This Redmi Note brings good specifications for a higher price!!
The Xiaomi Redmi Note series has always held a strong ground for itself as you get some of the best specifications on the premium mid-range and flagship smartphones. This year we have three smartphones from the Note lineup which include the Redmi Note 12, Note 12 Pro and the Note 12 Pro Plus. This year Xiaomi has brought in some very good upgrades in all their models over last year's Redmi Note 11 series.
With each iteration of the Redmi Note Pro Plus series, Xiaomi has always focused mainly on the cameras and now one of the biggest highlights for this year's newly launched Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus is that it comes with a 200MP main camera with OIS. But this year Xiaomi has priced the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus on the higher side.
The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus brings some very good specifications like a premium build and design, a 120Hz AMOLED display, a good set of cameras, a powerful MediaTek Dimensity 1080 chipset, a 5000mAh battery with support for 120W fast charging and much more. So is the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus worth buying considering its high asking price?
Let's find out in the full review.
Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus Design:
The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus sports a premium glass build which is a good upgrade over the polycarbonate build on the Redmi Note 11 Pro Plus. The back has the typical rectangular camera island which has a chrome finish and houses the triple cameras with a LED flashlight. This camera module is protruded slightly and you can feel that when kept on a flat surface.
The back of the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus has a slightly curved glass back compared to the Redmi Note 12 Pro which has a flatter panel but the latter one has a polycarbonate back. The back of the smartphone has a glossy finish which does catch some fingerprints. The back also has an IP53 rating which makes it dust and splash resistant.
In terms of weight, the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus weighs around 208 grams which makes it slightly heavier and is also thicker at 8.9mm around the sides. Around the sides, there is a polycarbonate frame and to the right side, there is a power button and volume buttons where the power button doubles up as a fingerprint scanner and is faster compared to optical in-display fingerprint scanners.
The left side remains completely cleaner. At the bottom, there is a USB Type-C port, a single microphone, a loudspeaker grille and a dual SIM card slot. There is no microSD card slot for storage expansion. On the front, there is a single punch-hole display with minimum bezels around the sides with slightly thicker bezels on the top as well as the bottom whereas the bezels on the sides are slimmer.
On the top, there is a secondary speaker grille that doubles up as a stereo speaker, a secondary noise cancelling microphone, an IR Blaster and a 3.5mm headphone jack which is a great addition as most smartphones skip it nowadays. Overall, the build and design feel premium but it does feel slightly heavier for smaller hands.
Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus Display:
On the front, the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus sports a larger 6.67-inch Full HD+(1080x1920 pixels) AMOLED display with a screen-to-body ratio of 19.5:9 and since this has an AMOLED display, the viewing angles and colour reproduction are very good and Xiaomi has used a very good AMOLED panel. This display has Corning Gorilla Glass 5 for protection.
There is the 120Hz refresh rate which makes everything work smoother on the display when it comes to multitasking. Talking about the refresh rate, here there are two different settings to choose from - Default and Custom where if you set the display to Default mode, the display switches between some fixed refresh rates - 30Hz, 60Hz, 90Hz and 120Hz.
But if you switch the display to Custom mode, it either switches between 60Hz or 120Hz depending on the content on the display. Combined with the 120Hz refresh rate, there is a 240Hz touch response which is good as you get faster touch responses during gaming and other tasks. The display of the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus has three different colour modes to choose from - Vivid, Saturated and Standard.
Choosing the Vivid mode provides more realistic colours with slight saturation, the Saturated mode provides oversaturated colours and both these cover the DCI-P3 colour gamut whereas the Standard mode covers the sRGB colour space and provides slightly muted colours. There is also a custom mode where you can set the saturation, contrast and colour temperature to warmer or cooler tones.
In terms of brightness, the display of the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus can reach a peak brightness of 900nits which is good and also under direct sunlight, it has good visibility. The display has support for HDR on YouTube and there is Widevine L1 so you can stream HDR content on OTT platforms this display has Dolby Vision which makes it great for media consumption as colours come out very well.
Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus Performance:
The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus sports a powerful MediaTek Dimensity 1080 chipset which is also found on the Realme 10 Pro Plus. In terms of daily activities, the smartphone can handle all the tasks easily whether light or heavy. It handles all the games with ease and games like Apex Legends, BGMI, etc. can run at the highest graphics settings easily.
In BGMI, the smartphone can easily run at HDR graphics with Ultra frame rates without breaking a sweat and also it can run at Smooth graphics with Extreme frame rates. After long hours of gaming, the back of the smartphone does not heat up much as there is a dedicated liquid cooling system which dissipates heat faster.
In benchmarks, the scores came out very good and in the CPU throttling test, the smartphone could maintain a sustained performance of 90-95 per cent without any throttling detected which is great. You get support for good carrier aggregation and 10 bands of 5G. The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus is only available in one variant - 8GB LPDDR4X RAM with 256GB storage of UFS 2.2 speeds.
Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus Software:
The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus runs on the latest MIUI 14 based on Android 12 which is slightly disappointing as it is 2023 and still Xiaomi is providing Android 12 instead of Android 13 which is seen almost on all smartphones launched in 2023. MIUI 14 brings some very interesting features over MIUI 13 like customized folders with normal and larger icons with newer widgets support.
Then there is the automatic compression of the applications, the split between the notification shade and the control centre is enabled by default, etc. Then there are a lot of customizations where you can choose between different styles for the Always-On display, change different themes and wallpapers that are pre-installed and a Sidebar is present which provides a lot of features depending on which application is being used.
However, there is some amount of bloatware which can be uninstalled but it is very less in number compared to RealmeUI. Then there are some useful Mi-specific applications like Mi Video, MIUI File Manager, Mi Remote App, Security application, Gallery and Music. In terms of software updates, the smartphone will receive another two years of AndroidOS updates and three years of security updates.
Overall, the software experience is good but the presence of Android 12 limits it to get further newer AndroidOS updates.
Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus Cameras:
The Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus sports a triple camera where the main camera has a 200MP f/1.7 Samsung HPX sensor, then there is the 8MP f/2.2 ultrawide camera and a 2MP macro camera. On the front, there is a 16MP f/2.4 Sony IMX471 sensor for the front camera. However, the main camera has a different Samsung HPX sensor compared to the Samsung HP2 sensor used on the main camera of the Galaxy S23 Ultra.
The main camera takes images with sharper details and has good dynamic range but there is a lot of oversharpening in the background. The contrast is slightly on the higher side but there is no noise present in the background which is very good. All these results have been captured using the default Photo mode which saves 12MP images and there is another Ultra HD mode which saves 50MP images by default.
The images taken using the Ultra HD mode come out with sharper details with good contrast and dynamic range. The noise is non-existent in the background and the colours look natural with no oversharpening. The HDR mode also works well on the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus as it provides saturated colours with excellent dynamic range and contrast and also no noise in the background.
During the night, the Auto Night Mode triggers automatically which provides sharper details with almost no noise in the background. The dynamic range is excellent and the exposure in very low-light areas or even the shadows is handled very well. If you turn on the dedicated Night Mode instead of the Auto one, then also the details look sharper with great dynamic range with less noise in the background.
The 8MP ultrawide camera does a good job in terms of details that look sharper and have good dynamic range. The colours have good saturation and the dynamic range is also good. However, there is a lot of noise in the background and around the edges there is very minor distortion since there is the automatic distortion correction that works well around the edges.
At night, the ultrawide camera takes images with sharper details but there is a considerable amount of noise in the background and dynamic range takes a hit with average contrast. The colours also look slightly washed out but with the dedicated Night Mode, the dynamic range is better and the colours look good but the details look a tad softer.
The 2MP macro camera does a decent job of taking images with an average dynamic range, and the details look slightly softer. Since it is a fixed-focus camera, it does take some time to capture images which have some amount of noise in the background. It is always recommended to use the main camera for macro images by going closer to the object and applying 2x zoom for better results.
In terms of portraits, the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus uses the main camera for the portraits and these have the proper amount of background blur and edge detection is perfect. However, the details look slightly softer and the dynamic range is just good which could have been better. The skin tones look natural and colours are well-saturated in the background.
On the front, the 16MP selfie camera does a good job in terms of details that look sharper and the dynamic range is good. The skin tones look natural with no oversharpening in the background and also noise is very less. These selfies are saved in 4MP by default. In terms of portrait selfies, the edge detection is good with proper background blur but details look softer and noise is present on the higher side.
The main camera can record 4K videos at 30fps from the main camera whereas the ultrawide camera can only record 1080p videos at 30fps. The videos from the main camera come out with sharper details and have excellent contrast and dynamic range with almost no noise in the background. The colours have a natural look and at low light, you also get similar results thanks to the presence of OIS.
The 1080p videos at 60fps come out with great dynamic range and details look sharper with saturated colours and no noise in the background. The videos from the ultrawide camera come out with an average dynamic range with slightly more noise in the background. On the front, the selfie camera can record 1080p videos at 60fps which is great and the videos look sharper and have a good dynamic range with less noise in the background.
Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus Battery Life:
The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus sports a larger sized 5000mAh battery which is 500mAh more in capacity compared to the 4500mAh battery on its predecessor. With MIUI 14, you get some improved battery life as optimizations have been done well and the newer Dimensity 1080 chipset is very efficient also.
With normal usage which includes casual streaming of social media, listening to music, web browsing, etc, the smartphone easily lasted for two days and with heavy usage includes heavy gaming for 3-4 hours continuously, rendering videos, and continuous calls for longer hours, etc. the smartphone lasted for one single day with some charge left.
The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus has support for 120W HyperCharge technology where you have the 120W fast charger bundled inside the box that takes the smartphone from 0 to 100 per cent around 25-30 minutes. The smartphone only charges at these faster speeds when the Boost Charge Mode that is present in Settings is turned on whereas the smartphone charges at 60-80W speeds which are also very faster.
Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus Audio Quality:
The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus houses dual stereo speakers with dedicated speakers on the bottom as well as on the top. The sound comes out equally good on both and the level of loudness is very good even at the highest settings and does not distort. There is also the 3.5mm headphone jack that provides excellent sound output with support for Hi-Res audio. The Dolby Atmos provides further sound enhancements.
Verdict:
The Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus is a great all-rounder smartphone from Xiaomi that provides almost all the necessities required in a mid-range segment like a premium build and design, a nice 120Hz AMOLED display with dual stereo speakers, a powerful MediaTek Dimensity 1080 chipset provides good performance and excellent gaming, the battery life is good and the crazy 120W fast charging is the icing on the cake.
The camera performance is good but still, the ultrawide camera needs some improvement in terms of images and videos, the software experience is good and feature-rich but still has the older Android 12 running out of the box instead of Android 13, and it is slightly heavier side for someone having smaller hands. Other than these, the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus is a great option to consider but it is priced on the higher side.
So if you compared it to its predecessor, definitely it is a worthy upgrade and worth buying if you can digest that slightly higher price as you get one of the best specifications in the mid-range segment.
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