Redmi added two new smartphones to its affordable A series last month. Prices for the Redmi A2 start at Rs 5,999, while the A2+ is available at Rs 8,499 in a single 4GB RAM and 64GB storage variant. We got our hands on the Redmi A2+ a week ago and have been using it since. In the last decade, Redmi has really thrust itself as the primary player in the entry-level smartphones segment. Does its reputation still hold up? Find out in our Redmi A2+ review.
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Table of Contents
Redmi A2+ review: Design and Display
Inside the box, you get the Redmi A2+ smartphone, a USB Type-B charging cable, a 10W power adapter, a SIM ejector tool, and a quick start guide. You don’t get a plastic case with the package neither does the smartphone come with a pre-installed screen protector.
Redmi has retained the design of last year’s A1 on the A2 series as well. The smartphone gets a plastic back with a textured finish that is very grippy. You don’t have to worry about any fingerprints or dirt settling on the back. The two-step camera panel gets a square cutout and there’s a fingerprint sensor right in the middle. This biometric sensor is what separates the Redmi A2+ from the regular A2 variant. The camera cutout houses the wide camera and the depth sensor.
Along the bottom edge of the smartphone, you will find the microphone, micro USB (Type-B) port, and the 3.5mm headphone jack. The speaker grille is positioned on the top edge. The volume rocker and power key have been placed on the right edge while the left edge houses the SIM and memory card tray.
Redmi has also retained the 6.52-inch IPS LCD display on the A2+. This display has a resolution of 720 x 1600p and is surrounded by bezels that get thicker around the chin. The A2+ has a screen-to-body ratio of 81%. For an entry-level smartphone, this is a great display to watch video content. The speaker puts out a decent level of audio that won’t have you reaching for your headphones every time you load a video on this device. We watched video content across Netflix, YouTube, and Prime, and the viewing experience was good.
The Redmi A2+ has decent touch sensitivity, but the haptic feedback on it is way too intense. We didn’t have any complaints about the scrolling experience while browsing social media feeds and web pages. Once we turned off the haptic feedback, we had a good time with the phone. The fingerprint scanner on this device is quick as well.
Redmi A2+ review: Performance and Cameras
Redmi A2+ gets some important upgrades under the hood. The smartphone is powered by MediaTek Helio G36 SoC and runs Android 13 Go Edition out of the box. For those that don’t know, Android’s ‘Go’ series is specially designed for entry-level devices that lack a powerful processor. You get the essential Android OS features with very little bloatware. While there is Xiaomi’s MIUI on top, the overall software experience is much closer to stock Android.
With the MediaTek Helio G36 chip inside, the Redmi A2+ does a good job of handling basic tasks like texting, social media browsing, music playback, and switching between multiple apps. You won’t notice an immediate decline in speed while multitasking, but the smartphone struggles when some heavy tasks are thrown at it. For example, we had to pause media playback while using navigation services on this smartphone.
We even tried a bit of gaming on this smartphone. It did a good job of running basic games like Candy Crush, Royal Match, and Bubble Shooter. The smartphone can also run Call of Duty Mobile, but the gameplay is less than satisfactory. This is something all entry-level smartphones struggle with, and we’d recommend looking for a device in another segment if you’re particularly interested in gaming. The Geekbench 5 app returned a single-core score of 144 points and a multi-core score of 514 points for Redmi A2+.
The Android Go experience on this device is pretty standard. There are some apps like Facebook Lite and Spotify that come preinstalled on the smartphone, but they can be uninstalled from the device. You can find traces of MIUI elements like the Cleaner app that clears cache, residuals, and obsolete files from the phone. There is also a ‘Game Center’ marketplace that comes preinstalled on the device. There is a ‘Mint Themes’ app on the A2+ that lets you change the wallpaper, but other than that, its functionality is very limited.
Redmi A2+ is equipped with a 5,000mAh battery that easily lasts an entire day if you are a heavy user. If you are more conservative with your use, you can push this phone to two days on a single charge without hitting any hurdles. If your tasks only involve texting and calling, this phone can last up to 3 days. The 10W power adapter can fully charge the smartphone in 3 hours. We would have really appreciated a Type-C USB port to improve the charging time. It is about time that entry-level smartphones started adopting the new ports.
There are no changes on the camera unit either. Redmi A2+ retains the 8MP primary shooter and the 0.08MP depth sensor. Up front, the 5MP selfie camera has been housed in a waterdrop notch. In daylight conditions, the primary 8MP camera takes good shots. The images produced by the camera have rich colours and a decent amount of detail. However, in diffused lighting and overcast conditions, the images come out a bit soft. This is definitely not a dealbreaker, but we’d have liked a camera upgrade on this smartphone. With that being said, it is still a good camera in this price range.
Images taken at night were very grainy and lacked details. The camera app lacks a Night Mode, so there is no way of reducing the noise in the images. We’d suggest sticking to daytime shots with this camera. The 5MP selfie camera up front takes decent images and does a good job of edge separation in Portrait Mode. The skin tones captured by this camera were close to real as well.
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Verdict
The Redmi A2+ puts up a solid performance for an entry-level phone. It can handle regular everyday tasks very well and the 6.5-inch LCD display is ideal to watch videos and movies. The 8MP camera on this phone puts up a decent performance under good lighting. We really liked the battery backup offered by this phone and would recommend this to users who travel frequently. With a 2-day battery life, Redmi A2+ would make a solid burner phone too.
Redmi A2+ review: Pros
- Good display
- Excellent battery life
- Handles routine tasks very well
Redmi A2+ review: Cons
- No night mode in the camera app
- Doesn’t have a USB Type-C port
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