Xiaomi Mi Note 10 comming soon

Xiaomi Mi Note 10 Review: The 108MP Penta Camera Is Here

Chinese phone maker Xiaomi after launching Mi Note 10, the world’s first smartphone to feature 108MP camera in Europe and in its domestic market as Mi CC9 Pro, is now all set to launch the smartphone in India by January 2020, GizmoChina reported on Monday.

The company's latest smartphone, the Xiaomi Mi Note 10, takes this approach to the extreme. It's a phone that outmatches expensive flagships with its 108-megapixel, penta camera and massive battery, while keeping the price at a fairly reasonable 550 euros ($610). 

At the same time, the Mi Note 10 has a mid-range, Qualcomm Snapdragon 730G processor, no face unlocking capabilities, and no water resistance. Are the tradeoffs worth it? Read on. 

Predictably fast

Typically, I'll start a review with an overview of the phone's design. But let's get performance out of the way. The Snapdragon 730G processor is not as powerful as the Snapdragon 855+, but I've been struggling to notice the difference. The phone is fast and responsive.

Mi note 10

   

The company is running a global photography competition. According to terms and conditions, winners will get the Mi Note 10 smartphone worth Rs 46,832. It is not clear whether this is the final India pricing or just tentative pricing based on the European model.

The review unit I was sent had 6GB of RAM and 128GB of storage; for me, this was plenty, but those who crave more storage should keep in mind that this phone does not have a memory card slot, so those 128 gigabytes are what you get. 

About that battery — it's an absolutely humongous 5,260mAh cell that will certainly last you a day and a half, but not more, as the phone seems to drain the battery a bit faster than what I would've expected. You also get a fast charger which will charge the phone from 0-100 percent in a little over an hour. Put the two together, and you get pretty great battery performance, even if it's not the best on the market

Dark mode yes, ads hell no

The Mi Note 10 is the first phone to sport Xiaomi's new MIUI 11 Android skin, which is combined with Android 9 (pity it's not Android 10). Overall, I've found MIUI 11 to be better and more intuitive than the user interfaces of some competitors from China. 

And while the MIUI does a pretty good job at the basics — the Settings menu is well organized, the control panel isn't too cluttered, and notifications work well — I don't like some of the new features. The dynamic wallpaper animations never cease, making them annoying in about 10 seconds. The new task switcher, which shows apps in groups of two, side by side, isn't that great either. But overall, I was able to set the phone up to my liking, and would have no issue switching to it from my iPhone. 

So many cameras

With a 108/20/12/5/2-megapixel penta camera setup on the back and a 32-megapixel shooter on the front, you'd expect fireworks, but Xiaomi keeps things fairly simple in its camera app. That's smart — most users want to just point and click, and swarming them with too many options is counterproductive. However, this approach sometimes backfires; I struggled to find the macro mode, only to realize it's hidden in one of the dots above the menu in the camera app. 

The options largely reflect the versatility of those five sensors on the back. Besides the macro mode and various zoom settings (0.6x, 1x, 2x, 5x, and up to 50x hybrid zoom if you swipe out with two fingers), there's also a portrait mode, a night mode, and even a dedicated 108-megapixel mode.