While the low-end smartphone is the least
competitive segment in the smartphone market, this year, we’re also seeing
low-end smartphones getting much better than last year. A good example is
Xiaomi’s brand new Redmi 9A and 9C smartphones.
Today, the Chinese company held a big
product launch keynote where we saw the global debuts of interesting products
like the Mi Electric Scooters. Moreover, the company announced a new curved
gaming monitor for global audiences, Mi TV Stick as well as other smart
accessories. Last but not least, we got the global pricing for the Redmi 9A and
9C smartphones. These two devices are truly competitive low-end smartphones and
were previously released in Malaysia last month.
The Redmi 9A follows the tradition of this
series by bringing solid specifications at an affordable price tag. The ninth
entry of the series brings a 6.53-inch LCD display with HD+ resolution and a
waterdrop notch with a 5MP selfie. On the back, we have a 13MP shooter coupled
with a LED flash. Unfortunately, the Redmi 9A will not be known as the
smartphone that brought a fingerprint scanner or a secondary camera sensor to
the Redmi A series. However, we can understand that some limitations are
necessary to hit the € 99 (US$ 112) global price tag.
Under the hood, the 9A sports an Helio G25
Octa-Core chipset featuring Eight Cortex-A53 cores paired with 2GB of RAM and
32GB of expandable storage. The processor may not sound impressive, but you
have to remember that last year’s Redmi 8A had a worse quad-core chipset. The
handset draws power from a 5,000mAh battery with a 10W charging. Unfortunately,
the company decided to give a step back with the Redmi 9A by adopting a
micro-USB port. The handset comes in gray, green, and blue colors.
Unfortunately, the availability was not detailed.
The Redmi 9C has an improved Helio G35
Octa-Core chipset and comes in 2GB/32GB or 3GB/64GB combos. The two versions
are priced at € 119 (US$ 135,72) and € 139 (US$ 158,52), respectively. The handset
has the same 6.53-inch display with a 5MP shooter living inside of the usual
waterdrop notch. Moving around to the back, we have a 13MP main camera
alongside a 2MP macro and 2MP depth sensors. The handset has the same 5,000mAh
battery with 10W charging. In counterpart to the Redmi 9A, it features a
rear-mounted fingerprint scanner.
