iQOO 9 Pro review

Video quality

The iQOO 9 Pro captures videos with all but the telephoto cameras. The main camera records video up to 8K at 30fps, and there's 4K at 24fps, 30fps and 60fps. The ultrawide shooter is limited to 30fps videos, but it can do both 4K and 1080p capturing. The selfie camera maxes out at Full HD at 30fps.

You get the option to choose between the h.264 and h.265 codecs.

Gimbal stabilization is naturally available on the primary camera, and it seems to include electronic stabilization as well.

Electronic stabilization is always-on and available on the ultrawide and the selfie cameras across all resolutions.

iQOO stabilization options are a bit awkward - there is Standard, Ultra, Horizontal Line, and Off. There are also options to show different markers (level, gimbal circle) to help you shoot better-stabilized videos.

Standard works on all cameras - it means Gimbal for the primary or EIS for the rest. The Ultra uses the main camera with gimbal and EIS, lowers the resolution down to 1080p@60fps and heavily crops the frame to achieve perfectly steady video. Horizontal line uses the ultrawide camera at 1080p@30fps and EIS, and it tries to stabilize the picture by a visible horizontal line on the viewfinder. Finally, Off uses the main camera without gimble or EIS.

Our advice - do not play with these stabilization triggers. Switching cameras is enough - each has its own stabilization, and it works brilliantly. The Stabilization menu is just a camera switching menu, but with different words. You may only want to visit these options if you want to turn off the gimbal for some obscure reason.

The stabilization works brilliantly on both the main and ultra-wide cameras. We found the videos to be incredibly steady, and vloggers, travelers, and amateur photographers should be equally satisfied.

The camcorder is incredibly generous with the bit rates - 8K footage gets 102Mbps, 4K - 50Mbps (35Mbps for ultrawide), while 1080p/30fps is allocated a similarly above-average 20-30Mbps when using the h.264 codec. The audio bitrate is 128Kbps, the sound is stereo.

Now, lets talk about the video quality.

The first video here was shot in 8K at 30fps, and the iQOO 9 Pro maintained a steady framerate. The picture offers average detail and looks upscaled. Various compression-like artefacts are visible, too. Other than that, the footage is of outstanding quality for colors, white balance, dynamic range and noise reduction. It looks great on 4K TVs, sharper than the regular 4K videos, so that's one reason to choose this resolution over the standard 4K. We tried comparing a regular 4K snapshot, and a 4K one that was resized down from the 8K clip, the latter was indeed noticeably sharper and with higher per-pixel detail.

The 4K video clips from the main camera are excellent. There is plenty of detail, no noise, the contrast is high, while the dynamic range is enough. The colors are lively and mostly true to life. Finally, the sound does come out rich and deep, too.

The standard 4K videos from the ultrawide camera (read corrected) are good. The detail is about the average towards mediocre around the corners, but the colors and contrast are great, and so is the noise reduction. The dynamic range is adequate, and the videos look natural.

The fisheye 4K clips from the ultrawide camera are amazing - they are especially sharp, with well-developed foliage, and building elements. There are no traces of noise, the colors and contrast superb, and the dynamic range is all right. Obviously, the picture is distorted, but that's the purpose of the fisheye look, and this camera could shine in certain destinations for sure.

The 8K low-light video makes sense for the same purposes as the daylight - be shown at 4K TVs or monitors as it will produce better sharpness than the regular 4K clips. Note that the 8K footage has a narrower field of view. The picture is noisy and soft, but the color saturation and the exposure are alright.

The 4K low-light videos from the main camera offer wider FoV, good contrast and great colors. The noise reduction has smeared some fine detail, and yet the clips are still noisy. But those are quite usable, so if needed - the camera will do an acceptable job.

The main camera also offers Super Night Video (the moon icon). It is always shot in 1080p resolution with 30fps and offers boosted exposure and highlights, colors are better as well, but most importantly - it's clean of any noise.

The 4K low-light videos from the ultrawide camera are darker, noisier and less detailed than the ones from the main camera, they are quite noisy, too. They are usable, but that's the best we can say for them.

The untouched 4K footage from the ultrawide camera with the fisheye look is amazingly decent. The resolved detail is a lot, the colors are preserved, and the exposure is okay even if a bit dark. The noise reduction does a very good job cleaning the noise, yet it is gentler on the fine detail. Overall, if you want to use the ultrawide camera at night for videos, you should use its fisheye option.

Finally, here is the iQOO 9 Pro in our video tool so you can make your own comparisons.

2160p: iQOO 9 Pro against the Galaxy S22 Ultra 5G and the vivo X70 Pro+ in our Video compare tool