Xiaomi is no longer just a smartphone brand. With its spinoff brands like Redmi, it has entered various genres of technology. We for one have been using their products since its inception in India when it was a small smartphone brand trying to get some percentage of the Pie here. Now, it is the Numero Uno brand in India when it comes to smartphones and just like its competitors, it has started to make a strong foothold in the TV and audio segment as well. Talking about which, the company under the Redmi banner has launched a new set of wireless earplugs. They call it Redmi Earbuds S that we have been playing around with since the past 2 weeks. At an incredible price, these are somewhat of a showstopper in the entry range of wireless earbuds. This is our review of the Redmi Earbuds S.
Design
Let us start by how light these are. Even when inside the case, the whole apparatus is super light. Available in matt black finish these are a capsule size earplug that weigh just 4 grams each. And in those many grams, Xiaomi was able to fit in 43mAh battery in each earbud and the audio drivers. Each earbud has a led light inside with a clickable front panel to manage tracks, calls and more. Underneath you get the charging points and the left/right ear markings. The default silicon ear tips did fit us well, however, the company does give two extra pairs in the box for different ear cavity types.
The Redmi Earbuds S are magnetic so they snap swiftly within the charging case. The charging case also has a matt black finish. The rear of the case has the micro USB port for charging, however, there is no charging cable provided in the box. The top lid of the case is also magnetic and snaps shut nicely. Overall, the design and build of both the earplugs and the case are good. We would have appreciated a little more tension in the case hinge, but in the price bracket, they are decent.
Redmi Earbuds S Performance
Coming to the fun part, Redmi Earbuds S is built for not just the music lover but also for gamers, which is a unique quality to own in wireless earplugs. It gets connected to any smartphone in no time at all. We tried them with a smartphone that supports Bluetooth 5.0 since Redmi Earbuds S also supports the same tech and the sound was outstanding. We got good bass, clear vocals and crisp lows and mids.
To put it to further test we played PUBG mobile with them and we loved every bit of it. It comes with a gaming mode that reduces the latency to 122ms and gives almost as good shot to sound latency as you would get from a wired headphone. These are also sweat and splash-proof (IPX4 rating), so if you take them to the gym or for a run nothing will happen to them. Just don’t dunk them in water. As far as the battery life is concerned, we got about 3.5 hours of battery life from them, which included 1.5 hours of gameplay. If you want more then just tug them back in the case and you will end up getting up to 12 hours of additional time as it has 300mAh battery.
Call quality is also not bad either on the Redmi Earbuds S and one can access voice assistants on the smartphone as well. You can do this by triple pressing the button located on the earpiece. Google assistant came up and we were able to command it well 9 out of 10 times.
Verdict
All in all, Redmi Earbuds S are a good package in just Rs 1,799. We quite liked the design and the built, we could not take them out for a jog, but we exercised with them at home and they did not unplug from the ear cavity even once. If you are looking for inexpensive wireless audio earplugs for music or gaming needs these are your best bet.
Pros
Good design
Good sound
Lightweight
Cons
No charging cable
Case lid hinges could have been more robust
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