Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G review

Redmi smartphones are positioned as more affordable than Xiaomi flagships. However, the top Redmi models are already approaching the flagship models in some respects. The new Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G, which is currently the top of the line in the Redmi line, arrived at gg for review. It does have a number of features that are typical of flagships. But it also has some compromises that made the price more affordable. Below, we'll tell you what happened and how successful it is. Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G.

The smartphone is very pleasant to use and has a number of undeniable advantages. First of all, it has an excellent quality AMOLED display with a good level of brightness and support for all HDR standards. The smartphone also has an interesting and stylish design, which is complemented by full IP68 dust and water protection, as in more expensive flagships. To this should be added an extremely fast charging speed, good performance, and a good main camera of 200 MP, which takes high-quality photos in most situations. And as small but pleasant bonuses, it's worth mentioning stereo sound and an infrared transmitter for controlling electronics. If we talk about the less pleasant aspects of using a smartphone, then, first of all, we should mention the large number of unnecessary programs and games out of the box, as well as annoying ads in proprietary applications. It's also worth mentioning that the ultra-wide-angle camera is very mediocre and lacks autofocus. Although there are more affordable smartphones with better ultra-wide cameras. And the 2MP macro camera is more of a toy.

There are interesting competitors in this range, including Xiaomi models. For example, the Xiaomi 13T has a more interesting set of cameras, a slightly more powerful processor, and a high-quality flat screen (for some, this will be a significant advantage) with a frequency of 144 Hz. But at the same price, it has less internal memory and slower charging at 67W. Or POCO F5 Pro with a more powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Plus Gen 1 processor.

5 reasons to buy Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G:

• Excellent AMOLED display with a refresh rate of 120 Hz
• High-quality 200MP main camera
• Stylish design and IP68 protection
• Super-fast 120W charging
• Modern set of wireless interfaces and an IR transmitter for controlling electronics

2 reasons not to buy Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G:

• Proprietary apps have built-in ads, many unnecessary apps out of the box
• Mediocre ultra-wide-angle camera, ineffective macro camera

Quick Transition:

1. What does Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G come with?
2. What does Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G look like?
3. How good is the Samsung Galaxy S23 FE screen?
4. Performance, sound and battery life of Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G
5. How user-friendly is the Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G interface?
6. How do Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G cameras shoot?
7. Five things you need to know about this smartphone

What does Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G come with?

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G comes in a standard-sized white box with the model name and picture. Inside is a pretty good package. In addition to the smartphone, the box contains a 120W charger, a Type-C cable, a screen protector, a tray eject tool, documentation, and a silicone protective bumper. It is black and does not match the colour of the smartphone itself. But it is much better and more pleasant to the touch than standard transparent bundled cases. And it has a side that protects the back of the case.

What does Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G look like?

One of the main features of Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G is the curved screen on the sides. The company notes that this is the first time such a screen has been used in the Redmi line. Opinions on curved screens are divided, whether you like it or not is an individual matter. But it looks really great. The bezels around the perimeter are very thin, the manufacturer claims that the chin is only 2.37 mm wide. The front camera is made in the usual way, in the form of a round hole. Above it is a thin slot for the earpiece speaker. The front panel is protected by Gorilla Glass Victus.

The frame no longer feels as expensive as the screen. It is made of silver-coloured plastic that resembles metal but is not. Although Xiaomi claims that the design has metal inserts at the corners of the smartphone. The sides of the frame taper and have a flat surface. The power and volume buttons are placed as standard, no surprises there. The height is quite comfortable for use with both hands.

The top has two microphones, additional speaker holes used for stereo sound reproduction and an infrared port for using a smartphone as a remote control for consumer electronics. The bottom has a main speaker, microphone, Type-C connector and a tray.

You can install two SIM cards in the tray. The smartphone also supports eSIM. There is no space for a memory card. But given the 256 GB storage in the younger version, this is not critical.

The back cover is also made of Gorilla Glass Victus and has bends on the sides. The coating is not matte, but rather pearlescent. We received a light purple version. It looks quite interesting, the back cover is conventionally divided into rectangles of different shades.

All three rear camera modules are separate and protrude quite strongly above the surface of the back cover.

Another feature that is usually more typical of flagships is full protection according to the IP68standard, so theoretically the smartphone can withstand immersion in water to a depth of 1.5 m for 30 minutes. The smartphone is medium-sized by modern standards, 161.4x74.2x8.9 mm, and weighs just over 200 g. Thanks to its good shape, the smartphone is comfortable to use.

How good is the screen of Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G?

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G is equipped with a curved 6.67-inch AMOLED screen. The screen has a rather unusual resolution of 2712x1220 (aspect ratio 20:9), pixel density is about 446 ppi. The manufacturer promises a peak brightness of 1800 cd/m². The screen supports all HDR standards: HDR10, HDR10+, Dolby Vision, and HLG. It is claimed that a 12-bit matrix is used, and 100% coverage of the DCI-P3 colour space is promised. The sensor readout frequency is 2160 Hz in game mode, PWM is 1920 Hz. The maximum refresh rate is 120 Hz, and in the settings you can choose automatic mode or a fixed frequency of 60 or 120 Hz. In the settings, you can choose a dark or light theme with the ability to switch on by schedule, enable the reading mode, select the scale of the interface text, colour mode with manual colour temperature adjustment, and Always on Display. But it's not quite full-fledged in a smartphone: it's only displayed for 10 seconds.

The display is really of excellent quality, with very rich colours and maximum viewing angles. The brightness is enough for comfortable use in most situations, although it was not possible to check it in the bright summer sun for obvious reasons. Measurements have shown that the maximum brightness in "Bright" mode is 492.231 cd/m². The colour gamut is much wider than sRGB. But the colour temperature is slightly too high, the picture leans towards cold shades. You can adjust it in the settings.

In the "Standard" mode, the colour gamut is close to sRGB, although not exactly the same, but the colour temperature is closer to the reference value. The maximum brightness is slightly lower: 448.488 cd/m².

Samsung Galaxy S23 FE screen comparison with other models:

Performance, sound, and battery life Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G is the first smartphone to feature the Mediatek Dimensity 7200 Ultra processor. Although, in fact, it differs from the regular Mediatek Dimensity 7200 only in the image processing signal processor, so the difference is only in camera operation. Mediatek Dimensity 7200 Ultra is a 4-nanometre octa-core processor in the mid-range segment, with two ARM Cortex-A715 cores clocked at 2.8 GHz and six ARM Cortex-A510 cores clocked at 2.0 GHz. The accelerator is responsible for the graphics Mali-G610 MC4. You shouldn't expect top performance, but the processor is powerful enough for a shell with any applications and for modern games. There is 8/12/16 GB of LPDDR5 RAM (plus another 6 GB of expansion due to the drive), the built-in storage can be 256 or 512 GB, and fast UFS 3.1 memory is used. The version with 12/512 GB is under review.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G performance tests

In synthetic tests, the smartphone shows quite good results for a modern mid-range smartphone. Of course, it's not a flagship, but the power will be enough for the vast majority of users.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G performance

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G was a pleasant surprise in terms of heating and performance stability. A rather large evaporation chamber is used. In the Throttling Test, the processor drops performance by up to 94% in 15 minutes of maximum load, which is a very good indicator. The body may get a little warm in synthetic tests and during long gaming sessions, but it becomes warm, not hot.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G performance in games

Like any modern smartphone, Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G has its own Game Turbo gaming application, which generally has standard functionality. A hub with all the installed games, performance settings, disabling notifications, blocking brightness, etc. Everything is very good with games. Genshin Impact runs at a fairly stable 60 FPS on medium settings. Diablo Immortal - 30 FPS on high settings (60 FPS mode is not supported for some reason). Call of Duty Mobile - stable 60 FPS on high graphics settings.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G Wireless and Sound

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G features dual-band Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac/6, Bluetooth 5.3 LE and NFC for contactless payment. Support for global positioning systems: GPS, A-GPS, Glonass, Galileo, Beidou and QZSS. The smartphone reproduces stereo sound through the main and earpiece speakers, there is support for virtual surround sound Dolby Atmos. The volume is quite good, but the quality is mediocre. The sound is flat, almost without low frequencies. But this is typical for mid-range smartphones.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G battery test

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G is equipped with a 5,000 mAh battery . The battery life is quite typical for modern smartphones. With active use (with games, active use of the camera), the smartphone will live until late in the evening. With more moderate use (calls, email, messengers, browser, YouTube, some music and a camera), you can get a day of work from a single charge. But an important feature of the smartphone is its extremely fast 120W HyperCharge charging. To improve charging efficiency and extend battery life, a separate P1 chip is used. The manufacturer claims that the smartphone is fully charged in 19 minutes. In real life, it takes a little more than 20 minutes, but it doesn't matter. In any case, you can charge your smartphone while taking a shower or making your morning coffee. the smartphone gains 70% in 15 minutes, and 30% in 5 minutes. The Power Delivery 3.0 fast charging standard is also supported. But, of course, the speed will be slower. Wireless charging is not supported. But given the speed of wired charging, this can hardly be called a disadvantage.

Additional features Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G

Now let's talk about some more hardware features. The smartphone has an infrared port for controlling consumer electronics. The corresponding application is installed on the smartphone. It was tested on a Philips TV and LG air conditioner, and everything works.

We also skipped the traditional section on how to unlock a smartphone. The fact is that we reviewed a smartphone with firmware designed for trading floors. It has a number of limitations. For example, there is no way to set up any type of smartphone lock (code, password, fingerprint, face recognition). Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G has an in-screen fingerprint scanner. We were not able to check how it works for its intended purpose. But it has an additional function: heart rate measurement. And this function works quite well.

How user-friendly is the Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G interface?

Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G runs on Android 13 with the proprietary MIUI 14 shell. Which is quite surprising, given the ready-made HyperOS based on Android 14. The shell is quite different visually from pure Android, but there are no significant differences in terms of the interface logic itself. Typical desktops with icons and widgets, three types of display (desktops, desktops with a separate application menu, and a simplified mode with large icons). Gesture and button navigation, as well as many options for customising the appearance of the shell.

The curtain can be of two versions: the classic one, like in Android. Or the so-called new version: swiping from the left side of the top edge of the screen opens notifications. On the right side, you can access quick wireless network switches, volume and brightness controls, etc.

The application manager has a slightly different look: applications are displayed as cards in two columns with vertical scrolling. It is possible to open applications in a window, as well as in two-window mode.

One of the unpleasant features of the shell is that there are many unnecessary applications installed out of the box. But even more annoying are the ads. They are regularly displayed in full screen, even in Xiaomi's proprietary apps:

A set of quite typical proprietary apps. Voice recorder, notes, calculator, QR code scanner, compass, level, etc.:

How do Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G cameras shoot?

The rear camera of Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G includes three modules. The main one is at 200 megapixels ISOCELL HP3 with f/1.7 aperture, 23 EFP, 1/1.4" matrix size, 0.56µm pixel size. It has omni-directional phase detection autofocus and optical stabilisation. It is claimed that the camera can take photos with 2x and 4x zoom without loss of quality. The second module is an ultra-wide-angle module at 8 MP with an aperture of f/2.2 and a viewing angle of 120° without autofocus. The third module is a 2 MP f/2.4 macro of dubious usefulness. The maximum video resolution is 4K@30fps. The front camera has a resolution of 16 MP, f/2.4. Of course, we would have liked a telephoto module instead of macro. But still, we are not looking at a flagship in the full sense of the word.

The camera app has a very user-friendly and intuitive interface. All the most important settings are available on the viewfinder screen, and additional settings are in the drop-down menu. The modes are switched with the usual swipes, and additional ones are in a separate section.

Examples of Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G camera photos

The main camera takes great pictures in almost any conditions. With sufficient lighting, the colours are natural and the detail is high. The night mode does its job well and the level of detail does not decrease significantly. But the colours are not as natural, which is quite normal.

The ultra-wide-angle camera works well during the day. Of course, you can see a decrease in clarity at the edges of the frame, which is typical for all ultra-wide-angle cameras. Night photos are also good:

The smartphone does not have a telephoto camera, so the zoom is exclusively digital. A crop from the main camera. the 2x zoom generally works quite well in good light. In the evening, the detail is noticeably reduced, noise appears, and it becomes more difficult to take a high-quality photo:

4x digital zoom

The macro camera has a low resolution and no autofocus. So you can play around, but the photo quality is mediocre.

Example of video shooting Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G

4K 30 FPS video on a smartphone is quite good. The shake is minimal, the jelly effect is also slightly present, but not critical:

Quick review of Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G: four things you need to know about this smartphone

• Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 Pro+ 5G is the most expensive and most advanced smartphone in the Redmi line.
• Inside is a modern mid-range Mediatek Dimensity 7200 Ultra processor.
• It has a glass and plastic body with IP68 protection.
• Runs on Android 13 with the proprietary MIUI 14 shell.

For those who want to know more:

• Samsung Galaxy S23 FE review
• Motorola Moto G84 review: an affordable Android smartphone with a bright 6.5-inch 120Hz OLED display
• Motorola Moto G54 Power Edition review: 120 Hz and 6000 mAh available to everyone
• Samsung Galaxy Fold5 review: the title champion in the heavyweight division