The Xiaomi Redmi Note 9 Pro was announced back in April, but it is only today that the UK launch has been announced with the phone coming to Amazon on the 8th of June with an RRP of £249.
Even though the phone is not launched yet, that RRP has already been slashed down to £229. There is probably a good reason for this, at £249 there is little reason to buy the phone over the already superb Redmi Note 8 Pro or the excellent Realme 6.
Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G vs Mediatek Helio G90T
Don’t get me wrong, the Redmi Note 9 Pro will no doubt be one of the best budget phones of the year, and Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G chipset offers superb performance. Many people may prefer having Qualcomm over the Mediatek Helio G90T in the other two phones. However, from my testing, the Helio G90T is as good if not better than the SD720 in many scenarios.
The SD720 is used on the more expensive Realme 6 Pro, so there is obviously a premium to using this chipset, but for a consumer looking for the best bang for your buck I see little reason to choose the SD720 over the Helio G90T.
| Total | CPU | GPU | MEM | UX | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Realme 6 – Helio G90T | 290644 | 97549 | 81058 | 55547 | 56490 |
| Realme 6 Pro – SD720G | 282336 | 104143 | 70801 | 52273 | 55119 |
| Realme X2 – SD730G | 258311 | 98328 | 67574 | 47945 | 44464 |
Camera Specification
The camera specification has seen almost no changes between generations. The new Redmi Note 9 Pro has:
- 64 MP, f/1.9, 26mm (wide), 1/1.72″, 0.8µm, PDAF
- 8 MP, f/2.2, 119˚ (ultrawide), 1/4.0″, 1.12µm
- 5 MP, f/2.4, (macro), 1/5.0″, 1.12µm, AF
- 2 MP, f/2.4, (depth)
The older Redmi Note 9 Pro has a lower specced macro camera at just 2MP.
Then the selfie camera of the new phone is actually worse at just 16 MP with a 1/3.1″ sensor, this is down from the 20MP 1/3″. However, this is now in a punch hole vs dew droip notch so aesthetically the phone looks nicer.
The Realme 6 has an identical spec to the Redmi Note 8 Pro on the rear then uses the same 16MP selfie lens of the Note 9 Pro.
Display & Design
The biggest difference is the increase in size to 6.67 inches from 6.53 inches with both phones having 1080 x 2400 pixel displays. Then, of course, the Note 9 Pro has the punch hole while the older phone has the notch.
The Realme 6 is a touch smaller at 6.5 inches but this also runs at 6.5 inches however this has a refresh rate of 90Hz.
Battery
The battery has improved quite a bit you now have 5020mAh and 20W charging vs 4500mAh and 18W.
Then the Realme has 4300mAh and 30W
Price and memory options
The current Amazon listing with the lower price as 6GB RAM and 64GB storage for £229
You can get the Redmi Note 8 Pro with 6GB/64GB for just £195 or the 6GB/128GB model for £209
For the Realme, you can get this for £219, but it only has 4GB RAM and 64GB storage, the 8GB/128GB model jumps up to £269.
Overall
At the RRP of £249, the Redmi Note 9 Pro did not look like a good buy compared to the older model. Even now, you are paying £34 more for not much difference in the specification. While that is not a huge amount of money, it is a 17% price difference and would have been 26.7% if sold at RRP.
For £34 you basically get a larger phone with more attractive design thanks to the punch hole and a shift from the rear fingerprint scanner to side, then significantly better battery specs.
