Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G Review

There appears to be a tendency of slapping the word 'Pro' onto the end of an existing device and marketing it as an upgraded model in a series with more capabilities. That's especially excellent news for the Poco M3 Pro, because the normal M3, which was introduced in early 2021, was barely suitable for purpose.

The M3 Pro, luckily, is a very different beast, with a new design and significantly more practical internals, resulting in a gadget that, although not as far-reaching as the 'Pro' name implies, is a strong entry at the inexpensive end of the market. Also, you can see the best smartphones under Rs 15,000 in India

Price and Availability

The Poco M3 Pro 5G is available in the UK directly from Poco for £179 for the 4GB/128GB version and £199 for the 6GB/128GB version.

The costs have been cut to £149 and £179 respectively at the time of writing, making this an even better value, although we can't predict how long that will stay.

While the Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G is more widely accessible in Europe than previous Poco phones, it will not be available in the United States or Australia.

Design

Except for the pretty huge Poco logo swatch that wraps around the rear camera, up in the upper left corner around the back of the device, there isn't much to write home about when it comes to the design of the Poco M3 Pro 5G - it's about as conventional as smartphones get in terms of aesthetics. If you like a more minimalist design, it can turn you off, but we didn't mind.

Aside from the more subtle Power Black that our review unit arrived in, you have the option of Cool Blue or a quite vivid Poco Yellow. If you want to stand out from the crowd, the other two colors are a perfect choice.

When you take it up, it seems like a rather cheap phone, with a lot of plastic and little heaviness, but it's neither poorly put together or disappointing in terms of real build quality. The rear panel, frame, and screen were all well-fitting.

It's important to note that the phone's glossy back attracts a lot of fingerprints, at particular with in black color, so you'll have to wash it down on a regular basis if you want it to look its best. The smartphone dimensions are 161.8mm x 75.3mm x 8.9mm, and it weights 190 g.

A USB-C connector, located next to a speaker on the bottom, provides cable communication and charging, while a 3.5mm headphone socket is located on the top for your wired headphones. There's no water residence or dustproofing here, and the fingerprint sensor is hidden behind the power button on the phone's right side as you look at it - not a technique we like because it forces the power button to be buried into the frame.

Whether you're listening, smartphone companies, we prefer a raised power button that's easy to locate without looking, as well as an in-screen fingerprint sensor that can read your complete fingertip. However, it's not a significant flaw, and the Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G has about as much style and design flare as you'd expect from a phone in this price range.

Display

This display is generally where budget phones appear like budget smartphones, although to be fair to the Poco M3 Pro 5G, the 6.5-inch LCD screen in which we've got here isn't too bad.

It offers a reasonable resolution of 1,080 x 2,400 pixels, a fair refresh rate of 90Hz, and it does decently in terms of brightness. Most of the time, you'll need to be at the top of the brightness level, but if you are, colors will pop and details will be clear.

All of this is to say that this isn't a top-end or even mid-range display panel – if you want a display that really pops, an OLED display phone is a better option. However, this will come at a cost, so it's a question of which features you want and how much you're willing to pay for them.

The bezels around the screen are beautiful and tiny – something even the cheapest phones nowadays can do – and the only interruption on the front is a single punch-hole for the selfie camera to protrude through. It'll satisfy as a design strategy until makers find out how to get a good camera to function beneath the screen.

The display of the Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G stands up to everything from swiping through images to browsing the web, albeit it isn't always the smoothest when scrolling, despite the 90Hz refresh rate. This is a good size, and it works well for movies and games - however there's no HDR processing, so the picture's darkest and brightest sections can lose detail at times.

Camera of Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G

In most instances, the Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G's rear camera is adequate, but not exceptional. It has a triple-lens design of 48MP wide + 2MP macro + 2MP depth, thus there's no ultra-wide or telephoto zoom.

On the front, there's a single-lens 8MP wide camera that'll suffice for selfies but won't be up to much in the way of harsh circumstances.

If the light is excellent and you have a steady hand, you can get some great images with this phone, but some of the ones we took were a little dull in areas — the HDR looked a little unpredictable at times, but you can always switch it entirely on or fully off instead of having it set to auto.

When HDR is enabled, the camera usually balances light and dark well. Although color reproduction was generally good and shutter speed was pleasingly rapid, certain details appeared blurred and smeared. Although close-ups are handled flawlessly most of the time, the macro mode proved to be of little value.

The Poco M3 Pro 5G struggles in low light — you can capture some passable photographs in the dark if there is enough light available, but there are more misses than strikes in general. When you pay less on a smartphone, the camera is generally one of the giveaways, and this is the case here: if you want reliable smartphone images, it could be worth investing in a more costly handset.

The video on this phone has a maximum resolution of 1080p and a frame rate of 30 frames per second, and the results, like the images, are acceptable but not particularly stunning. Instead of photographs and films you'll cherish for a long time, think about short shots for posting on social media.

Other users have had better results from the Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G's camera than we did, so we don't want to give it a low score in this category. It's probable that some software tinkering will be required to obtain the greatest results from your photos, either on the phone or after they've been transferred to another device.

Specs and Performance

For the price, the Poco M3 Pro 5G features a MediaTek Dimensity 700 5G processor, 4GB or 6GB of RAM, and 64GB or 128GB of storage. We've seen super-cheap phones struggle to make do with even lower specifications, so it's refreshing to see a phone that goes above and beyond.

But it's not much more than the basic minimum, so expect the occasional stutter or lag - not in a way that detracts from the user experience, but just enough to let you know you're not using the Samsung Galaxy S21 or the iPhone 12. It should be able to run all of the programmes and games you desire, but expect lengthier loading times and a few milliseconds of delay while moving between apps.

If you have the choice in your area of the globe, we'd recommend going with the 6GB and 128GB configuration — it's a surprisingly fantastic option for a phone this cheap, but it does add to the price.

The MediaTek chipset is what really distinguishes the Poco M3 Pro 5G as a cheap phone, albeit it does day-to-day work admirably. It's a significant upgrade over the Xiaomi Poco M3.

You're probably curious how these specifications convert into Geekbench 5 scores: 431 for single-core, 1,284 for multi-core, and 1,325 for OpenCL. That's a little less than the similarly spec'd and similarly priced Realme 8 5G, but it's close enough that you won't notice much of a difference when using it.

The performance levels are about where you'd anticipate given the phone's price — approximately twice the very cheapest phones on the market and half the price of some of the top mid-rangers.

It's worth emphasizing the 5G connectivity on board here – it's right there in the phone's name – which gives your buy an added layer of future-proofing. Although 5G is far from universal, it is rapidly becoming so in most regions of the world. We're delighted it's included here, albeit it's no longer such a big deal; just the cheapest new phones don't have it, so it's no longer such a big deal.

Android 11 and the Xiaomi MIUI skin execute software chores admirably. With its collection of useless additional applications and overdone aesthetic choices in certain places, we're not great fans of MIUI, but it's not bad - you could get along just fine with it.

Battery life

The Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G, like many inexpensive phones, has excellent battery life. The combination of less colorful displays and less powerful technology means the battery, which has a 5,000mAh capacity, isn't taxed as much.

In general, we found that the phone lasted well over two days of use, and if you're diligent, you'll only need to charge it every other night.

However, there is no wireless charging, and the wired charging rate is just 18W — if you want super-fast charging, you'll have to upgrade to a more costly phone. This won't be an issue for some folks, and when you're buying at this pricing point, you have to accept some compromises along the way.

In terms of movie watching, streaming films over the web at maximum brightness and low volume consumes around 8% of the battery every hour, resulting in a total of 12-13 hours. That's more than you can get from a lot other phones, so it's something to consider if you're thinking about buying one.

If you're just going to pick up your phone once in a while and don't mind turning down the brightness, you may get even more time between charges.

In the settings, there are also battery saver and super battery saver modes, which severely limit background activities and extend the life of your phone in exchange for a few trade-offs – these make the device even more desirable in terms of battery life.

Pros and Cons

Pros

• It won't cost you much
• A superb performance
• It has 5G connectivity

Cons

• There is plenty of competition
• Camera quality is average
• Software could be improved

Verdict

We believe the Xiaomi Poco M3 Pro 5G is a good value for money - it's not the finest budget phone we've seen this year, but it's also not the worst. If you're looking for a phone that's both economical and has a long battery life, this phone is worth looking into. Also, you can see the OnePlus 10 Pro, Rumors, Release Date, Price, Specs, News, and Leaks