Xiaomi Redmi Turbo 5 hands-on review

Camera

The Redmi Turbo 5 has a dual camera system on the back, consisting of a 50MP Sony IMX 882 main sensor and an 8MP ultra-wide camera. On the front is a 20MP fixed-focus camera. The rear cameras can do 4K video, but the front is limited to 1080p. We have seen this same setup before on the Poco X8 Pro and even the Poco X8 Pro Max, for that matter, and the results here are going to be similar.

The Redmi Turbo 5 main camera takes impressive quality photos. The colors look great, as is usually the case with Xiaomi cameras, and the level of detail and resolution is also quite nice. Dynamic range is decent, except in very high-contrast scenes, where the camera struggles a bit to maintain the detail in both highlights and shadows.

Main camera

Equally impressive is the 2x digital zoom. The quality of these images is almost always very good, and they can often pass for optical 2x telephoto images.

Main camera 2x zoom

What's disappointing is the 8MP ultra-wide camera. While colors are still great, there isn't enough detail in the images even in good lighting, and it rapidly devolves further as it gets darker. Still, unless you look at the images very closely, they still look pretty decent, especially on the phone's display.

Ultra-wide camera

All in all, the cameras on the Redmi Turbo 5 are pretty competent for the price category.

Conclusion

At a time when pricing is in flux, and everything seems to be getting expensive, the Redmi Turbo 5 comes as a breath of fresh air. While not a super new or ground-breaking device, the Redmi Turbo 5 is an extremely competently made phone with an elegant design, great build quality, superb display, amazing battery life, competent cameras, and class-leading performance.

We wish it did more to differentiate itself from the Poco X8 Pro, which is pretty much the same phone with a slightly smaller battery at a lower price. Even something simple as swapping the front camera with one that had autofocus and could do 4K video would have been great. But we once again come back to the pricing and the current market situation, and feel that perhaps we should count our blessings and avoid looking a gift horse in the mouth. This is still a great phone under INR 40,000, and we hope Xiaomi is able to maintain the price.

Pricing

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