Redmi Note 10T: 4 reasons to buy the budget 5G phone (and 3 reasons you shouldn’t)

4 reasons to buy Redmi Note 10T

Decent performance

Redmi Note 10T, as mentioned above, comes with the MediaTek Dimensity 700 chipset paired with up to 6GB RAM and 128GB storage. According to our review, the handset was able to perform day-to-day tasks like messaging, calls, social media, music, etc without any lag or stutters in the UI. The scepticism surrounding the MediaTek chipsets’ performance seems to be slowly fading as the company has been introducing consistent performers in recent times. “You will seldom experience any lags when you are using the phone routinely,” said our review.

However, considering we’re talking about a budget phone, we hope you keep your expectation in check as it can’t handle heavy-duty gaming, but outside of that the MediaTek Dimensity 700 is a capable performer for the price.

Capable cameras

The Redmi Note 10T comes with a triple camera set up on the back, comprising of a 48MP primary sensor, a 2MP macro lens, and a 2MP depth sensor. Let’s be honest, the main 48MP camera sensor is what most users would be using primarily and, long story short, it’s a capable sensor. It delivers good pictures in favourable lighting conditions. The colour production is on the realistic side.

For most smartphone cameras, Red and Green are slightly hard to get right but surprisingly, the Redmi Note 10T almost (almost) get’s it right, if not for slightly extra pop. The details are well maintained. The 2MP depth sensor is good enough for portrait shots in good light conditions. The front 8MP selfie snapper is also capable in daylight conditions.

Battery life

The Redmi Note 10T packs a 5,000mAh battery with 18W fast-charging support but the company is providing a 22.5W adapter in the box. This is a limitation of the chip rather than a cost-cutting from the company. The 5,000mAh battery can easily last an entire day with normal to moderate usage. if you’re a casual smartphone user, you can even push it to two days, which is sweet.

5G on a budget

As said, Redmi Note 10T is Redmi’s first 5G enabled phone. It comes with the Dimensity 700 chipset. 5G may not be useful in the country at the moment but it is for the future but when will that future arrive is uncertain at the moment as there doesn’t seem to be a fixed schedule yet. Either way, the Redmi Note 10T supports a total of five 5G bands (SA: N1, N3, N40, N77, N78 | NSA: N78).

Redmi Note 10T: 3 reasons to not buy

Long charging time

Though the Redmi Note 10T offers a good battery life, thanks to its 5,000mAh battery unit, the charging speeds are quite slow. Despite the company is offering a 22.5W adapter in the box, the phone only supports just 18W speed. The Redmi Note 10T takes over two hours to charge completely up to 100 percent. This could be a dealbreaker if you’re looking to quickly charge your phone on the go.

MIUI experience

MIUI 12 offers an impressive set of customisation options and the custom skin has come a long way in terms of ease of use. However, the Redmi Note 10T still runs on the older MIUI 12 instead of MIUI 12.5, which is less cluttered in comparison and allows to uninstall the system applications. The ad situation in MIUI is still one of its weak points, and that continues with the Redmi Note 10T. Yes, on carefully disabling few settings in the UI, you can avoid ads completely, but a regular smartphone user might not be totally aware of these settings and should see ads frequently, which can get tedious in time. Xiaomi is promising MIUI 12.5 update to the Redmi Note 10T soon but for now, this is what you get.

Weak low-light camera performance

The 48MP primary camera Redmi Note 10T performs well in good lighting conditions with good details, colour reproduction, and a realistic tone to the images. On the flip side, the low-light performance of the sensor is a damp squib, as noted in our review. If you’re a camera enthusiast who likes to click photos on the go (including night-time), look elsewhere as the Redmi Note 10T is not for you. The images are noisy and details are not very well preserved.