Xiaomi Redmi Note 8 Pro Specifications
Redmi Note 8 Pro launched by Xiaomi. An awesome overall phone. Therefore, let’s talk about it in-depth.
As MKBHD said “Cheap phones are getting good. And good phones are getting cheap“. If we move back some years, we’ll notice that smartphones were very expensive. Moreover, budget smartphones were just trash. Not to bash companies here but the time was just wrong.
Just because you don’t want to spend $1000 on a phone, there are many budget smartphones. These smartphones are getting better day by day. Therefore, Xiaomi has done it again with its Redmi Note 8 Pro.
What’s New?
Xiaomi’s latest release Xiaomi Redmi Note 8 Pro. Xiaomi thought that MediaTek was the way to go this time. Therefore, they didn’t go with Qualcomm 730. They didn’t even use the Snapdragon 675 which they’ve done before.
This mobile has 6GB of Ram, 128 GB of storage. So it’s not that bad of a cheap. The Mediatek Helio G90T was used in Redmi Note 8 Pro. So is it worth it? Is not going with Snapdragon a dealbreaker for most people?
Accessories in the Box
Inside the box, you’ll find a USB Type C cable. It has a quick charger which is 18 Watt. However, it’s using MediaTek’s pump express. But here’s the fun part. According to Xiaomi, it will support Qualcomm’s quick charge 3. The internal chipset shows that it does has the chip that supports quick charge.
It might even support Qualcomm’s quick charge 4 but I’m not sure. You even get a nice TPU case in the box. Therefore, the quality is the fine and free case doesn’t hurt that much.
Camera
Looking at the back of the phone, it has a Corning Gorilla 5. It has a Four-camera setup where there are three on the back and one on the front. Two of the cameras are 2 Megapixels: One for Portrait mode and Depth feel. The main camera is 64 Mega Pixels. It is a Samsung Sensor.
The camera performance is quite good too. You can shoot up to 4K video. You can even swap between lenses before you start recording. However, once you start recording, you won’t be able to change the lenses. Redmi Note 8 also has a 64 MegaPixels mode in the camera. This is a big change in the camera. Moreover, it also has a portrait mode too. You have the option to change the amount of blue according to your liking.
If we talk about video, the sound quality has a low bitrate. So you shouldn’t expect much from it. It has 127kbps bitrate. Moreover, there is not electronic-image stabilization on 4K recording so the video will be quite shaky. It’s should’ve worked at least only at 1080p. It would’ve been nice if there would’ve been an option for changing to ultra-wide in video mode. I don’t know why Xiaomi did this approach.
Focus is cool but sometimes it can miss from time to time. Therefore, it works but Redmi Note 8 Pro’s camera isn’t that reliable. It would’ve been nicer to see dual face autofocus face detection.
Moreover, Xiaomi has stepped up its resolution game for the front camera. Now it’s 20 MegaPixels compared to the 13 we have previously. The earpiece is on the front too. It works well. There are no complaints about that.
With the front camera, you’ll get a 1080p resolution. Once again there is no electronic image stabilization. Though the quality is quite good with the front camera. Moreover, the night mode is still not very good. That is because it doesn’t work all that well.
Design
There are an 8 MegaPixels Ultra Wide angel Lens too which is quite good too. Moreover, under these camera lenses is a fingerprint. The Phone itself feels sold and it has curved edges. On the bottom of the phone, there is a single loudspeaker. Moreover, there’s a microphone, a USB-C and a headphone jack.
The sides are made from metal, they have a good feel to them. There’s a secondary mic at the top which is used for noise cancellation purposes. Also, there’s an IR Transmitter.
On the left, we can find a sim tray which is a hybrid slot. Therefore, you can either put two nano sims or one nano sim and a micro SD card. It also has a rubber gasket around the sim tray just to make it dust-free. Also, there’s no IP rating on this device therefore, it’s not water-resistant. The Sim Tray itself is made from metal.
The weight of this phone is 203 Grams. It’s heavier than the previous generation of Xiaomi devices. The reason is only one. It has a larger battery. The battery packs a whole punch. It has a 4500 mAh battery. The phone itself is 8.9 mm thick. This is due to the increased battery capacity.
Including the camera bump, it’ll bring the thickness up to 10.6 mm. Moreover, the notification LED is just around the front camera. There’s a tiny LED just across the camera.
The screen has slimmer bezels. Moreover, their approach to notch is slightly different compared to other devices. There is a bottom bezel, I don’t know why it’s there but it’s on the thicker side. They could’ve done better although. But everything looks good, to be honest.
The phone has a face unlock and it’s pretty cool considering a budget smartphone. Fingerprint unlocking is blazing fast too. As soon as you tap the sensor, it’ll unlock. It unlocks the phone under a second.
Display
The first impression of the screen is that it’s a good looking IPS display. The resolution is 2340x1080p. The screen is 6.53 inches which are massive. It is a good panel that Xiaomi has selected.
You have the option to hide the notch if you don’t want your content going behind it. The free space of the phone is 114 GB which we get out of 128 GB. One important thing to notice is that there is not a Widevine level one search. This means that Netflix and other services won’t be in Full HD resolution.
I hope that the fix will be in Global ROM as the Chinese Rom doesn’t have it.
Performance
The Antutu score is over 200k which is good. The Helio G90T did a good score for the performance test. The performance overall is quite good. You can multitask with ease and precision. Doing day to day tasks is blazing fast. Therefore, you don’t need to worry about lag at all. coupled with the 6GB of ram, everything is good.
The performance of the phone is really good right now. We can compare the performance to Snapdragon 710.
Sound
There is a single sound speaker at the bottom and it sounds okay. There’s no crazy volume or bass in it but it just gets the job done I hoped that it would have sound on the earpiece but unfortunately there isn’t.
Gaming
Gaming is a breeze. Games like Asphalt and PUBG will work flawlessly without any kind of lag there. The MALI G76MC is a good GPU choice. Therefore, the whole approach for Meditek was finally a good choice. It’s a perfect combination of CPU and GPU they’ve done here.
Performance and Gaming wise, this phone is an absolute beast. The temperature remains cool too. No problems as far as thermal performances are concerned.
Pricing and Launch Date
The expected release date of Xiaomi Redmi Note 8 pro is October 8, 2019. Moreover, for the pricing, it is expected to be in a price range of 200 USD which is quite budget-friendly. It will be good to see Xiaomi destroying other budget smartphones. The price range is quite good.
Is it a budget smartphone killer?
I’d say yes and no. Sure, the device itself is cool and packed with quite a punch and power. Even though there are some quite blunders they did with the device. In my opinion, the camera is possibly one of the biggest flaws this device has. Moreover, performance and display are quite good. Therefore, we all expect Xiaomi Redmi Note 8 Pro to be budget-friendly too.
Fixing all the issues that I’ve mentioned like EIS and others will provide to be quite fruitful for them. The device itself is great and I will recommend it as a budget smartphone.
Is it a Go or a No?
I am quite impressed with Xiaomi’s approach for Redmi Note 8. The device is perfect, it has enough storage, performance is good, the camera is okay. Considering all this, if it’s launched around the price tag of $200, then there isn’t any competitor to compete with this device. This is because everything is perfect in we ignore the camera for a second.
Therefore, if you want a budget-friendly device that can perform well and you’re doing day to day tasks and gaming or even consuming media, then Redmi Note 8 Pro is must recommended.
On the other hand, if you are fixated towards using a lot of cameras and taking videos or Vlogging a bit, it’s a straight no.