Weekly poll results: Redmi 9 gets a warm reception

Flagship prices have shot up sky-high, are entry-level phones following a similar trajectory? Well, the Redmi 9 may be pricier than its predecessor, but it still got a lot of positive vibes in last week’s poll.

The MediaTek Helio G80 chipset is quite powerful for the segment. People were already discussing how well it will handle games at 1080p in order to put that higher resolution screen to good use. The Mali-G52 MC2 should hit 30 fps easily and go up to 60 fps in less demanding games. This GPU is comparable to the Adreno 612 (that’s the GPU inside the Moto One Zoom and the Galaxy A70 from last year).

However, there were some detractors. Those in the market for an actual entry-level device say they are waiting for the inevitable Redmi 9a – the “a” models scale back the hardware and shave as much off the price as possible. There were also rumors of a 9c model.

Interestingly, it’s the 1080p display of the Redmi 9 that came under fire. The increased graphical fidelity is nice, but it comes with higher power draw both from the screen itself and from the chipset, which now has to juggle twice as many pixels.

The additional camera is a must-have these days. An ultra wide cam creates photos with a very different perspective, it’s not just about how much you can fit in the frame (that is to say panorama mode is no replacement for an ultra wide lens). And some of those lucky enough to have both an ultra wide and a tele lens on their phone have found that they use the wide one more than the tele one.

At the end of the day, it looks like Xiaomi will be able to sell quite a few Redmi 9 phones. Perhaps not to the exact same people that the Redmi 8 attracted, but the upgraded hardware will attract new customers.