Is Xiaomi's Redmi Note poised for another round of success?

Friday January 27, 2017 , 3 min Read

Last year, Chinese tech firm Xiaomi sold so many units of its budget phone – the Redmi Note 3 – that it came to a point where the company was selling one phone per minute. Also at one point of time, it was the best selling phone online in India. Along with a few other budget bestsellers like the Redmi 3s and its Prime version, Xiaomi managed to notch up $1billion in revenue from India. And it hasn't been here long. In fact, it hasn't been anywhere long.

Now, even as the face of the company and the man responsible for Xiaomi's stellar growth in India Hugo Barra, Vice President for global operations, packs his bags to return to the Silicon Valley, Xiaomi is doing pretty good in the country. Its recently launched Redmi Note 4 sold out in 10 minutes online, leaving users to wait for the next round of sales. You might well ask what the big deal about Redmi Note 4 is. Well, it's rock solid for the next-to-nothing price. On just about all fronts!

The Redmi Note 4 does not look all that different from other Chinese phones, including Xiaomi's own. Nevertheless, it has a good looking design. It's solid without being heavy and curved so that it can be held comfortably. It's all metal and comes in gold, black, and a gunmetal-like grey.

There are three variants to choose from:

2GB RAM with 32GB storage for Rs 9,999

3GB RAM with 32GB storage for Rs 10,999

4GB RAM with 64GB storage for Rs 12,999

This phone, in all its variants, is in the now regular 5.5-inch size. There's an upgrade of specs, specifically moving to the Snapdragon 625 processor with which the device works smoothly enough with no detectable glitches. It's still on the now receding Android 6.0 and one will have to wait and see if and when it moves up to Android Nougat. Meanwhile the company's own interface on top of Android, MiUi8 is quite feature-rich, if you can forgive the usual absence of an app drawer and tons of preloaded apps. One of the more interesting features on the Redmi Note 4 is the ability to use two instances of an app – including WhatsApp. This "Second Space" is meant to appeal to business users who want to assign one SIM to personal and one to work-related communication. The 4,100mAh battery does its job very well and will surely see you through the entire day and more, whether you're using it for personal stuff or work.

This device uses a hybrid SIMs slot, which means you can either use two SIMs or one SIM plus a microSD card. It's become the norm. It supports 4G VolTE. The 13MP camera is just fine.

Overall, the package is value for money. While the competition since the earlier Redmi Note 3 has really hotted up, clearly Indian fans are more than willing to give the successor another strong lease of life.

(Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of YourStory.)

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