Redmi Note 9 Pro Max review- Design, Display, Performance, Camera and Battery Backup.

Redmi Note 9 Pro Max Review

 

Well we have a lot of budget phones these days in 20,000rs price segment from Realme, POCO and Redmi. And one particular device in this range is the Redmi note 9 pro max , Not only this device looks premium but even has some features that have some practical use case , for instance a battery that lasts for 2 full days on a single charge. So in this video lets have an in depth look at Redmi note 9 pro max and let's find out what differentiates this device in this crowded smartphone market. Well there are a lot of things to cover so do read it till the end if you want to know the details about this device as I have been using this as my primary device for over a week now.

Design and Built Quality

Starting right off with the display well like other devices this device is huge and this display is 6.67 inches full HD+ LCD protected by gorilla glass 5 with this hole punch camera on the top which really doesn't bother much, be it watching a movie or playing a session of PUBG. I got used to it pretty quickly and I didn't even notice it after a while, I even found some cool punch hole wallpapers to add the fun element to my device.

 And unlike other devices like Realme 6 pro and POCO x2 this one doesn't have a crazy high refresh rate and the display is a 60hz standard panel which is a bit old school. And overall I am happy with this display the colors look sharp , vibrant and true to life but I wish it was at least an Amoled display and the brightness should have been a bit higher if not a 120hz or other gimmicky stuff , see the thing is these high refresh rates are great , after using POCO x2 for some time I can say that the high refresh rate is addictive and the device feels a lot smoother but the drawbacks of that overshadow the benefits, first of all not much apps still support such high refresh rates secondly you end up losing your battery 2 times faster and as far as I know people buy budget phones because of features such as great battery backup and good cameras and not for a refresh rate that kills the battery in half day. So do keep that in mind.

Also this one does not have any stereo speakers as it might seem by this huge grill on top but what it does have is a physical led notification that is even missing in the POCO x2, it is a tiny white colored led but it’s visible and subtle at the same time and you will be happy to have it. So you also have a headphone jack in this one and it is handy to have it in case the battery of your Bluetooth device dies out.

And the frame on this device is made from plastic and not metal which is a bit less durable but it will hold up just fine and the device weighs 209gms but the weight distribution is done pretty well. Plus you have 2 microphones as usual and this IR blaster on top which is really handy. I forgot how handy it was till I started using it with my air conditioner before going to bed so I am glad that this series still has it. And I think one more good thing that you have with this one is a dedicated microSD card slot, so you can use 2 Sims and a micro SD, if you are still using that.

Now coming to the back, this glossy back panel is protected by gorilla glass 5, but I think it’s a bit fragile as mine got a deep scratch even after taking special care of it so always use a case with it if you want the device to stay like this for long.

Battery Backup

You also have a USB type c port next to it that can charge this device at a whopping 33watts and that is something you are going to love, As claimed by Xiaomi it charges the device is around 1h 10 minutes and that is overkill for this huge 5000mah battery which is one of the best feature of this device and this charging animation also changed after the April update. Plus that 5000mah battery is like a mini inverter, seriously! It easily lasts for 2 full days even with some gaming and the screen on time that I got with it and it is really impressive , plus it gets topped up in the blink of any eye , so that’s great.

Performance and UI

Now coming to the performance well this one is powered by snapdragon 720g processor which is a latest 8nm processor by Qualcomm , plus it has UFS  2.1 storage that is quite fast as compared to eMMC that was used in earlier budget phones , plus this one also has 6gb of ram along with128 gb of storage and you can save some of your money by going with the 64gb variant and this device is powered by MIUI 11 based on android 10and overall I am satisfied with the way this device performs in day to day scenarios and it can easily handle anything you throw at it, I found no glitches whatsoever and I was able to disable most of the ads and remove the bloatware in MIUI 11 but I like some of the features present and they make up for a pretty good experience like this gaming turbo mode that adds up a bunch of features that are really handy while gaming , three finger screenshots , forced dark mode etc.

 Overall I am not a fan of MIUI and custom ROMS for this device are also coming soon as some of them are out for the pro variant. Also the gaming performance on this one is better than I expected and games like PUBG ran just fine on ultra settings and I got a continuous frame rate of 60fps which is appreciated as even the device like POCO f2gets around 40-45 fps which is really bad as it even has that liquid cooling. In short this device can handle any game you wish to run perfectly without any issues.

The call quality on this one is also great and I got no dropped calls with my primary Sim plus it also has voice over wifi for Jio sim and other networks too On the side you have the volume rockers that are clicky but I wish they were a bit softer and that is totally subjective .And below that you have your power button and fingerprint scanner and I think the placement of fingerprint scanner in the power button is a great move as you don't even have to press the button to unlock the device and that is one less thing to do , but you can also change that in settings.

 And this fingerprint scanner is quite fast and accurate and it unlocks the device every time but I see some minute delay in unlocking the device and I think it can be fixed easily with a software update. So no problems there as well. And one tiny thing I really appreciate is that the screen protector on this one is pre applied as well so there is no need to buy one for now.

Camera Performance

Another main highlight is the quad camera setup on this device, so it has 4 cameras on the back and one hole punch camera on the front. So the primary camera is a 64 mp Samsung GW1 sensor the second camera is an 8mp ultra wide sensor, the third one is a 5mp macro and4th one is a 2mp depth sensor which nobody asked for. And the front camera is a 32mp wide angle camera, so this back camera is capable of taking some really good quality images that are detailed and look sharp be it in daylight or at night and it also has that 64 mp mode to take high resolution images and it does not make that much of a difference but sometimes the details it captures are much more than in auto mode , apart from this the ultra wide camera is also good enough for some clicks in daylight but it is not that great for any challenging scenario and same is true for that macro camera.

So the final output from this camera is much closer to reality and the images are true in color and are plenty sharp with quite a lot of details. The 64MP sensor was able to retain quite a lot of details but in some cases it tends to over sharpen the images.

And the front facing camera is also great for selfies and it clicks some great images without any tweaks and the colors it captures are natural and overall these cameras are good enough and overall I found them to be better than most of the phones at this price range.

Final Thoughts

 So my final thoughts about it : well the Redmi note 9 pro max is an excellent budget phone with good specs at this price and with the ICICI card discount it’s a better buy also if you have a tight budget go with the Redmi note 9 pro variant you will not be disappointed with that as well ,The display could have been an Amoled or with a better refresh rate but the practical features like faster charging , bigger battery and better performance are enough to cover for the lack of it and overall it’s a good buy at this price with a ton of good features as well and it looks really nice in hand as well more premium and subtle than other budget phone in this price and has it’s own identity if you compare it with likes of Realme that has same design for every other device. So that’s it this was a detailed review of Redmi note 9 pro max and if you have anyother questions do let me know in the comments section.

ALSO READ Redmi Note 9 pro review ,Redmi 9 Spec, Price and Review