Redmi Note 13+ Pro first impression

The fusion design with 3D curved glass makes it look sleek and feels like you're holding a premium piece of tech. Wrapped in shades of pastel leatherette, it breaks the monotony of traditional phone design by incorporating multiple colours instead of just a singular hue. It could’ve gone either way, but the careful selection of a mild colour palette has helped Redmi pull off something truly unique. The 6.67in 1.5K AMOLED Display is the icing on the cake, offering sharp visuals that even your grandma's cat pictures will look like professional photography, albeit with a little help from Lightroom. 

The IP68 rating isn't just a number either and the Redmi has the chops to go snorkelling or even full-blown scuba for a bit, if need be. It's your phone's way of saying, "I'm ready for whatever you throw at me." Dust, water, spilled coffee — bring it on. We didn’t go that far, but we did drop it in a fish bowl to entertain ourselves with a larger-than-life screen size and it survived just fine. 

Like many of its breed, Redmi has gone for 120W Hypercharge. It's like having Flash running circles around your phone. Zero to hero in 19 minutes flat — take that, world!

Now, let's talk about the brain of this beast – the Mediatek Dimensity 7200 Ultra. The Note 13+ Pro is being touted as the world’s first device to use this midrange SoC built on the 4nm process. Running at 2.8GHz, this chip is no Flash like its charging tech but had no issues with taking a 200MP shot every second and about 2 regular pics every second. With 12GB RAM on board, for almost every task, it’s enough to shred processing times and if that's not enough, you can expand it to 16GB with virtual memory, borrowed temporarily from storage. Our review sample was a 256GB variant, but there will be a 512GB option at launch too. 

Processing times for the 200MP images are swift too, allowing you to zoom in to see the details without waiting a lot for the image to render and load. And to complement its speed, there's a Mali-G610 MC4 GPU, ensuring your graphics are as smooth as melted butter on a hot summer day. Games like Asphalt and Sniper 3D had no qualms either and the only real gremlin here was the buggy MiUi OS that crashed on multiple occasions, whether it was opening the camera app, unlocking the phone unsuccessfully or apps just quitting on you without any warning. This might be down to the pre-production review samples that were given out, and it’s not something an update won’t be able to fix, so it’s not a major concern. What is startling though is the amount of bloatware - everything from a dozen browsers to pre-installed games and even gambling apps, it does need careful attention while setting up and doling out permissions. 

Adding a little something extra to spice things up, the Redmi Note 13+ Pro dances to the tune of Android 13, but it's not your vanilla Android. It's wearing a heavy MIUI 14 skin, and it's got more customizable themes than a teenager has moods. You can change the look of your phone more often than you change your socks (we hope you change your socks often).

Now, let's get down to the nitty-gritty of the camera. Video is decent, capped at 1080p 60 or 4K 30. However, there's a catch – engage filters, and the 4K resolution automatically drops to 1080p and is also capped at 30fps. It's almost as if the phone is a bit shy when it's all glammed up.

In photo mode, 2x optical zoom gives you a focal length equivalent to 46mm, 4x is 93mm while the 1x is 23mm and while we would’ve liked more zoom, the idea for the 200MP resolution is that you can zoom and crop, without a whole lot of degradation. The resolution in 200MP is top-notch, but it tends to overexpose and brighten the darker areas. Great for social media posts but not the last word in accuracy for sure. Still, the resolution jumps from roughly 3000x4000 pixels to a massive 16000x12000 pixels in 200MP mode. If you like dabbling with editing apps, this is a great starting point to get maximum sharpness and detail. The colour tint is more of a concern than anything else here, veering more towards the greenish spectrum and forcing you to colour-correct more often than not. Again, if you’re anyway prone to using filters, all this makes little difference.

Like with all the failed attempts before it, the apologetic 2MP macro lens should’ve just been avoided, but it’s still there and you’ll have to go to settings every time you want to get near the nostrils of someone or something.  The selfie cam suffers from the same fate of brightening up things more than normal but it digs out details…at the expense of accurate skin tones. You might look like you just stepped out of a Marvel movie, but your friends might question if you've been hanging out with Green Lantern.

To sum it up, the Redmi Note 13+ Pro is a wild ride. It's got the speed, it’s got the 5G connectivity, the distinctive style, and the 5000mAh stamina to keep up with your crazy life. It's not perfect, but then again, who is? It keeps things interesting with its MiUi customisation options, camera tricks and solid sound and display combo. So, buckle up, charge up, and get ready for a smartphone experience that's as unpredictable as your grandma's cat.