12 Pro+ is the top model in this year’s Redmi Note 12 series . The Redmi brand belonging to Xiaomi is responsible for launching phone models with a more attractive price-performance ratio. The Redmi smartphone broke the barrier of two thousand zlotys, but in return wants to offer a sufficiently strong specification to justify it. This is the fifth and cheapest phone on our market so far with a camera matrix with a resolution of 200 megapixels. In addition to twice the camera resolution compared to last year’s model, we also get twice as much memory for files, more RAM, a larger battery, a better display and 120W charging. Redmi Note 12 Pro+ may prove to be an attractive proposition for people looking for high-end specifications who do not want to spend five thousand zlotys on Xiaomi 13 .
Appearance and performance
Redmi phones take inspiration from models sold under the Xiaomi brand , but do not want to compete with them. That’s why this year’s Redmi Note 12 Pro+ is more like Xiaomi 12 instead of the latest thirteenth installment. In our opinion, this is not a problem, because last year’s flagships had an attractive design.
The back of the Redmi phone is made of frosted glass, but the frame of the device is plastic. The phone is available in three colors: black, white and blue, which we received for testing. The intensity of the color depends on the viewing angle.
Note 12 Pro+ has good quality stereo speakers, a fast fingerprint reader in the power button and a headphone jack. The phone is among the larger and heavier, exceeding 200 grams of weight. Its housing has an official IP53 sealing standard, so the phone is dust and water splash resistant.
Display
The Redmi screen has a diagonal of 6.67 inches and is made in AMOLED technology. It supports a refresh rate of 120 Hz and has a resolution of FHD+ 2400 x 1080, and its maximum brightness is 900 nits. The Redmi display makes a very good impression. Its narrow frames are almost symmetrical and the viewing angles are very good. It differs from flagship panels in lower maximum brightness, which is important only in direct sunlight. In everyday conditions, the brightness is quite sufficient. There is also no shortage of any important settings, including the eye protection function or the ability to manually select the refresh rate.
Specification and system
Note 12 Pro+ is equipped with a Mediatek Dimensity 1080 processor. The processor supports 8 GB of RAM, and the user has 256 GB for the system and files. This is more than in its predecessor – Redmi Note 11 Pro + had 6 GB of RAM and 128 GB of file space.
Redmi crossed the barrier of half a million points in the Antutu benchmark. This result is more than half weaker than in today’s flagships. He gave it a 96th place in the ranking. You can find cheaper phones in the market with a higher Antutu score. From the Xiaomi stable , it would even be a two-year-old POCO F3 model. Redmi in terms of performance is not a more attractive proposition than the competition, but it is also worth emphasizing that in everyday use it does not lack anything. The smoothness of the phone’s operation is very good and, apart from the most demanding mobile players, hardly anyone will lack computing power.
The Redmi Note 12 Pro+ communication package includes 5G, WiFi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, NFC and infrared.
Redmi is the first smartphone in a long time that has not received the latest Android 13, but works on its older, twelfth version. The secured ones are more current, because from February 2023. This did not prevent the manufacturer from using the latest version of the MIUI 14.0.6 system overlay, which is the same as in Xiaomi 13 .
As we know from experience also from other Xiaomi phones , the MIUI overlay is well optimized and visually attractive, but it can surprise the user with an advertisement placed in system applications.
Camera – photos and videos
Redmi Note 12 Pro+ belongs to the elite group of smartphones with the latest 200 megapixel matrix. However, this is not the same matrix as in Xiaomi 12T Pro , only with a smaller physical size, called Samsung HPX. In addition to high resolution, the main camera boasts optical stabilization and high brightness of the F1.7 lens.
The picture quality from the main camera is really good. The frames are detailed, sharp, with well rendered colors and a wide tonal range. Night photos are very good. They don’t pull as much detail out of the shadows as more expensive phones, but they’re not noisy either. In its price range, the main Redmi camera is at the forefront.
Unfortunately, the other two cameras definitely can’t match it. The ultra wide-angle camera has a low resolution of 8 megapixels. Even in good lighting conditions, the lower detail and less sharpness are immediately noticeable. Any wide-angle camera is weaker than the main camera, but here the difference is too big. There is nothing to mention about the macro camera with a resolution of only 2 megapixels.
The quality of the 4K video in terms of detail and color is good. Unfortunately, stabilization does not keep pace here. It is not effective enough and even with small movements of the camera, it introduces not very pleasant distortions of the image.
Sample pictures:
Battery and charging
Redmi Note 12 Pro+ has a larger battery than its predecessor. Now it is 5000mAh. In our YouTube video streaming test with the screen brightness set to half, the phone discharged to 50% after 9 hours and 40 minutes. So you can count on at least 18 hours of video streaming. This is a result at the level of competitors with a battery of the same capacity. Some flagships can last a little longer by adapting the screen refresh to the content displayed.
Along with the phone, we get a very powerful 120W charger in the box. It allows you to fully charge the phone in just over 20 minutes, and 15 minutes of charging is enough to exceed 80% capacity.
Conclusion
Redmi Note 12 Pro + has a very strong specification for the medium shelf it represents. The screen keeps a very high level, the main camera is one of the best in its class, as is the very fast battery charging. These highlights of the program are complemented by stereo speakers, a fingerprint reader and large RAM and ROM memory. Each of these aspects is worth the price that the manufacturer demands.
The performance is slightly below the expectations and capabilities of the competition, although it is difficult to feel it in everyday use. The biggest compromise, however, is the additional cameras. The wide-angle camera is low resolution and very average. However, the 2-megapixel macro camera is completely out of place in a phone at this price.
Redmi Note 12 Pro + can be recommended because its advantages are worth a higher price than last year’s model. You just have to remember that not every element of this phone holds the same high level.
