Xiaomi has started 2016 with the release of its Redmi Note 3, a phone that was launched in China last year. The major difference being that the Redmi Note 3 in India will be housing the Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 chipset whereas the one in China was launched with the MediaTek Helio X10 processor. Apart from being the first Xiaomi phone with a full metal body, this is also Xiaomi’s first foray into fingerprint scanner sporting handsets.
The phone was announced to a packed auditorium on 3 March, and Hugo Barra, Xiaomi’s vice president of international also announced that the Mi5, Xiaomi’s flagship phone that was announced at the Mobile World Congress, will be coming to India next month. So let us see if the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 repeats the magic that its last generation phones were
The Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 sports an all metal body and has rounded edges along the sides. Turn around the phone and the resemblance to the rear side on the Meizu MX5 is uncanny. The round fingerprint scanner is located just below the 16MP camera on the rear side and they are aligned to be placed in the centre. The dual LED flash unit is located in between the camera and the fingerprint scanner. The base has the speaker section and there’s a slight protrusion chin just below to ensure there is a gap between speaker section and the flat surface its placed on.
Features: 8/10
Xiaomi is one company which started the specs vs price battle when it had launched the Mi 3 two years ago. And that is a legacy it has carried forward with the Redmi Note 3 as well. For starters, the Redmi Note 3 comes with Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 SoC which houses a hexa core processor, with a dual core Cortex A72 processor clocked at 1.8GHz and a quad-core Cortex A53 processor clocked at 1.4GHz. This is paired with Adreno 510 GPU.
Software: 7.5/10
MIUI 7 OS which was announced by Xiaomi in October last year comes loaded on the phone. While in terms of pure looks, there isn’t any drastic difference from the MIUI 6, but we do see some finesse on the OS. Xiaomi has added on a lot more Indian themes to the MIUI 7 for starters. It has an animated profile picture feature called ‘Showtime’ which lets other MIUI users see your animated selfies when you call them, instead of a profile picture.
Xiaomi has clearly delivered enough goods with the Redmi Note 3 for us to recommend it. While it comes in two variants – Rs 9, 999(for 2GB RAM/16GB ROM) and Rs 11, 999(for 3GB RAM/32GB ROM) – we would recommend the latter as it gives you more room to do multi-tasking. Of course, you need to keep in mind that this phone does not perform well in the low light photography department. So if all you are looking for is a great battery life and fast performance – the Redmi Note 3 has little competition.
One thing we would have really liked to see is a Marshmallow OS support, instead of the dated Android 5.1. But considering the Redmi Note 3 ships with the MIUI 7, we are not sure when and if the Redmi Note 3 will get an Android 6.0 facelift. Not that the current implementation is bad in any way, but with Android 6.0 features like Doze mode can be great value adds to the already good battery life on the Redmi Note 3.
The Xiaomi Redmi Note 3’s closest competition is the LeEco Le 1s which is selling for Rs 10, 999 and houses MediaTek Helio X10 processor with 3GB RAM and 32GB storage. We had faced call quality issues with the Le 1s, which is non existent in the Redmi Note 3. Also in terms of pure performance, the Snapdragon 650 goes ahead of Helio X10 by a significant amount. Redmi Note 3 will surely ruin Le 1s’s party with its offering.
If you are still not convinced of either of these phones, then you may check out the trusted Moto G 3rd gen or the Huawei Honor 5X which are around the same price brackets as well.