Xiaomi Redmi 9 Hands-on, First Impressions

Entering the sub-PHP10k battleground is Xiaomi’s new Redmi 9 — not to be confused with the Redmi Note 9. It sports a Full HD display, a MediaTek Helio G80 chipset, up to 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage, quad rear cameras, and a huge 5,020mAh battery. Let’s check it out.

Close to 200g, it’s a hefty device and you can definitely feel it. It’s solid, robust, but at the same time looks pretty good. The back panel is not made of any reflective material, it’s a matte plastic with ripples starting from the rear camera area.

The front panel is home to a 6.53-inch IPS display with a resolution of 2340 x 1080, with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection. The bezels are relatively thick, especially the bottom one, and on top it utilizes a waterdrop notch to house the 8MP front camera and speakerphone.

The left side contains the triple card tray with dedicated slots for two nano SIM cards and a microSD card. On the right, we have the volume rocker and power button.

At the bottom, we get a headphone jack, the main microphone, USB Type-C port, and loudspeaker. Up top, the secondary noise-canceling microphone as well as a Redmi staple, the IR blaster.

Checking out the back, we have a quad camera setup with an interesting setup. Three of them are in one module in the middle along with the fingerprint scanner, and we have an additional one in a separate module with the LED flash.

The rear cameras are a 13MP main, 8MP ultrawide, 5MP macro, and 2MP depth. In front, it’s an 8MP camera. Check out some of our initial sample shots here:

Powering the Redmi 9 is a MediaTek Helio G80 octa-core CPU with a Mali-G52 MC2 GPU, along with 3GB/4GB of RAM and 32GB/64GB of internal storage. For battery, we get a 5,020mAh cell with support for 18W fast charging, which is nice.

Running the software department is MIUI 11 on top of Android 10 — but MIUI 12 is definitely coming soon for this device.

The Redmi 9 is priced at PHP6,990USD 119INR 10,098EUR 113CNY 867 for the 3GB + 32GB variant, and PHP7,490USD 128INR 10,820EUR 122CNY 930 for the 4GB + 64GB variant — both of which are great prices for a phone with this hardware. We’re gonna see what it can really do, so do stay tuned for our full review.

Redmi 9 specs:
6.53-inch FHD+ (2340 x 1080) IPS display, 400N, 70% NTSC
Corning Gorilla Glass 3
MediaTek Helio G80 2.0GHz octa-core CPU
Mali-G52 MC2 GPU
3GB, 4GB LPDDR4X RAM
32GB, 64GB eMMC 5.1 storage
Up to 512GB via MicroSD card (dedicated slot)
Quad rear cameras: 13MP F2.2 (wide) + 8MP F2.2 (ultra-wide) + 5MP F2.4 (macro) + 2MP F2.4 (depth)
8MP F2.0 front camera
4G LTE
WiFi 802.11 n
Bluetooth 5.0
GPS, A-GPS, GLONASS, Beidou
NFC
IR Blaster
Rear-mounted fingerprint scanner
3.5mm audio jack
USB Type-C
5,020mAh battery w/ 18W fast charging support
163.32 x 77.01 x 9.1mm
198g
Carbon Grey, Sunset Purple, Ocean Green