Xiaomi Redmi Y2 Review

Selfie is the new trend and with Vivo and Oppo being the king for selfie centric phones, more and more companies are trying to get their best in the segment. Xiaomi launched their first selfie – centric phone the Xiaomi Redmi Y2. With the launch of the phone, they did mess up their lineup quite a bit. Today we are here to see if the Redmi Y2 is positioned right for the selfie lovers, and they get the full benefit of the amount they are paying.

Design & Build

Xiaomi has kind of kept the design language similar to the Redmi series of devices launched recently like the Redmi Note 5 & Note 5 Pro, Redmi 5 & even the Redmi S2 which they launched specifically for the Chinese market. The phone comes with a 5.99 – inch display which is the same panel which is used on the Redmi Note 5 – series in India. Even the back camera module is the same as on the Redmi Note 5 Pro. One of the downsides of the Redmi Y2 is about the construction of the device, it gets a plastic build unlike the metal build of the Redmi Note series.

Talking about the placements the phone have a dual camera unit at the back with a dual tone flash and a fingerprint scanner which is placed right in the center. On the front, we have the display, earpiece, selfie camera, selfie light, and some bezels. On the right, we get the volume rocker and the power button which are easy to reach.

Build of the phone is not that great as we did mention just above with the plastic build. Although the phone looks premium and just likes its more costly sibling Redmi Not 5 Pro, but in hand feel of the device is mostly compromised and the phone does look kind of cheap to hold.

Display

Redmi Y2 comes with the same 5.99 – inch panel as we saw on this year’s Redmi Note series. The panel has rounded corners which gives it a better overall look. Due to the tall boy design of the phone, it is not as easy to reach the top of the display and perform tasks on the notification panel. The company has included features such as the switch between the navigation buttons and the navigation gestures which makes it easy for us to utilize the whole display as per our need.

Viewing angles of the phone are quite good with a neutral color tone output. We can although tweak the output as per our liking. The resolution of the phone is just HD+ which is a downside on the phone. The original display of the phone is much reflective which will make it an issue for you to look at the phone during the daylight, although you can get a Matte screen guard installed to solve up the issue.

Performance

Xiaomi Redmi Y2 comes with the tried and tested processor from Qualcomm the Snapdragon 625, but it has started to show its age. The phone is capable of giving a good lag-free performance, but we can see minor lags in the phone at times. Multi-Tasking on the phone is a breeze and it can perform all the day to day task you throw on it.

As far as benchmarks go the phone is capable of scoring 77,083 on AnTuTu, while on GeekBench is scored 823 and 3982 in single core and multi-core tests. These performance doesn’t matter as far as you are using the phone for daily usage and clicking pictures. The phone will do lag a bit during heavy gaming, and won’t be able to play the game above Medium graphics as after that the GPU of the phone will bottleneck the CPU.

Camera

Xiaomi comes with an easy camera interface which can be used by anyone. It’s the same what we see on most of the Xiaomi devices. On the back, the device comes with a 12 – MP Rear camera with a 5 – MP secondary camera assisting the main camera for bokeh effect. On the front, we get a 16 – MP Selfie shooter, along with a front selfie flash.

With the normal camera features, we get a couple of different features from the stock application such as short videos, portrait mode, manual mode, and more. Redmi Y2 produces great images with AI enabled to apply beautification to the subjects of the photos. The secondary camera at the back gets you some great images with smooth subject cropping. Low light shots from the phone are kind of choppy due to lower shutter speeds.

Even the front camera gets some great selfie shots for most of the time and even when assisted by the flash in nights also you get some great images. But the downside of the front camera is that it also has softer images just like beautification mode is always on even in the normal mode, HDR images turn great but you need to have a stable hand.

Battery

Redmi y2 comes with a 4000 math battery and comes for a verity of colors such as Gold and Black. Both the color options are mostly available and it is kind of easy to grab one. The battery can easily last for more than a day, and you can keep the phone running for a day and a half with a full charge. The phone takes some time to charge which a downside is considering more and more phones are getting fast charging nowadays.

Verdict

Xiaomi Redmi Y2 is a great phone for people who are looking for a device which can easily take care of your front camera needs. It is truly selfie-centric phone, which can even handle most of your average mobile phone needs like social media, calling, and all others. The phone is priced at the right place making it a hot buy for all the selfie lovers. What do you think about the Redmi Y2, and also will you be choosing one in the near future for your selfie love?