The Redmi Note 10S was kind of a shocker. I couldn’t really get behind the vision for the smartphone when it came out. I would continuously look at the Redmi Note 10 and then at the Redmi Note 10S, but couldn’t really find a big difference. I have been using the Redmi Note 10S for the last two months. To be honest, the Redmi Note 10S is a little different from the Redmi Note 10. I have used both and can feel the difference while operating the devices. But there are a ton of similarities as well which is obvious given Redmi Note 10S is just an upgraded Redmi Note 10. Let me tell you how the smartphone worked.
Redmi Note 10S Review: Design
The Redmi Note 10S isn’t very different from the Redmi Note 10. Both the smartphones have an identical body and the same camera layout. You can even get the same colour options in both. But the Deep Sea Blue colour that I received looks very fresh and pleasing to the eyes.
The design of the Redmi Note 10S still looks pretty awesome. The curved edges help with holding the smartphone comfortable and the sleek design helps with feeling like you are holding a premium device in your hands.
There is a 3.5mm headphone jack at the bottom just beside the USB Type-C port for enabling charging. There are dual speakers on the Redmi Note 10S; one at the top and one at the bottom. The power button and the volume rockers are in the right side of the body while the SIM tray is on the left side.
The camera bump at the rear isn’t too major and even though I have seen the same camera layout in the Redmi Note 10, it looks really cool.
Redmi Note 10S Review: Display
The Redmi Note 10S has a 6.43-inch AMOLED display with resolution support of 1080x2400 pixels. The bezels on the screen are fairly small and there is a small punch-hole cutout at the top center housing the selfie camera.
The colours on the display are good, but they are not the most accurate. Even while playing videos on YouTube or Netflix, there were some issues with the content in the colour accuracy part. The brightness is okay meaning you won’t find it too hard looking at the screen under direct sunlight.
I don’t have many complaints about the display except that Redmi could have added support for a higher refresh rate just to provide an extra edge to the smartphone.
Redmi Note 10S Review: Performance and Battery
The Redmi Note 10S is a very decent performer when it comes to gaming. I installed and played games such as PUBG Mobile, Battlegrounds Mobile India, and Call of Duty to see how the device is performing. To my surprise, the MediaTek Helio G95 SoC could support the workload really well. There wasn’t any abnormal battery drainage issue and the device didn’t even overheat.
I could use the phone for longer hours and even charge it quickly with a 33W charger that the company provides inside the box of the smartphone. Further, the battery life of the smartphone is super excellent for people who are not using it heavily. I only had to charge the device once every 1.5 days and it would run comfortably. This could be due to the fact that it sports a 5,000mAh battery!
On using the smartphone daily, I didn’t find any problems with its performance. So in the performance and battery department, I would say that Redmi Note 10S is really good. The smartphone runs on MIUI 12.5 based on Android 12 out of the box.
Redmi Note 10S Review: Camera
For the camera, I like to focus on a few things - portrait mode, macro mode, and ultra-wide-angle shots. For the unaware, the Redmi Note 10S has a quad-camera setup at the rear with a 64MP primary sensor that is paired with an 8MP wide-angle-sensor, 2MP depth sensor and a 2MP macro sensor.
At the front, there is a 13MP selfie sensor with support for features such as AI beauty, AI portrait mode with bokeh and depth control.
I tested the rear camera of the smartphone and found that its portrait mode is really good; even better than the normal camera mode. The image that I shot from the portrait mode of the smartphone had very accurate and to some extent enhanced colour. (The image clicked from portrait mode is right below.)
The cricket ball is really a good way to test how the camera sensors of the smartphone are working. The wide-angle shooter is decent, but not the best. However, I am really impressed by the macro sensor of the Redmi Note 10S. The image that came from the macro sensor is not the most accurate in colour, but then none of the pictures that came from the normal camera mode was! Regardless, the detail in the surroundings was really good.
Attached below are some of the pictures clicked from different camera modes for you to see.
Redmi Note 10S Review: Conclusion and Price
The Redmi Note 10S is a slight upgrade over the vanilla Redmi Note 10. The question is whether it is worth the money! There are a few things about the device that are really good, but then most of what you can get from the Redmi Note 10S, you can get with the Redmi Note 10 as well.
Talking about the display of the device, it is something that I found I can live with. It is bright enough even when I am outdoors and the speaker performance is really good given there is one at the top and one at the bottom.
The smartphone can also handle heavy multitasking and gaming without overheating much which is a big positive at this price range. Then the camera is just what you can expect from a Redmi phone at this price point.
Coming to the price of the smartphone, it is available in two variants in India. The base variant with 6GB RAM and 64GB internal memory is priced at Rs 14,999 and the superior variant with 6GB+128GB will cost Rs 15,999.
If you are thinking of buying this device, I would say there are many better ones available at this price range. But if you are a Redmi fan, then you won’t be disappointed by the Redmi Note 10S.
