Xiaomi Poco F2 Pro review
Are you looking for the best powerful smartphone? A flagship smartphone in your low budget? So, the new Poco F2 Pro comes with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 powerful chipset, here’s the complete Poco F2 Pro review.
Highlights
- Powerful Snapdragon 865 flagship chipset
- Price Worthy
- Latest MIUI 12 skin
Poco F2 Pro: Overview
The first on Poco F2 Pro review thing is, recently Xiaomi’s sub-brand Poco has launched its new smartphone, which is the new Xiaomi Poco F2 Pro. The Poco F2 Pro handset features a high-end Specs smartphone, as well as a premium smartphone, so it has a Snapdragon 865 flagship chipset.
Earlier Poco Phone F1 was removed, which is the predecessor of the latest Poco F2 Pro. Poco F1 was the first smartphone of Poco smartphone, after its launch, it was the most successor smartphone.
In its low budget, high-end specs are famous for smartphones, so this smartphone also has more and more specifications provided in low budget. One of the best features of this smartphone is that the Poco F2 Pro offers a motorized pop-up selfie camera, which was first seen in 2019, which is seen in any smartphone even in 2020. A plus point of having pop up smartphones is that there is no notch in the front of these smartphones and a minimum bazel is seen.
This smartphone should be one of the best for powerful camera performance at this time, as it has an SD 865 powerful chipset, as well as comes with a camera at 64 MP, which is for pro-level photography. It has a 4700 mAh battery, which also supports 30 Watt fast charging. The design of this phone may just disappoint you, as it weighs 219 grams, which is quite heavier than average.
Poco F2 Pro full specifications
| Display | |
|---|---|
| Screen Size | 6.67 inches Full HD+ |
| Type | Super AMOLED |
| Resolution | 1080 x 2400 pixels |
| Refresh rate | Standard ( 60 Hz ), 180 Hz responsive rate |
| Aspect Ratio & Pixel Density | 20:9 ratio (~395 PPI density) |
| Screen Protection | Corning Gorilla Glass v5 |
| Body | |
|---|---|
| Dimension | 163.3 x 75.4 x 8.9 mm |
| Weight | 219.00 grams |
| Build | Front Glass, Glass Back, Aluminium Frame & Body |
| SIM | Dual SIM card tray, 5G enabled, Dual 4G VoLTE, 3G, 2G Networks |
| Software & Hardware | |
|---|---|
| Operating System | Android v10, based on MIUI 12 |
| Processor | Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 (12nm) |
| Clock Speed | Octa-core (1×2.84 GHz Kryo 585 & 3×2.42 GHz Kryo 585 & 4×1.80 GHz Kryo 585) |
| GPU | Adreno 650 |
| USB Type C | Yes |
| Memory | |
|---|---|
| Memory Card Slot | No microSDXC card slot |
| Internal Storage & RAM | 6 GB / 8 GB RAM, 128 GB / 256 GB storage |
| Memory Type | UFS 3.1 |
| Rear Camera | |
|---|---|
| Camera Setup | Quad Cam, 64 MP, f/1.9, 26mm (wide), 5 MP, f/2.2, 50mm˚ (telephoto macro), 13 MP, f/2.4, 123 degree (Ultrawide), 2 MP, f/2.4, (depth) |
| Features | HDR, Panorama, Portrait mode, Scene Mode, gyro-EIS |
| Video | 8K @ 24/30fps, 4K @ 30/60fps, 1080p @ 30/60/120/240fps, 1080p @ 960fps |
| Front Camera | |
|---|---|
| Camera Setup | Motorized pop-up 20 MP, f/2.2, 27mm (wide) |
| Features | HDR, Night light, Portrait Mode, Beautify Mode |
| Video Resolution | 1080p @ 30fps, 720p @ 120fps |
| Connectivity | |
|---|---|
| Wi-Fi | Yes |
| Wi-Fi Direct | Yes |
| Wi-Fi WLAN | Yes, 802.11 a / b / g / n / ac / 6 |
| Bluetooth | Yes, Bluetooth v5.1 |
| Bluetooth features | File Transfer, Audio control |
| Features | |
|---|---|
| Fingerprint | Yes |
| Fingerprint Scanner Location | In Display Mounted |
| Accelerometer | Yes |
| Gyroscope Sensor | Yes |
| Compass & Proximity Sensor | Yes |
| Battery | |
|---|---|
| Size (in mAh) | 4700 mAh |
| Type | Lithium Polymer, Non-Removable |
| Fast Charging Support | Yes, 30 Watts Quick Charge delivery |
| Wireless charging | No |
| Reverse Charge | Yes, 3 Watts |
| Others | |
|---|---|
| Color Variants | Phantom White, Cyber Gray, Electric Purple, and Neon Blue |
| 3.5mm Audio Jack | Yes |
| Price | Rs. 40,790 or $680 USD |
Pros
- Super AMOLED screen
- Powerful Chipset (Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 chipset)
- Motorized Pop-Up selfie camera
- Affordable price
Cons
- 3.5mm jack is weird
- Very heavy (219 g)
- Getting hot after a few hours of usage
Read about: Is wireless charging harmful for your smartphones?
Price and Availablity
The Poco F2 Pro was announced in May 2020, after which this smartphone was first launched in the UK on 19 June 2020. This smartphone is available in 2 storage variants, 6 GB RAM and 128 GB internal memory, and another 8 GB RAM and 256 GB internal memory.
This smartphone has not yet been launched in India, with a starting price of about Rs 40,790. The releasing date of Poco F2 pro India is not confirmed. At the same time, the price of this phone in the UK is £549, but now its price is around £479, which is equivalent to $680 USD or 990 Australian dollars.
This phone is unlikely to be launched in the US, as Xiaomi is not about to launch Poco smartphones to sell its Black Shark series in the US. But Xiaomi is going to sell this smartphone in Australia soon. According to the source, this smartphone is going to be launched in India in the month of December.
Display
The Poco F2 Pro has a 6.67-inch Full HD Super AMOLED display, which has a screen resolution of 1080 by 2400 pixels. This smartphone is based on an aspect ratio of 20:9. This smartphone has a refresh rate of only 60 Hz, which is very low according to this price point.
Some smartphones of the Poco brand have brightness support of up to 500 nits, which is excellent for this price point. So, the Poco F2 Pro also supports 500 nits of brightness. The big thing is this smartphone has a sampling rate of 180 Hz, which makes the touch screen even more responsive.
Xiaomi has come with a lot of smartphones 6.67 inches in the 2020 session, such as the Redmi Note 9 Pro and Mi 10. Perhaps the reason is that the company would have found this size gaming and best viewing display perfect. It has a super AMOLED display, so its color saturations are very bold, pretty, and look great. Another plus point of the AMOLED screen is that the colors emerge in it, that is, dark colors look very dark.
Which gives a very good look when streaming movies at night time. All the current premium smartphones are coming, there are displays of 90 Hz, 120 Hz, or 144 Hz, but Poco F2 Pro has
only 60 Hz (standard) in it. Currently, a 60 Hz display is used in many smartphones, especially the iPhone and some cheap smartphones. The Higher refresh rate makes the screen smooth during scrolling, viewing, and gaming, so most people like it.
Design
The Poco F2 Pro comes in 4 Colors variants, Phantom White, Cyber Gray, Electric Purple, and Neon Blue. If we talk about the design of this phone, then this smartphone feels you little heavy, because the weight of this smartphone is 219g.
The dimensions of this phone are 163.3 x 75.4 x 8.9 mm. Which is a bit longer to see and slightly larger, which can be difficult to carry one-handed. The front and back of this phone have glass, which is fully protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 5, and its body or frame is made of aluminum.
It has a power button and volume rocker on the right side of the phone. It has a motorized pop-up selfie camera on the upper side as well as a 3.5mm audio jack. There is a USB Type C charging port on its bottom side. The most important thing about this phone is that it has a 3.5mm jack, most smartphone users prefer to use wired earphones as the wired earphones offer better sound quality.
But there is an issue that the 3.5mm cable does not stay in the audio jack and plugs out easily. So the plug has to be plugged into the jack frequently, which can be quite irritating and distracts between listening.
The Poco F2 Pro has a pop-up camera in a small rectangular shape, this pop up also has an LED light. When you pop up or down the camera it glows light and a loud melody sound is heard. If you hate this sound and light then you can do it silently.
The speed of this pop-up is very fast, which means its detection. All the Pop-Up cameras this time come with auto drop detection in smartphones. When the camera is on, the phone drops or the phone shakes at the same time, then this smartphone automatically turns the pop-up camera down. So that the pop up does not get damaged when the phone falls down.
There is a setup of 4 cameras in its rear, which is designed in an X shape. Just below this is a dual-tone flash, with the POCO logo in the lower.
Cameras
Poco F2 Pro’s camera quality is really amazing. It comes with a Quad Camera setup on the rear panel. The first camera is a 64-megapixel main sensor, the second is a 5-megapixel f / 2.2 aperture (telephoto macro) sensor, the third is a 13-megapixel (123° ultraviolet) sensor, and the last one is a 2-megapixel depth sensor.
It has a second sensor mean telephoto + macro lens, which acts as a 2 in 1 sensor. The first mode is a telephoto lens, which captures close up shots, and the second mode captures macro shots, which has 10 x digital zoom.
During testing, we noticed that the Poco F2 Pro pictures have come out very well, its camera has an image post-processing software, in which images can be adjusted after capturing. With this help, images can be made more colorful and vibrant colors. Its colors are much better, but not as bright as Samsung or Apple. Another thing noticeable in this is that autofocus is not as effective as its focus can be manually set up and captured.
It also has an ultrawide sensor, that covers an area up to 123°. Which is a good thing that it did not cause much quality loss when zooming the captured images. This 4rth depth-sensing camera has been greatly improved from the depth of field images of its previous smartphone.
It’s used for background blur or portrait shots that have come out quite well, but it is not accurate to identify objects. Its previous smartphone Xiaomi MI 10 Pro has a dedicated portrait camera, which is very accurate.
If we talk about video recording of the Poco F2 Pro smartphone, then this smartphone can record at 24 or 30 @ fps in 8K resolution, and it can record up to @ 60 fps in 4K resolution. Slow-motion recording can also be recorded in 720p and full HD quality on this phone. If we talk about its front camera, then it comes with a 20-megapixel pop-up camera, which has a very fast speed of pop up and down.
Hardware and Performance
The Poco F2 Pro is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 octa-core chipset with a clock speed of up to 2.84 GHz. It has an Adreno 650 for the graphic, which is very powerful. This processor really very powerful, as it is the latest flagship smartphone which is enough to run any games or heavy tasks. Such as PUBG mobile, call of duty mobile, Fortnite mobile, etc.
Currently, the new flagship smartphones of 2020 come with a Snapdragon 865 chipset, in which the performance of the Poco F2 Pro was quite good. Its multi-core score was 3367 in the Geekbench 5 benchmarking test during testing. Which is much more than most flagship smartphones such as Oppo Find X2 Pro and Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra in this price range.
The most competitor of this smartphone is OnePlus 8 and Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max, whose performance has been considered the most powerful so far. But the main thing is, Oneplus 8 has also Snapdragon 865 chipset.
RAM and Storage
Poco F2 pro comes with two storage variants, the first is 6GB RAM with 128GB of internal storage, and the second is 8GB RAM with 256GB of internal storage.
The main difference between both variants is the 6GB variant has LPDDR4X support, and the second variant is 8GB. This variant supports LPDDR5 RAM, which is really powerful. Both variants are based on the UFS 3.1 storage type, which makes the smartphone faster than faster. The Oneplus 8 has also 8GB of LPDDR4X RAM.
Software
This smartphone runs the latest version of Android 10, which is based on MIUI 12. The major issue in all Xiaomi’s devices is that there are various types of bloatware that Xiaomi company can fix with the OTA update.
When this Poco smartphone was launched, it saw a lot of pre-installed bloatware, such as apps like AliExpress, eBay. They can also be uninstalled but some apps can only be disabled. So, this software is not as good as Oxygen OS. If you didn’t compromise about software, so the second option is Oneplus 8. Which has no pre-installed apps or any bloatware.
Battery Life
Poco F2 Pro comes with a 4700 mAh Li-Po battery, which is the average battery capacity for flagship or high-end smartphones. If you use this phone for normal use, then this phone will give you 2 days of battery backup. But if you do heavy tasks or gaming, it can give only one-day battery backup.
If you do normal usage such as song listening or HD video streaming, then it can easily do 14 to 15 hours of the video stream and 24 hours of song listing. If you continuously do 8K video recording or heavy gaming on this phone, then this smartphone can give you 7 hours of HD gaming very easily.
For charging in this phone, 30-watt fast charging support is also provided, which can fully charge your phone within 90 minutes. There is no wireless charging support on this phone because it is very difficult to get a smartphone with wireless charging support at this price point.
Buy it if…
If you want to get a pop-up selfie camera smartphone, which has the latest flagship and 5G support. Then you can go with this smartphone.
If you want to use a premium smartphone on a low budget then this smartphone is for you. This phone does not have premium features, yet at this price point, this phone will not disappoint you, so it is a very good option at a low price.
Don’t buy it if…
Most powerful flagship phone– if you are thinking of getting a smartphone with heavy gaming or powerful performance, then you can do it with this smartphone. Because it has a Snapdragon 865 chipset which also supports 5G.
If you live in a dusty environment, don’t buy this pop-up smartphone, because dust can enter through the pop-up camera, and it can damage or jam the camera head.
Ashok Kushwaha is a Senior Editor at Digital Bachat with 5 years of experience covering mobile phone and computer technology. He enjoys showing you the most valuable smartphones and laptops.
