Phone offerings outside of the most mainstream brands have managed to enter the limelight as of late, many with prices that are a fraction of the heavy hitters but with great functionality and, sometimes, even better features than the brands you know. Redmi, a subsidiary of Xiaomi, has released its latest flagship phone, the Redmi Note 13 Pro +.
The Redmi Note 13 Pro +, a 5G phone with some pretty beefy features, has a MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Ultra chipset with an Octa-core (2×2.8GHz and 6×2.0GHz) CPU and a Mali-G610 MC4 GPU. It runs on Android 13 and MIUI 14(Xiaomi’s OS). The phone comes with 256GB of storage with 8 or 12GB of RAM and 512GB with 12 or 16GB of RAM. The version I tested was 512GB with 12GB of RAM.
In the box, you get the Redmi Note 13 Pro +, documentation, a SIM ejector tool, a simple, black phone case, a 120W phone charging block and a USB-C to USB-A cable. The phone has a plastic casing, in keeping with its lower price point, but you can get versions with a faux leather covering that gives the phone a little texture. Its screen is Corning Gorilla Glass Victus and has a dual SIM tray.
“Its screen is absolutely gorgeous and vibrant, making watching videos and playing games on the Redmi Note 13 Pro + an amazing experience.”
The display is a crystal clear 6.67” AMOLED screen running at 120Hz with a peak brightness of 1800 nits and 68 billion colours. It has a 20:9 aspect ratio (1220×2712 pixels) and the same ppi density as the iPhone 15 Pro Max. The screen is absolutely gorgeous and vibrant. Watching videos and playing games on the Redmi Note 13 Pro + is amazing. The speakers put out 24-bit/192kHz audio, and while it may not be as booming as my Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, it really holds its own.
Getting to the cameras, you have a great variety of lenses to offer, giving you a wonderful toolbox for taking great photos and video. The Selfie Cam is a 16MP f/2.5 wide-angle lens with a 1/3.06” censor and can shoot video at 1080p up to 60fps. The front-facing cameras include a 200MP (yes, that’s right), f/1.7 wide angle lens with a 1/1.4” censor and optical image stabilization, an 8MP f/2.2 lens with a 120-degree field of view and a 1/4.0” censor and a 2MP macro lens at f/2.4. With electronic image stabilization, you can shoot video at 4K up to 30fps and 1080p at up to 120fps.
The image quality on the camera is great. You get a ton of detail in your photos, even when not in 200MP mode. When 200MP is turned on, you can find yourself zooming in a lot on an image you took and still getting fantastic clarity. I did try to use the night photo on myself, and I found that it created some really hard edges, making it look more like a filter than an enhanced image.
Portrait mode works really well, though. The lack of a food photography option isn’t a dealbreaker for the majority of people, but it would have been nice to have. I do, however, like that the pro mode switches seamlessly between photography and video instead of being two separate options like in most phones.
“The slightly lighter weight and more narrow phone make it so easy to handle, especially for content creators out in the field.”
The video quality was very clean. I tested taking video away from most lights to capture a slightly low-light scenario and you can pick up a little graininess, but nothing that would be considered unusable even if you were using it for a vlog. And from a content creator’s perspective, the slightly lighter weight than some of the big phones (35g lighter than the Galaxy S23 Ultra and 22g lighter than the iPhone 15 Pro Max, and the slightly slimmer phone makes it so easy to handle when out in the field.
Battery life, easily a top 3 concern surrounding any phone, is not a concern with the Redmi Note 13 Pro +. With the 5000 mAh lithium polymer battery, I’ve had no issue getting through a full day with plenty of battery to spare, and that is with taking a lot of photos and playing a good deal of video. The 120W charger, however, could charge you to 100% in as little as 19 minutes, should you overdo it.
At around $434 USD, the Redmi Note 13 Pro + is about half the price of the Samsung flagship and nearly $1000 cheaper than Apple’s (when comparing similar storage and RAM). This phone is a fantastic buy for people not stuck in any particular ecosystem or just someone looking for a phone to get them to their next contract after losing/breaking a phone but still wanting a quality device.
Plus, where a company like Huawei couldn’t offer the apps you might come to depend on, Redmi’s Android-based OS gives you access to everything you use. Add to that all the expected features, like NFC connectivity, and you could seamlessly transition away from the more common phones in North America and thrive with the Redmi.
All in all, the Redmi Note 13 Pro + is an excellent phone at an excellent price for users of any type. It has the battery life, camera quality and overall performance that make you feel like you are holding a premium phone in your hand without the burden of paying a premium price.
