Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G First Impressions: Moving Up the Ladder

Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G has been officially launched in India and is currently the latest and greatest smartphone that Xiaomi has to offer in its popular Redmi Note lineup. The Redmi Note series has been successful in India primarily for providing best-in-class hardware along with aggressive pricing. However, with pandemic-driven supply chain issues and rising inflation, the Note 12 Pro+ 5G is now more expensive than any previous model.

The Redmi Note lineup has breached the Rs. 25,000 price point for the first time in India. However, Xiaomi has packed some premium hardware into this phone, along with some category-first features that could make the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G strong enough to join our list of the best smartphones under Rs. 30,000 in India. But can it actually top the list? We will let you know in our full review coming up very soon. Meanwhile, here are our quick first impressions of it.

Starting with the design, the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G continues to feature a flat frame made of plastic. The phone has a glass back and feels very dense in the hand. For those who want the numbers, it weighs 208g and is 8.9mm thick. Thankfully, this thickness allows for a 3.5mm headphone jack at the top, next to which is an IR emitter and a microphone. The primary microphone sits next to the dual nano-SIM tray, USB Type-C port, and primary speaker grille at the bottom. On the right of the phone are the power and volume buttons. The power button doubles as a fingerprint scanner for authentication.

The Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G in its Arctic White colour

The Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G feels well-built. The back is made of unspecified toughened glass, whereas you get Corning's Gorilla Glass 5 on the front. I really like the Arctic White colour of my Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G. Although glossy, the white paint job helps hide fingerprints and smudges, which could be more visible on the Iceberg Blue and Obsidian Black colours.

Unlike its main rival, the Realme 10 Pro+ 5G (Review), the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G has a flat display. The bezels are fairly narrow except for the chin which is slightly thick. There is a cutout on the top of the display for the 16-megapixel front camera. The display measures 6.67 inches diagonally and has a full-HD+ resolution. Xiaomi has not skimped on any features; the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G's 10-bit display supports an adaptive 120Hz refresh rate, Dolby Vision and HDR10+ certifications. The phone also has WideVine L1 DRM certification.

The display is bright enough for both indoor and outdoor use. That said, the peak brightness has dropped to 900 nits as opposed to the Redmi Note 11 Pro+ 5G's (Review) 1200 nits.

One of the highlights of the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G is its primary rear camera. As the flagship in the new Redmi Note 12 series, this phone has a 200-megapixel 1/1.4-inch Samsung HPX sensor with an f/1.65 aperture and optical image stabilisation (OIS). The triple-camera setup is completed by an 8-megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera and a 2-megapixel macro camera. For selfies, there is a 16-megapixel front camera. As of now, I can tell you that the primary camera's daylight performance is quite impressive. I will be testing the performance of all four cameras for the full review.

In terms of software, the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G runs on the Android 12-based MIUI 13. Xiaomi is lagging behind others when it comes to offering the latest Android version in its phones. However, unlike the mess that Realme UI 4.0 is at the moment, with its bloatware and ill-suited app recommendations, the same is not the case with MIUI 13 so far. There are a few unnecessary apps in MIUI 13 which can be uninstalled. Xiaomi has promised to provide two major Android updates and four years of security support for the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G.

The Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G has very few preinstalled third-party apps.

Under the hood, there is a 6nm MediaTek Dimensity 1080 SoC, which is the successor to the Dimensity 920 featured in the Xiaomi 11i HyperCharge (Review). The Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G also borrows the 120W fast charging tech from the 11i HyperCharge. The company claims that the phone's 4980mAh battery can be charged from zero to 100 percent in 19 minutes. We will, of course, test this claim in the review.

From the looks of it, the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G seems more like the spiritual successor to the Xiaomi 11i HyperCharge 5G. Xiaomi will announce the pricing details for the two variants (8GB RAM + 256GB storage, and 12GB RAM + 256GB storage) at its launch event on January 5. So, what is in a name, one might ask? All that matters is how well this phone performs and if it actually delivers enough bang for your buck. To find out, stay tuned to Gadgets 360 for the full review of the Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G, which will be up very soon.