Poco M2 Pro It has been launched in India at a starting price of Rs 13,999 and looking at its specifications, it seems that it will Redmi Note 9 Pro And Realme 6 Poco M2 Pro can be a strong competitor for Poco M2 Pro, which are two excellent products coming with a similar price. However, just writing the specifications on paper does not really tell about the capability of the smartphone. We have reviewed the Poco M2 Pro to see how it performs in real life. Let’s see if the Poco M2 Pro is really as good as it is made out to be.
Poco M2 Pro design
Poco wants to make people in India believe that the M2 Pro is a swadeshi phone. For this, the company has given special labels on the front and back of the box. However, the strange thing is that the charger that comes with the phone has a Mi logo and when you turn on the phone, you are greeted with the MIUI logo.
The Poco M2 Pro gets an attractive design and is well built, but it looks very similar to the Redmi Note 9 Pro (Review). Everything, including the display, buttons, ports, hole-punch and rear camera bump, is completely identical. Poco has used a new pattern on the bottom of the phone. There are also some minor changes to the camera module. The M2 Pro has a P2i water-repellent coating, which is said to be splash proof. The Poco M2 Pro feels a bit heavy and big in the hand. The fingerprint sensor is set in the power button and it also unlocks the phone with a simple tap.
Poco M2 Pro performance
MIUI and app performance were excellent during our review. This is largely due to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G chipset. This is the same processor used in the Redmi Note 9 Pro and Realme 6 Pro. I am testing the mid variant of the Poco M2 Pro, which has 6GB LPDDR4X RAM and 64GB UFS 2.1 storage and is priced at Rs 14,999. Apart from this, the phone comes in a 4GB RAM + 64GB storage variant and 6GB RAM + 128GB storage variant, which are priced at Rs 13,999 and Rs 16,999 respectively.
Navigating the MIUI interface was fast and multitasking worked well. App loading was generally fast. Gaming performance was also very good. I played a few graphics-heavy games and all ran smoothly with good graphics. I did not notice any heating issues, even after playing for long hours at a stretch. Game Turbo is a useful feature that gives you shortcuts for screen recording etc. while playing games.
The video experience also looks good on the Poco M2 Pro’s display. However, the single speaker is not very impressive. If you use wired headphones, you can enable software enhancements for audio, but there is no feature available to increase the volume of the speaker.
Poco M2 Pro cameras
The Poco M2 Pro has four rear cameras, with the primary sensor being a 48-megapixel one. This includes an 8-megapixel wide-angle lens, a 5-megapixel macro camera, and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. You get a 16-megapixel hole-punch selfie camera. The Poco M2 Pro has the same version of the MIUI camera app that comes on the Redmi Note 9 Pro. The only real difference in functionality between the two is that you can use Night mode for the selfie camera on the M2 Pro.
There are also some interesting features, such as the ability to record full-HD videos with the macro camera and the output was surprisingly good. Video recording can also be done in Pro mode, which allows you to set the exposure yourself and it also gives the ability to record in LOG format.
In daylight, the Poco M2 Pro’s primary camera takes good-looking photos. Landscape shots had sharp details and vivid colours. The included Pro Colour toggle gives you better colours when you need them. Close-ups look good too, though the camera app tends to show bright colours a bit more than the actual scene. The wide-angle camera produced noticeably weaker colours and detail than the primary sensor. Portrait mode worked well and set the background blur level well.
The primary and wide-angle cameras struggle in low light situations. The camera app did a good job of suppressing noise, but photos generally lacked exposure. Apart from this, there is a lack of detail when zooming. Night mode was also not effective, there was barely any improvement in a few photos.
Selfies shot in good light looked good. Detail and skin tones were generally good. Shots were decent as long as there was enough light around.
The M2 Pro supports video recording up to 4K 30fps. Videos shot at this resolution show warm color tones and colors also appear overly sharp. There is no stabilization in this resolution. Talking about 1080p, video stabilization is better here and colors were also more natural. Video quality is not good in low light and videos come out a bit grainy.
Overall, the cameras on the Poco M2 Pro performed well in good lighting, but struggled to deliver good results in low light.
Poco M2 Pro battery
I found the battery life on the Poco M2 Pro to be pretty good. The 5,000mAh battery easily lasted a full day even with gaming and camera usage. With light usage, I was able to make it through a second day as well. The phone lasted a little over 17 hours in our HD video loop test, which was good. The charger that comes with it charges the battery at 33W output. With this charger, the phone’s battery gets charged up to about 95 percent in an hour.
Verdict
I think that Poco M2 Pro It is a good addition to the sub-Rs 15,000 smartphone segment and I have no problem recommending it. You can see it from almost every angle. Redmi Note 9 Pro You can think of it as similar to the Poco M2 (Review), of course with a higher charging output. Also, it should be much easier to buy than Xiaomi’s flash sale system. The Poco M2 Pro offers good build quality, a sharp display, solid battery life, and good performance. The cameras aren’t too bad, provided you’re shooting during the day.
However, I wouldn’t say that the Poco M2 Pro is the only option in this price segment, as it is similar to the Redmi Note 9 Pro, which has been selling in the country for quite some time now. Realme 6 (Review) also remains a solid option as it is still the only sub-Rs 15,000 phone to come with a 90Hz display.