Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus Review: Is this solid offering from Xiaomi worth the newer upgrades in the mid-range segment?

 

A solid mid-ranger from Xiaomi with a lot of exciting features!!

Redmi Note smartphones have been the epitome of a feature-rich and affordability set of smartphones in the budget and mid-range segment as they bring some specifications which provide the basic necessities for an individual daily. The Redmi Note 13 series is trying to set the newer wave of excitement, especially with its top-end offering i.e. the Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus.

While the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus (Review) launched last year had set the standards for the Note lineup with its great set of specifications and each generation of this lineup saw an increase in the prices. The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus is the successor to the already popular Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus and this newer smartphone brings some very exclusive features like IP rating, 200MP primary camera, etc.

So can the Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus continue to deliver the same level of richness as its predecessor in the mid-range segment and is it worth the upgrade over its predecessor? 

Let's find out in the full review.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus Design:

The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus sports a newer design with a curved look both at the front as well as on the back. The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus is available in three different colours - Fusion Black, Fusion White, and Fusion Purple colour of the last one has a vegan leather finish at the back giving it a premium look and feel while holding it in hands.

The cameras are placed on the back instead of on a camera bump and all three cameras are surrounded by glossy plastic rings. The back is curved to the sides which makes it easy to hold in hands. This Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus has an IP68 rating for dust and water resistance which is the very first Redmi Note smartphone to have an IP rating.

The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus weighs around 204 grams which makes it slightly heavier. Around the sides, the smartphone has a polycarbonate frame running all around and is slimmer at 8.9mm. The right side of the smartphone houses the power button and the volume buttons whereas the left side remains completely empty.

On the top, there is a secondary noise-cancelling microphone, an IR Blaster, and a secondary speaker setup. The bottom of the smartphone houses a USB Type-C port, a loudspeaker grille which serves as the primary speaker, a primary microphone and a dual SIM card slot. There is neither a 3.5mm headphone jack nor a microSD card for storage expansion. 

On the front, there is a curved display with thinner bezels around the sides which looks premium and to the top centre, is the cutout for the selfie camera. Since both the front as well as the back are curved now, the smartphone feels slippery slightly. Still, overall the build and design is where Xiaomi has nailed it with the Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus making it look like a flagship smartphone.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus Display:

On the front, the Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus houses a 6.67-inches 1.5K (1220x2712 pixels) AMOLED display which is a 12-bit one and since it is an AMOLED display, the blacks and blues look deeper with great viewing angles.  Like its predecessor i.e. the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus, this one also has a 120Hz refresh rate display which is great.

Talking about the refresh rate, this one is an adaptive one which means you get two different settings - Custom and Default. Switching to the Custom option allows the display to refresh between 60Hz or 120Hz only whereas the Default mode allows the display to switch between 30, 60, 90, and 120Hz respectively depending on the content in the display.

Combined with the 120Hz refresh rate, you get a 240Hz touch sampling rate for faster touch responses. The display of the Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus can reach a good peak brightness of 1800nits but under direct sunlight, the display can achieve around 1200nits which provides good visibility. The display also has the Dolby Vision which provides great content consumption.

In terms of display settings, there are four different modes to choose from - Vivid, Saturated, Standard, and Advanced that includes the sRGB and P3 settings. However, setting the display to Vivid or Saturated provides a saturated colour content with deep blacks and blues whereas Standard provides a slightly off-white tone in the display. P3 again provides punchier colours in the display.

The display of the Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus has an optical in-display fingerprint scanner that works fast and is accurate. The display has support for HDR on YouTube and there is Widevine L1 so you can stream HDR content on OTT platforms easily and currently  Netflix also supports Dolby Vision. In terms of display protection, there is Corning Gorilla Glass Victus present which is really great. 

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus Performance:

The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus is powered by the newer MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Ultra which has an octa-core setup that consists of 2x2.8 GHz Cortex-A710 cores with another 6x2.0 GHz Cortex-A510 cores coupled with a powerful Mali-G610 MC4 GPU. This chipset is based on an efficient 4nm process and you can expect a great performance and battery life.

In terms of daily tasks, the smartphone can handle all tasks like scrolling between webpages, rendering videos, clicking images, playing games, etc. easily without breaking a sweat. In gaming, all heavy games like BGMI, the smartphone could easily run at Smooth graphics with 90fps frame rates and also it could run on HDR graphics with Ultra frame rates. 

However, after longer hours of gaming i.e. 3-4 hours continuously, the smartphone did not feel much warmer but around the camera module, it does feel slightly warmer. In the CPU throttling test, the smartphone could attain a sustained performance of around 70-80 per cent which is good with minimal throttling detected. The scores came out really good in benchmarks.

In terms of network connectivity, you get support for good carrier aggregation and also have around 12 bands of 5G. The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus is available in three different variants - 8GB RAM with 256GB storage, 12GB RAM with 256GB storage, and 12GB RAM with 512GB storage where RAM is of LPDDR5X and storage speeds are of UFS 3.1. There is also virtual RAM on board for better multitasking.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus Software:

The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus runs with MIUI 14 built on top of Android 13 out of the box. This is a big disappointment as many smartphones launched in 2024 come with Android 14 out of the box. Also, even Xiaomi's own sub-brand POCO has its own offering POCO X6 Pro which comes with HyperOS which is based on the latest Android 14 out of the box.

MIUI 14 comes with many newer features like text recognition in Gallery, management of devices through the Smart Devices feature, larger home screen folders, and optimized CPU and GPU usage. Just like all MIUI versions, there is a split between the Notification shade and Control Centre where you would find all the toggles. There is a floating window where you can use multiple applications at a time.

There is also the Sidebar where you can keep your favourite applications and use them accordingly. There are newer themes present with MIUI 14 and now with each theme, you get newer wallpapers, ringtones, system icon looks, and also different styles for the Always-On Display. There is a security feature called Security application which has the settings and privacy feature along with management of permissions of various apps.

Though MIUI is well optimized, there is a lot of unnecessary bloatware present which can be uninstalled easily and you can disable the GetApps which does throw in a lot of notifications. In terms of software updates, the Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus will receive another three years of AndroidOS updates and four years of security patches. 

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus Cameras:

The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus houses a similar set of cameras as that of its predecessor i.e. the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus which includes a 200MP f/1.7 Samsung ISOCELL HP3 sensor for the main camera which supports OIS, an 8MP f/2.2 ultrawide camera and a 2MP f/2.4 macro camera. On the front, there is a 16MP f/2.4 camera.

The images taken during the daylight from the main camera come out with excellent details with good dynamic range and less noise is present in the background. The contrast is slightly higher and colours look saturated in the background also. All these images are saved at 12.5MP by default. At 2x zoom, the images have a great amount of detail and have a good dynamic range.

During the night, the primary camera automatically turns on the Night Mode by default and these images come out with excellent details with good dynamic range, less noise in the background and also good colour saturation with proper exposure in low light. The details in shadows are abundant. Without the night mode, the images come out with good details but do have a slightly average dynamic range and more noise.

The 8MP ultrawide camera does a good job in terms of details and dynamic range but looks over-exposed in most scenarios. There is a large amount of noise present in the background with distortion around the edges. At night, the images from the ultrawide camera come out with good details but look softer, have more noise in the background but the colours look saturated without any kind of oversharpening.

The third camera is a 2MP macro camera which is just for taking macro images and these images have an average amount of detail, decent dynamic range, more noise in the background and colours look slightly washed out. In terms of portraits, the primary camera does a good job in terms of dynamic range and edge detection with proper background blur.

The portraits have a natural-looking skin tone and the details look great. In terms of selfies, the front camera does a good job in terms of details and has a good dynamic range with natural-looking skin tones. The noise is on the slightly higher side which needs to be improved. In terms of selfie portraits, the edge detection and background blur come out well with less noise in the background.

In terms of videos, the primary camera of the Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus can record 4K videos at 30fps and these videos come out with good details that look sharper, have great dynamic range, colour saturation is perfect and since there is OIS, there is almost no noise present in the background. However, there is some issue in terms of focusing which is slightly cumbersome.

The ultrawide camera can take 1080p videos at 30fps and the videos come out with decent dynamic range and details look softer with a lot of noise in the background. The front camera can record 1080p videos at 30fps and these videos come out with a good dynamic range but there is some amount of noise present in the background. 

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus Battery Life:

The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus sports a 5000mAh battery which is similar in capacity to that of its predecessor i.e. the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus and with normal usage that includes scrolling through webpages, streaming social media, listening to music, etc. the smartphone easily lasted for two days with some charge left which is good considering the chipset is built on an efficient 4nm process.

With heavy usage which includes playing games like BGMI for 4-5 hours continuously, taking images and videos, running benchmarks, etc. the smartphone easily lasted for one and a half days with some charge left. The standard screen-on time with normal usage came around 6-6.5 hours and with heavy usage, the standard screen-on time came around 4-5 hours.

In terms of charging, like its predecessor i.e. the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus, this smartphone also supports 120W HyperCharge technology so as a result, you get a 120W fast charger which charges the smartphone from 0 to 100 per cent within 20-25 minutes which is very fast. To utilize the full 120W charging, you need to enable Boost Charge Mode or else the smartphone charges at 60-70W.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus Audio Quality:

The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus sports a dual stereo speaker setup that houses the primary speaker at the bottom and the two outlets for the secondary speaker which together provide a stereo sound effect and even at the loudest settings, the sound does not feel muffled. There is Dolby Atmos for enhanced sound output. 

Verdict:

The Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus provides a great package in a mid-range smartphone which includes a refreshing design and has good build quality, a 120Hz AMOLED curved display with a set of stereo speakers, a powerful MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Ultra chipset which provides good performance and gaming experience, the 200MP camera setup does a great job in terms of images and videos, etc.

The one thing that this smartphone brings is an IP68 rating which is the first for the Redmi Note series and is a good addition in the mid-range segment. The software experience is good with the MIUI 14 as it is well optimized and it combines a solid battery life with support for 120W fast charging. However, there are things where Xiaomi could have been improved. 

The software is where Xiaomi is still sticking with the older Android 13 instead of the newer Android 14-based HyperOS that is even present on the POCO X6 Pro. The primary camera does a good job but it does struggle in terms of low-light performance and the ultrawide camera could have been better. Other than that, the smartphone proves to be a good all-rounder to be considered in the mid-range segment.

However, when compared to its predecessor i.e. the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus, you get extras like the IP68 rating, a slightly powerful chipset, better brightness levels, and an in-display fingerprint scanner which looks to be a good upgrade but if you are someone who does not want these extras, the Redmi Note 12 Pro Plus is a still a great mid-range smartphone to be considered.