other Xiaomi smartphones.

Talking about the functional elements, a power button cum FPS is on the right along with volume rockers, a triple SIM/memory card slot on the right, a USB Type-C port placed at the bottom, and a 3.5mm headphone jack on the top along with obvious microphones placements.

One of the imperative factors in deciding what phone to buy is the display and trust me, Redmi Note 10 Pro won’t disappoint you even for a bit. Specs-wise, the device has a giant 6.67-inch AMOLED FHD+ display with a 20:9 aspect ratio and 120Hz refresh rate.

Talking about its performance in actual use cases, the display is dapper and I can bet on it that you would advocate it no matter if you are a Xiaomi fan or not. It is a mammoth spread across 6.67 inch diagonally and with the tiny bezels and the top-most Corning Gorilla Glass 5 diving into the mid plastic brand, adds another half a millimetre of screen real estate to enjoy.

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The display is huge and tall thanks to the 20:9 aspect ratio. I am a big fan of watching movies and there was no point in testing the device that I didn’t feel as if I was watching a movie on a widescreen. Dim the lights in your whole keeping the device as the source and it creates a surreal effect where the stereo speakers complement the overall viewing experience transporting you to the next level of amazement.

I tested the device for its brightness and it can go as dim as 2.3 nits and there’s no flickering to it. It has been rated with a peak brightness of 1200 nits, a manual brightness of 450 nits and a typical brightness of 700 nits and all three claims are almost true so that’s a good thing for Redmi Note 10 Pro users.

Well, I can’t just leave an important feature here. The display mounted on Redmi Note 10 Pro has a 120Hz refresh rate (not adaptive). It is buttery smooth sometimes but not the best when you force it to work. The home screen supports three 120Hz refresh rate while all other apps, even the dialer switches down to 60Hz with a stutter. The 120Hz sometimes feels like just an on-paper spec. The transitions are excellent though thanks to the 240Hz touch sampling rate that compliments it. The display is HDR10 compliant as well as offers a DCI-P3 Wide Color Gamut, SGS eye care display certification to name a few of its traits.

Performance-wise, don’t expect it to pull off flagship-grade activities in a jiffy. It has a Snapdragon 732G processor clocked at a max 2.3GHz while the Adreno 618 GPU has been overclocked to 800 MHz. Along with that, it has 6GB LPDDR4 RAM and 64/128GB UFS 2.2 storage.

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I tested the device and found out that it scores promising GeekBench scores at 567 and 1716 points on single and multi-core tests. It doesn’t break a sweat loading and processing-intensive apps and games although I would still prefer setting it to medium settings to get the best of performance. Surprisingly, Redmi Note 10 Pro is truly a good performer thanks to the inclusion of a Snapdragon chipset since Helio processors are really on the lower side of performance even on day-to-day usage.

Daily usage on Redmi Note 10 Pro is splendid and I didn’t see any lag and multitasking is as smooth as possible. Try playing games at medium settings and in bursts to prevent the chipset from combusting (metaphorically).

Software and the chipset under the hood and the configuration do make a lot of difference. Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 Pro (India) arrives with Android 11-powered MIUI 12 out-of-the-box just like its siblings. I personally am not a fan of MIUI since it has a tonne of bloatware, it is infested with ads and more. Still, it is one of the most widely used custom UI and thus, I won’t be biased with it in terms of its play on Redmi Note 10 Pro.

As usual, the MIUI 12 on-board device has tonnes of AOD themes to select from. The user interface on MIUI 12 is quite simple with everything self-explanatory. You get hands-on several MIUI iterations as well as at least one year of Android major OS upgrade support on Redmi Note 10 Pro so for now, at least Android 12 (MIUI 13) is supported.

MIUI 12 has an optional app drawer if you aren’t a fan of placing all apps on the desktop. There’s a folder-wise apps group such as Business, Tools, New, etc that makes it easier to locate any app you want and so on. Other features include Dark Mode, optimized by HRR displays, a tonne of proprietary apps, a Security app, enhanced privacy settings among others.

Camera by far is one of the largest factors one would consider when buying a smartphone. If it’s about numbers, the Redmi Note 10 Pro has got a 64MP primary, an 8MP ultrawide, a 5MP macro, and a 2MP depth sensor. The only difference it has with Redmi Note 10 Pro (global) and Redmi Note 10 Pro Max is the 108MP primary sensor that these two devices have and not the Redmi Note 10 Pro.

There’s a lot going on with the camera setup mounted on Redmi Note 10 Pro. I did try the 64MP primary shooter on-board Redmi Note 10 Pro quite extensive and found out it is compelling especially at this price tag. The shots are detailed even under the shadows so you will have detailed shots irrespectively of the textures. The shots captured using the primary sensor preserves high dynamic range, the subject is not overexposed and the sensor was able to capture even the faintest of details such as birds flying in the sky when I was taking a shot of a building.

It can go at 2x zoom and a 10x digital zoom if you want but I personally feel that the details aren’t that much in these two modes. I would rather shot images at normal mode and crop images to post it on social media and other platforms. Overall, the primary sensor doesn’t disappoint you even for a bit. I am not a professional photographer but still, I did see how crisp, vibrant, and vivid the images were so there’s no doubt a pro photographer will be able to squeeze out more from the 64MP shooter.

The 8MP ultrawide snapper takes quality images at a 118-degree FoV with a blend of accurate colours, straightened corners which is a plus point given the fact that most devices I have tested have images shot with ultrawide snappers that have distorted corners. Anyways, the nighttime photography using the ultrawide sensor is surprisingly usable too and that too without the need of a night mode, and the fact that UW snapper doesn’t have a night mode is compelling.

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Talking about the 5MP macro sensor, you can shoot your subject in a well-lit surrounding at a distance of 3 to 10 cm and get mind-blowing images. However, it is to be noted that when I started taking photos in not-so-favourable lighting conditions, the shots were proportionately reduced in quality as well. So, I would recommend clicking your subject on the macro sensor in a brightly lit surrounding for better results.

2MP depth sensor works with the primary camera and does a good job of isolating the subject as well. You might not have the best portrait effect out there but certainly, it is usable. The same goes for portrait shots on the 16MP selfie shooter which doesn’t have a dedicated depth sensor at its disposal.

As usual, the selfie shooter can capture images with a good amount of detail, sharpness, and high dynamic range during the daytime while the nighttime shots may sometimes be a hit and a miss. But that doesn’t mean the selfie shooter is less than anything but rather a sensor that can capture detailed and usable shots in most scenarios if not all.

If you mark all the specifications and hardware/software components on-board Redmi Note 10 Pro, the battery is at the ace position. A massive 5,020 mAH battery lies under the hood providing an excellent battery backup. Since you aren’t getting a high-end chipset, the performance is obviously lower and the battery consumption is on the lower side as well. It has an endurance rating of 114 hours with 15:47 hours of HD video playback at a 120Hz refresh rate although most of the video playback apps/platforms support 60Hz only.

In any case, you can expect a good one and a half day of battery backup on mixed usage. Using it to its extreme will obviously give you a shorter backup but expect it to last for a day at the least even with moderate to heavy usage. Redmi Note 10 Pro comes paired with a 33W wired charging capable of charging the battery to its capacity in just 90 minutes. Although it is too much of a time, it is to be noted that it’s not a flagship device so 90 minutes is understandable and in fact, lower than many of its competitors.

There’s a cherry on the cake when it comes to the speaker setup. Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 Pro packs in a stereo speaker setup with two loudspeakers set up at the bottom and the top section each. The stereo speaker setup is loud and in fact more balanced than that of the Redmi Note 10. I would say that even if it is not absolutely balanced, it is a good 40 per cent on top and 60 per cent at bottom audio coming out of the respective speakers. At the end of the day, it works.

When it comes to the connectivity features, Redmi Note 10 Pro gets a USB Type-C 2.0 port for data and charging, a Bluetooth v5.1 with LE and A2DP, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/g/g/n/ac dual-band on-board. There’s no NFC on the Indian variant. The GPS system is limited to BDS, Glonass, and A-GPS only but having more systems could have been better.

There’s a side-mounted fingerprint scanner on the right that takes care of unlocking the phone. I tested it for some time and to be honest, it is quick. I don’t personally love side-mounted FPS but that doesn’t change the fact that Redmi Note 10 Pro has a good setup for unlocking the phone. Then again, there’s obvious PIN and Pattern lock as well as 2D facial recognition systems on-board where the latter is less secure.

Pros

• Super AMOLED display with 120Hz refresh rate
• Qualcomm Snapdragon 732G
• 64MP Quad-rear camera
• 5020 mAh battery with 33W fast charging
• Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection
• TÜV Rheinland Low Blue Light certification
• IP52 dust and water resistance

Cons

• No 5G connectivity
• No NFC