Just because you’re not feeling the 5G hype, doesn’t mean you don’t deserve a better phone, says the Redmi Note 10S. With its compact design and economic price, the phone is here to make sure your options aren’t limited to choosing between the cutting edge of price & function, versus a junker from the Clinton years.

But how does the phone stack up? Read on and find out.

Xiaomi Redmi Note 10S Specs (RM899)

The Feel of It

Just like its sister phone the Redmi Note 10 5G, the Redmi Note 10S feels pretty good in your hands. It’s plastic casing makes it incredibly lightweight, so you can carry it around without worrying about wearing yourself out over long periods of time.

I’m a big fan of the fingerprint-proof casing, which means you won’t have to worry about embarrassing photos where you can see the smudges on the back of the phone.

Where the phone really shines though is in its screen, which sports a 6.43 inch display at 2400 x 1800p. When you consider the size of the phone, this is basically one of the best functional viewing resolutions you can get, and even mundane YouTube videos look amazing on it.

The tradeoff here is that the screen has a low refresh rate of only 60hz, so don’t expect any high-intensity gaming out of it. It’s not too bad a tradeoff, all things considered- after all, a lot of console games are still in denial about wanting to be more than 30 frames per second, but considering even the Redmi Note 10 5G’s 90 hz screen, if you’re looking to game in style this probably isn’t the phone for you.

Camera

The Redmi Note 10 S comes with a quad camera, a feature usually reserved for higher-end phones. This allows you to take a variety of photos, with lenses tailored for different situatison.

The stand out workhorse is the 64MP main camera, letting you take gorgeous high-resolution photos to capture every detail. This should work for most every day use, since you’ll be able to capture regular shots gorgeously.

After that the next lens is an 8MP Ultra-Wide, letting you take gorgeous sweeping panoramas. This is a great lens to have on holiday, letting you take wonderful vistas with good clarity.

After that you have a 2MP Macro lens, meaning you’ll be able to take photos of whatever hobby you’ve been working on for the past year. It also comes with a 2MP depth sensor, so taking all manner of artistic shots is really possible with the Redmi Note 10S.

The front camera is no slouch too, with a 13MP camera that takes great selfies. The quality is also pretty decent if you wanted to use it for livestreaming, so this is definitely something to look into for budding content creators.

Gaming

Like I mentioned earlier, the biggest bottleneck with the phone is its screen, which only caps out at 60hz refresh rate. I won’t hold it against the phone for much longer here, since there’s a lot more to gaming than a Game Genie window with a big number in the framerate section. After all, the Redmi Note 10 S runs the MediaTek Helio G95 chipset, which already runs the phone’s OS pretty well. On top of that it also has 6GB RAM, so it’s not like the phone wasn’t made for running games or anything.

One of the most popular mobile games, PUBG Mobile runs well on the phone, assuming you’re running it at lower settings. The game’s borderline unplayable on any of the higher settings, and you won’t be able to run the high framerate mode thanks to the screen’s refresh rate. The main praise here is for PUBG Mobile’s options, where there’s absolutely a setting that the Redmi Note 10 S can run the game flawlessly. It doesn’t look amazing, but it looks well enough and more importantly the only thing killing you will be your own lack of skill.

Similarly, we tried out the GamerBraves Mobile Testing Apparatus, Genshin Impact, and the results weren’t great either. Any attempt to get the game running on higher settings is met with a wonderful slideshow presentation, while you also discover the Redmi Note 10 S’s secret hand warmer function. Actually the heating issues kind of stays the same even  in regular play, but at the very least the game is optimized well enough that you could kill some time in Genshin before doing your dailies on PC.

Admittedly, the Redmi Note 10 S isn’t really that great of a gaming phone. On one hand, it does the bare minimum- it can run games. But don’t expect to be taking glorious screenshots or having much to brag about performance wise, and do expect some nasty caveats to go with it.

Closing Thoughts

At the end of the day, the Redmi Note 10 5S is one of those phones that seems like you need to really make an informed decision when it comes to buying. For its price point, the screen is great! But it affords good pricing and display quality by trading in a lot of other functionality, particularly when it comes to gaming.

As a mobile gaming site, it’s hard to not take that a little seriously, but again it all comes down to personal preference. If you’re the type who just plays auto battler gacha games, you’ll have no qualms- who cares about 90hz when your waifu looks gorgeous on an AMOLED screen? But if you’re the type who wants to climb to the top of mobile esports, maybe give this one a miss.