Back in the August of 2018, Xiaomi revealed the POCO F1 with the mission to bring the power of flagships to the masses. This and the booming smartphone gaming scene aided to the success of the POCO F1. Xiaomi fans, smartphone gamers and spec hungry users all were happy to get their hands on the POCO. Though being a performance beast, it was still a budget device and had its downfalls.
Fast forward to May of 2019, the K20 Pro was announced with the same mission as the POCO F1 with the opportunity to fix what was wrong with the F1. With the drastic jump in the display department to the AMOLED from the IPS panel used in the F1 to the better camera package and the more premium metal and glass build, let’s just say Xiaomi learnt from the F1 and did listen to the feedback of the users.
I have been using the device for the past few months now. Let’s dive into what the K20 Pro has to offer!
Unboxing and Specs
Specifications
- Body: Aluminum frame, Gorilla Glass 5 front, glass back
- Display: 6.39" AMOLED, notch-free, 2,340x1,080px resolution, 19.5:9 aspect ratio, 402ppi; HDR 10 and DCI-P3 compliant.
- Triple rear camera:
- Wide - 48MP f/1.75, 1/2", 0.8µm pixel size, PDAF
- Telephoto - 8MP, f/2.4, 1.12µm pixel size, 2x zoom
- Ultra-wide - 13MP, f/2.4, 1.12µm pixel size
- Front camera: Motorized pop-up 20MP, 0.8µm, f/2.2; 1080p/30fps with drop detection.
- OS: Android 9 Pie, MIUI 10 (Upgradable to Android 10, MIUI 11)
- Chipset: Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 coupled with Adreno 640 GPU.
- Memory: 6GB of RAM; 64/128GB storage or 8GB of RAM, 128/256GB storage
- Battery: 4,000mAh Li-Po
- Charging: 27W fast charging
- Connectivity: Dual-SIM; LTE-A, 4-Band carrier aggregation, Cat.15/13 (800Mbps/150Mbps); USB-C; Wi-Fi a/b/g/n/ac; dual-band GPS; Bluetooth 5.0
- Others: Under-display fingerprint reader, single down-firing speaker and 3.5mm headphone jack
Looking at the specs above, the device does scream all round flagship! But specs are just specs. Let’s look into what the device has to offer in the real world. But before we dig any deeper, let’s unbox and take a look at the device first.
Unboxing
When I looked at the box, I was hoping for a dark colored box (K20 Pro comes with a dark box in China), but the version in India came with a white box. (*Dark mode cravings intensifies*)
Enough with the nitpicking though, let’s look at the box.
Starting from the front, the box flaunts the bezel-less design of the phone with the motorised camera popped-up.
The back of the box has the usual details listed out.
Opening up the box, we see another box containing the quick start and safety info leaflets, a sim ejector tool and a black case. The case is a hard one with a smooth black finish, kudos to Redmi for including a better case than a TPU one.
Going deeper, we see the device wrapped in a protective film. I did remove the film right away and here it is, the K20 Pro in all its glory. The device originally launched with 3 color variants; Flame Red, Glacier Blue and Carbon Black with a Pearl White color coming later. I went with the Carbon Black variant because I loved that carbon fiber look!
Going further in, we can see the charging brick and the Type-C USB cable. The charging brick is a 18W brick….wait, what? Yes! While the device does support 27W charging, it comes bundled with an 18W charging brick, the only sane explanation to this is cost cutting. Though the 18W charger doesn’t disappoint at all, we will look into the charging times later in the review.
Design and Display
Let’s look at the design and display of the device. As soon as the device is in your hands, you are gonna notice the compact form factor while still keeping a big display at the front, thanks to the bezel-less design. The device has a healthy weight to it, which is well distributed and feels solid in hand. Let’s have a look at the device from all the angles.
At the back we have the triple camera setup. From top, first, we have the telephoto sensor which is 8MP f/2.4 having a 1.12µm pixel size and provides a 2x zoom. Below that, is the main camera sensor which is a 48MP f/1.75 IMX586 sensor having a 0.8µm pixel size with PDAF. At the bottom is my favorite, the ultra wide sensor which is a 13MP f/2.4 with 1.12µm pixel size sensor which provides a 124.8 degrees field of view! Coupled with a dual LED flash unit. Wait..that’s not all about the camera department, hidden between the main sensor and the ultra wide sensor is the Laser AF sensor, which I will talk more about in the camera section of the review.
Below that is the Redmi branding, which is subtle and goes with the design of the device. The back is covered with Corning Gorilla Glass 5 which curves on the side edges and gives the device a slimmer profile which is nice to hold on to. Being all glass, it is a fingerprint magnet and slippery but the small form factor and the bundled case does aid to the overall handling of the device. The carbon black variant reminded me of the Kevlar Black variant of the POCO F1(*Nostalgia Alert*).
At the front, from top, we have the earpiece, which is thin and blends in with the top bezel nicely, thumbs up to this fine detail. Below the earpiece is the star of the show, the 6.39 inch 1080p+ AMOLED display with an aspect ratio of 19.5:9, which Redmi calls the “Horizon display”, it is a Samsung panel and it shows! The resolution is 2340x1080 pixels which converts to a 403 ppi.
The display is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 5 and has that 2.5 curve on the edges which makes me remove and throw the case away. The display supports HDR10 content and covers the DCI-P3 color gamut. It is sharp and has punchy colors with good contrast. Different display color profiles can be selected in the settings menu depending on your liking, more on that in the software section of the review.
My only complaint with the display, which is kind of a rant actually is the curved corners, which are the trend now-a-days but I for one, don’t like this trend! Behind the screen, in the bottom part is the under-display optical fingerprint reader which is pretty fast for an optical sensor and pretty accurate. To be honest, I did expect less in this department but the optimised software and the hardware make a good experience.
The top of the device has the motorized pop-up camera with a notification LED built in. While being creative and looking nice. It is kind of an impractical place to position the notification LED.
The left of the device has nothing but an antenna line.
On the right are the volume rockers(yup, it's 2020 and I still call them volume rockers, YOLO!) and the power button. On the carbon black variant which I have, the power button is red, though there is no special pattern to differentiate it from the other buttons without looking which sounds like a small thing but is noticeable when you use the device.
The bottom of the device has the sim card tray on the left, the charging port in the middle and the bottom firing speaker on the right, which is just bad by today’s standards, there is no way of putting it nicely!
Overall, the device does feel premium to hold with an immersive display which is a delight to look at, there is no cost cutting in this department like the spiritual predecessor, the POCO F1 which despite being called a ‘flagship killer’ only had flagship performance. It is not the case with the K20 Pro though.
Camera
As we all know, now-a-days, every smartphone manufacturer is providing 2, 3 or even 4 cameras in their devices and that’s excluding the front cameras! Well, Redmi isn’t running away from this trend and has honored (no pun intended) the K20 Pro with 3 cameras at the back.
Let’s start with the Main camera first. As mentioned in the specs section above, it is a 48MP IMX 586 sensor having a f/1.75 aperture. The camera uses pixel binning to combine 4 pixels in 1 giving out a 12MP image, though a dedicated 48MP camera mode is provided in the camera app as well. The first thing you are gonna notice is how quickly the camera focuses on objects, thanks to the PDAF assisted with the laser autofocus.
The camera does produce good shots in daylight conditions which are sharp and has a wide dynamic range. The only problem with the camera is that it tends to oversaturate the pics sometimes. Though this has been improved by Redmi over the course of time via MIUI updates. In low light scenarios, there is a little noise in the pictures but it isn’t that noticeable, the inbuilt night mode does help a lot in this case. Below are some sample shots taken from the main camera.
On to the telephoto lens now. It is a 8MP sensor having a f/2.4 aperture. The pics turn out to be good in broad daylight scenarios considering the narrow aperture but the sensor does suffer a bit in low light but isn’t completely unusable.
Comparison of telephoto and main camera pics:
Last but not the least, the ultra wide angle sensor, which is a 13MP sensor having the same f/2.4 aperture as the telephoto. I had a lot of fun shooting with this sensor. It takes surprisingly good photos in daylight conditions taking in consideration the narrow aperture. It does suffer in low light conditions but the night mode helps and you can have some fun in low light environments as well. Below are some shots taken from the ultra wide angle camera.
Comparison of ultra wide angle and main camera pics:
The portrait mode is also present, which uses the telephoto lens by default to give you that depth effect, it is good to note that the amount of blur can be adjusted via software. There is also a full body mode which uses the main camera sensor to click the portrait shots. I liked the portrait shots better in the full body mode as it has the clear advantage of using the main camera sensor.
Portrait Shot(former) and Portrait Shot in full body mode(latter):
Overall the pictures produced have ample amount of detail, great contrast while keeping the tones true to life. The night photos also come out well though not as good as the daylight photos, thanks to the dedicated night mode.
Coming to the front camera, it is a motorized pop-up unit having a 20MP sensor with f/2.2 aperture. It manages to capture selfies which have a good amount of detail and sharpness, though I felt the dynamic range could have been a little better, Nonetheless, the images from the selfie snapper come out crisp and you won’t complain about it. There is also a portrait selfie mode which blurs the background, giving you a bokeh effect. I like the normal mode better though.
Talking about the video, the first thing I want to mention here is that the telephoto lens isn’t used for recording videos and when you hit the 2x button in the camera app when in video mode, the device uses the main camera with digital zoom to capture the video instead of using the 2x telephoto lens.
Both the main and ultra wide angle cameras support video recording upto 4K resolution, the former at upto 60fps while the latter being capped at 30fps. There is no hardware stabilisation available, but the device does have EIS which does a pretty good job at stabilising the videos with a minor loss in the overall field of view though it is only available only when recording at 30fps, which is kind of a bummer.
The videos produced from both the main and ultra wide angle cameras have good color reproduction, good detail and an above average dynamic range. The colors are on the natural side and there is no noise in the main camera, the noise does creep in when recording using the ultra wide angle sensor though.
Here are some video samples:
The camera does support slow-mo videos at 120fps, 240fps and 960fps all at 720p and 1080p. Apart from that there is a pro mode present, which lets you play around with the shutter speed, focal length and what not.
Performance and Battery Life
Before jumping into the real world scenarios of performance, let’s first look into how the device performs on Geekbench.
Before jumping into the real world scenarios of performance, let’s first look into how the device performs on Geekbench.
Time for some gaming! To test the device’s gaming performance I played 2 major titles: PUBG Mobile and Call of Duty Mobile. Both games were running on the highest settings and there were no frame drops or lag. Do note that PUBG Mobile and Call of Duty Mobile are one of the most resource hungry games available on Android and the K20 Pro manages to run them without any issues. It is obvious that the device can crush any game available for Android till date.
While games feel smooth and do look great on the beautiful AMOLED display. The small bezels do make the device a little awkward to hold while gaming, this may be what I feel and you don’t though, but the placement and performance of the speaker does not do justice to the device.
Talking about the charging, as mentioned earlier the device comes bundled with a 18W fast charger which fuels up the 4000mAh battery from 0 to 100% in around 1 hour 35 minutes, which isn’t a bad timing to be honest.
Software
The device comes with Android 9 with MIUI 10 on top and is upgradable to Android 10 with MIUI 11 with an over-the-air update.
The device comes with Android 9 with MIUI 10 on top and is upgradable to Android 10 with MIUI 11 with an over-the-air update.
MIUI is well known for its optimization and lots of customization options from different themes for the Always-On display to different themes for the entire phone.
Apart from all the features we are going to look into, one major feature which I would like to point out right away after upgrading to Android 10 is the system-wide dark mode. The dark mode while saving battery does look beautiful as well on the AMOLED display.
The device I am using for this review is running on the latest build of MIUI 11, which is 11.0.4 which is based on Android 10.
The ambient display options have the depth you won’t see anywhere else. It has many types of clocks to choose from with each one having its own customisation options. I liked the one in the 2nd pic below.
While we are talking about the display, there is a system-wide dark mode toggle and an option to select the color scheme of the display. Auto and Saturated color schemes are more or less the same with the emphasis on punchy colors while the Original color scheme provides true to life colors. Not to forget there is also an option to turn on DC dimming which makes the display flicker less in low brightness situations and reduces strain on the user’s eyes.
Despite running on Android 10, the device doesn’t have Google’s navigation gestures, instead it replaces them with their own in house full screen navigation gestures, which I don’t have any complaints about.
Another feature worth noting is the new game turbo which boosts the gaming performance of the device by freeing up memory. The feature also provides some nifty features like game DND and other minor visual effects as well.
Apart from all the above features, the device comes with small features like reading mode, scrollable screenshots and MIUI’s quick ball for a different type of navigation scheme.
There is no denying that MIUI is getting better with every version, from the optimization to the tonne of available customization options, it makes for one of the best skins on top of Android and we can easily say that this makes use of the K20 Pro’s hardware like it should be!
Conclusion
Redmi (Xiaomi) has always been a brand which considers users’ feedback and learns from their shortcomings in the past, this clearly shows in the K20 Pro.
In this review I compared the K20 Pro with the POCO F1 alot, because at their time, both the devices were launched to battle for the same moniker, “The Flagship Killer”; to be the value for money flagship phone of the year. Period.
While the F1 was the value for money flagship of 2018, it managed to do so with many shortcomings, which I already mentioned in this review. But this wasn’t the case with the K20 Pro.
The K20 Pro did hit the right spot. From the beautiful bezel less design, the premium build to the top-notch performance and the software optimization is a sweet cherry on top. The camera performance could’ve been a tad better but considering the price point, I would take it! The only real disappointment was the bottom firing speaker, which I feel should have been louder and better sounding if not a dual speaker setup.
Overall, the Redmi K20 Pro does total justice to its tagline, “The Flagship Killer 2.0”!
Conclusion
Redmi (Xiaomi) has always been a brand which considers users’ feedback and learns from their shortcomings in the past, this clearly shows in the K20 Pro.
In this review I compared the K20 Pro with the POCO F1 alot, because at their time, both the devices were launched to battle for the same moniker, “The Flagship Killer”; to be the value for money flagship phone of the year. Period.
While the F1 was the value for money flagship of 2018, it managed to do so with many shortcomings, which I already mentioned in this review. But this wasn’t the case with the K20 Pro.
The K20 Pro did hit the right spot. From the beautiful bezel less design, the premium build to the top-notch performance and the software optimization is a sweet cherry on top. The camera performance could’ve been a tad better but considering the price point, I would take it! The only real disappointment was the bottom firing speaker, which I feel should have been louder and better sounding if not a dual speaker setup.
Overall, the Redmi K20 Pro does total justice to its tagline, “The Flagship Killer 2.0”!
