Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro Review: Few compromises for affordability

Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro Review: At a starting price of $300, the POCO X4 Pro 5G is no doubt an affordable 5G smartphone you can buy in 2022. But along with the affordability, there are some things you’ll miss out on when you buy this phone. I call refer to these missing features as compromises for affordability.

So, what are the compromises inside this phone? Can you do without the missing features inside the POCO X4 Pro? Are there alternative smartphones to buy instead of this one? What are the strengths of the POCO X4 Pro? Well, this Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro Review will provide answers to these and many more questions.

Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro Review

Display, Design and Build

The Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro 5G comes with a 6.67-inch display, AMOLED panel, support for a 120Hz refresh rate, and HDR10 feature. It has a flat display and a punch hole at the top center of the screen that houses the selfie camera. The real camera module is home to triple camera sensors and it’s placed Horizontally on the topside of the back cover.

The screen of the phone is protected by Gorilla Glass 5 and its build materials are Glass front, plastic back, and plastic frame. The volume rocker and the power button are located on the right-hand side. It has two speakers, one at the bottom and one at the top. The 3.5mm jack port is located at the top side of the phone while the charging port is located at the bottom (USB Type-C).

Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro comes with IP53 dust and a splash-resistance rating. This does not mean the phone is waterproof because using the phone underwater can cause real damage to the phone. Splash resistance is very different from water resistance. Overall, the design, display, and build quality of the POCO X4 Pro are incredible. It’s not flagship but one look at the phone and you might think it’ll actually cost more than $400.

Camera

The Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro comes with a triple rear camera setup and a single selfie camera. It has a 108MP main camera with PDAF, an 8MP ultra-wide lens, a 2MP macro lens, and a 16MP front camera. The photo quality from the cameras of this phone is great. The main camera can separate the background from the subject and focus on the subject. But this is where the company also makes the biggest compromise.

There are limited to no good camera features on this phone. This greatly limits the things you can do with the main 108MP camera when it comes to photography and videography. For example, there is no OIS stabilization feature when taking photos. There is no gyro-EIS video stabilization when making videos, and the camera of the phone can only shoot videos in 1080p resolution (not 4K).

Note that this is not because the 108MP is not capable of using all these features, but to keep the price of the phone down, Xiaomi did not include these features. For average users, they won’t probably notice but for those who need the camera of their phone for something extra, this camera setup won’t do it for you.

Chipset and Performance

The chipset inside the Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro is the Qualcomm Snapdragon 695 5G. This 5G chipset is a good mid-range SoC that has a fast CPU and powerful GPU. The Snapdragon 695 5G has an octa-core CPU with a speed clocked at 2.2GHz. The CPU is paired with the Adreno 619 GPU.

The peak download speed for this chip is 2.5Gbps and its peak upload speed is 1.5Gbps. This chip is using the LPDDR4x RAM technology and also has support for UFS 2.1 storage technology. The chipset is built on the 6nm Process Node and Technology. It uses the Qualcomm® Kryo™ 660 CPU Intelligence (AI) Engine and has support for Near Field Communications (NFC).

The Snapdragon 695 5G chipset is a very good chipset and has a very nice Image Signal Processor (ISP). Its equipped with the Qualcomm Spectra™ 346T image signal processor, Triple 12-bit ISPs, and the quality of photos from the camera is very good. When it comes to gaming and graphics rendering, the Adreno 619 is up to the task.

RAM and Storage

The POCO X4 Pro comes in two RAM and storage options. A 6GB RAM + 128GB storage and an 8GB + 256GB of storage. The RAM and storage options you’ll get depend on your region/country. There is space for storage expansion via a microSD card.

Battery

Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro is powered by a 5,000mAh battery with a 67W fast charge. You can charge the battery from 0 to 100% in under 41 minutes. The phone has no wireless charge technology but you can use the battery of the phone for a long time. Steady heavy users can drain the battery in about 8 hours. While normal users can get up to two days of battery life.

Software

The POCO X4 Pro boots MIUI 13 based on Android 11 out of the box. Xiaomi is promising about two years of major software updates and three years of monthly security patches for this phone. You can download updates, apps, and games from the Google Play Store and you have access to use the Google Mobile Services (GMS).

Other sensor features such are Fingerprint (side-mounted), Google Assistant, GPS, proximity sensor, NFC, Infrared port, and FM Radio. POCO X4 Pro comes in the following colors: Laser Black, Laser Blue, and Poco Yellow

Realme 9 Pro Plus Review: Conclusion

The Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro review shows that the phone is affordable but there are few compromises. The major compromise comes from the camera features. Before we talk more about these few compromises and possible alternatives, see the reasons why some won’t like to buy the POCO X4 Pro and why you should buy the POCO X4 Pro below.

Why some won’t like to buy the POCO X4 Pro

Not the best camera experience
Very limited camera features when taking photos and videos
Lots of pre-installed applications (but that is another way to make the phone affordable).

Why you should buy the POCO X4 Pro

It’s a very good and affordable 5G smartphone
Fast, bright, and colorful display (has support for a 120Hz refresh rate)
Good battery capacity with fast charging available
Build quality and design is very good
It’s protected by Gorilla Glass 5 and it’s dust and splash resistant (this also has to count for something)
Decent performing chipset inside

So, what are the few compromises inside this phone? One, the camera has no stabilization features and can only shoot videos in 1080p resolution. You also have to deal with lots of pre-installed applications. And lastly, a 2022 phone should boot Android 12 and not last year’s software.

Are there alternative smartphones to the POCO X4 Pro 5G? Well yes, there are few. I’ll recommend the Realme 9 Pro+ ahead of this one, the Samsung Galaxy A52s from last year, and even its predecessor the POCO X3 Pro from last year. Don’t get me wrong, for its price, the POCO X4 Pro 5G is a good phone to buy in 2022 especially if you need a 5G phone with a big, fast, and colorful screen.

Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro Price

The starting price of the POCO X4 Pro is $300 for the 6GB + 128GB storage. There is also a more expensive storage version with 8GB + 256GB storage. You can buy the phone using the link in the table below.

Where to buy the Xiaomi POCO X4 Pro 5G

POCO X4 Pro 5G	Price
Amazon Germany	€319.90

Images: Mr. Whostheboss