Xiaomi Redmi 3S vs Meizu m3s: The battle between two upgraded budget smartphones

The affordable smartphone segment in India has gained a lot of traction in recent days. Companies such as Xiaomi, Meizu, Lenovo, YU and LeEco have disrupted the smartphone market in a big way and consumers' expectations have grown. The competition is much intense in China, where most of these brands come from, and the recent launches by Xiaomi and Meizu may face a tug-of-war situation in attracting shoppers.

Xiaomi launched the successor to its popular Redmi 3 smartphone, the Redmi 3S, in China earlier this month and Meizu also upgraded its successful m3 smartphone with all-new m3s. Both phones are priced Â¥699 (around Rs. 7,200) and Â¥899 (around Rs. 9,200) for 2GB RAM + 16GB storage and 3GB RAM + 32GB storage models, respectively.

Since both phones are priced similarly, they tend to confuse buyers. Here's a comparison of Meizu m3s and Xiaomi Redmi 3S to help buyers choose the right smartphone based on their use.

Design and display

Xiaomi Redmi 3S features a 5-inch HD 720p display with 294ppi encased within a full metal body. The handset's design is reminiscent of the Redmi Note 3, but in a smaller size. As for Meizu m3s, like the Redmi 3S, there is a full metal unibody and a 5-inch HD display with 296ppi. In terms of design, it looks like its predecessor m3 smartphone and has a 2.5D curved glass on the front.

Camera

Xiaomi Redmi 3S sports a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera with 5-physical lens, f/2.0 aperture, PDAF, HDR and 0.1 second phase focusing speed. On the front, there is a 5MP camera with f/2.2 aperture, 36 smart selfie styles and more.

Meizu m3s also has a similar camera configuration. It features a 13-megapixel rear-facing camera with PDAF, f/2.2 aperture, dual LED flash and a 5MP front snapper with f/2.0 aperture and FotoNation 2.0.

Under the hood

Xiaomi Redmi 3S is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 CPU paired with 2GB/3GB RAM and 16GB expandable storage. Meizu m3s uses a different chipset with same RAM configuration. The m3s is powered by a 1.5GHz MediaTek MT6750 octa-core processor and has a hybrid microSD card slot for additional storage.

Both phones run Android 5.1 Lollipop, but the m3s has its own Flyme 5 OS and the Redmi 3S comes with MIUI 7.

Battery and add-ons

Despite being small packages, both phones have quite impressive batteries. The Redmi 3S has a 4,100mAh unit as compared to the 3,020mAh battery found in the m3s smartphone. Both phones have fingerprint scanning feature and support 4G LTE as well as dual SIM cards.