Xiaomi Redmi 4A review: Best entry-level smartphone for those migrating from feature phone

Ever since Xiaomi made its debut mid-2014, the Chinese company has made huge stride in the Indian market and unlike rivals, it did not burn huge cash on marketing. It's feature-rich products took care of themselves and set a new standard in mid-range.

Having said that, Xiaomi too had its fair share of troubles be it Ericsson's patent infringement case and the most recent #BanChineseProducts online campaign and yet, it made a remarkable turnaround in a span of months thanks to the success run of the Redmi Note 3, followed by the Redmi 3 series. By the end of 2016, it not only managed to break in to the top five, but also became the second biggest phone-maker in India. With striking distance from Samsung, Xiaomi has launched another feature-rich entry-level phone Redmi 4A in the country.

Will the Redmi 4A, the company's first 2017-series product in India be able to continue Xiaomi's success run in to the year. Let us find out.

Xiaomi Redmi 4A design and display review:

The Redmi 4A comes in Dark Grey, Gold, and Rose Gold and for the review, we got the latter and it is quite a looker. Xiaomi has done superb paint job, which makes the phone look metallic in appearance, but in reality, it is made of plastic. However, when held in hand, it is surprisingly sturdy.

It measures 139.9 x 70.4 x 8.5 mm in dimensions and weighs just 131.5g, which makes the phone little prone to slipping out of hands. Thankfully, Xiaomi has made the device's shell with matte finish offering additional grip to fingers to hold on to the compact phone.

As far as the display is concerned, the Redmi 4A sports a 5.0-inch HD (1280x720p) screen having 294 ppi (pixels per inch). Having a compact body has its benefits, as all the pixels squeezed in to small screen, it enriches makes the viewing experience delightful.

There is one qualm though, Xiaomi phone's capacitive buttons (home, recents and back) at the bottom are not backlit.

Having said that, we were pretty impressed with exterior looks and also display resolution.

Xiaomi Redmi 4A performance review:

Xiaomi Redmi 4A comes packed with 1.4GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 425 quad-core processor backed by 2GB RAM and 16GB storage, if need be user can expand the memory up to 128GB via microSD card.

For a device priced under Rs. 7,000, testing the Redmi 4A on benchmarking apps, we thought it might be a pointless exercise. Once again, like its build quality, the Redmi 4A surprised us.

It scored 30,027 points on AnTuTu benchmark app and also it managed get a respectable score of 674 and 1738 on single-core and multi-core tests, respectively on Geekbench v4.0 app.

In practical terms, Redmi 4A, despite having MIUI, a forked version of Android Marshmallow OS is quite fast. Applications on the phone loaded fast and while switching between multiple apps, it didn't show much lag.

Redmi 4A owners can play with popular games like Angry Birds and Temple Run, among others without facing any lag, but don't expect phone to perform well with graphics-rich games.

Having said that, Redmi 4A is still the best in its class. No other phones offer this kind of configuration under Rs. 7,000.

Xiaomi Redmi 4A battery review:

Xiaomi Redmi 4A comes with a 3,120mAh and during our tests, we simulated daily average smartphone usage, which includes internet browsing, voice-calling, WhatsApp messaging, three to four YouTube clips (minimum 3 minutes each) and tried video calling.

It managed to last the whole day and if used conservatively, the Redmi 4A will last one and half days easily.

Xiaomi Redmi 4A camera review:

Xiaomi Redmi 4A comes with an 8MP rear camera with LED flash, HDR (High Dynamic Range) and auto-focus. It took really good snaps during the bright light conditions. But, it begins to lose colour accuracy during low light condition.

On the front, it houses a 5MP camera and it took some decent pictures.

But for a device priced under Rs. 7,000, Redmi 4A is still a good camera phone and it can even give some Rs. 10,000 range phones, a run for their money in the market. We were also quite impressed with Smart and Pro photograph modes in the Redmi 4A. No other budget phones offer these kind of custom modes.

Xiaomi Redmi 4A review verdict:4.5

Considering all aspects, Xiaomi Redmi 4A offers more value than its price. We were especially impressed with its build quality, processing power, battery life and photo taking ability.

The Redmi 4A truly sets a new benchmark in the entry-level smartphone class and literally, there is no rival in the market, which can match its all-round capabilities.

If you are looking to migrate from a feature-phone to a smartphone or searching for a low-priced secondary phone with a decent set of features, look no further than the Redmi 4A and definitely, you will not regret buying it.

Pros:

• Good build quality
• Long battery life
• Decent camera with HDR

Cons:

• Its capacitive buttons on the display panel is not backlit, but it's not a big deal, as I was able to get the hang of it within a few days.