Weekly poll results: Poco X5 duo gets an okay start, the vanilla model more so than the Pro

Some of you have already bought a Poco X5 Pro and leveraged the early bird pricing, though judging by last week’s poll the phone is just as likely to turn people away as it is to draw them in. Surprisingly, the vanilla X5 ended up the more popular option. What happened?

At a glance: Poco X5 Pro and Poco X5

Price and features is the short answer. For the former, the old Poco X4 Pro can be found for around the same price as the vanilla X5 and the old Pro is the better phone. The new Pro has some upgrades, but some downgrades too.

The major upgrade is the Snapdragon 778G chipset, which was well received among commenters. It is indeed quite powerful for this price class, though it and the Snapdragon 870 have been around for a while, so it’s not that hard to find similarly priced phones with those chips.

As for downgrades, some people really love their microSD cards and the X5 Pro removed the slot. The X4 Pro had a microSD slot, the X5 still has one, the new Pro does not. That’s a self-inflicted wound on Xiaomi’s part.

The Poco X5 fared better – most people looking at the X5 duo would rather have the vanilla model than the new Pro. The lower price definitely helps as does the microSD slot. The 48MP camera isn’t much to write home about, though the 108MP module of the Pro is lacking OIS and 4K @ 60fps video, so its camera isn’t the main reason people want one anyway.

In the way of criticism, the X5 duo are phones that launch in 2023 with Android 12 and Pocos aren’t known for their numerous or timely updates.

The Poco X series still has life left in it, but in the minds of many of our readers it peaked back in the time of the X3 series.