Slim, Sleek, and Solid

Xiaomi have really outdone themselves with the look and build of the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5. Like the Xiaomi Redmi 5 Plus, the Redmi Note 5 is a metal cased phone with a sleek finish and premium feel. Although it packs a large battery – 4000mAh to be exact – it’s still reasonably thin. The dual cameras on the back do protrude out a tiny bit but isn’t too much to be uncomfortable or annoying. The phone is quite a fingerprint magnet though and gets worse when your hands have even the tiniest bits of muck on them. Another drawback of the metal back is that it can be difficult to get a solid grip on it sometimes. It does come with a soft plastic case though, which I’ve have on 24/7, so the phone slipping isn’t a problem anymore.

Working Man’s Phone

Being a millennial writer that deals with online publishing means I’m going to need a lot of apps running at the same time. At any given time, I can have Spotify, Microsoft Word, Google Chrome, my gallery app, Whatsapp and a whole host of other apps in the background. Despite that, the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 handles all of them relatively well, although I do have to clear my cache and kill nonessential background apps every now and then. The battery is solid too; I almost always have at least 30 to 40 percent left when I’m about go to sleep. It will also play some of the larger games such as Hearthstone, but that does impact battery life a bit. But as a white collar man’s daily driver? Perfect.

Best Bang-for-Buck Camera

Xiaomi are calling the Redmi Note 5 the ‘Camera Beast’ and it is easy to see why. It’s not very often that a smartphone at this price range comes with a dual camera setup on the rear. The rear cameras produce solid images as expected. The bokeh effects are a nice touch and are Instagram-friendly. The front facing camera is also decent, although shots from it can get slightly grainy. One issue that I do have with both cameras however is that there is a bit of lag between hitting the shutter button and the picture being taken. This happens quite frequently when shooting in not ideal conditions, especially when using other apps such as Instagram other than the native camera.

Gestures Galore

This is honestly my favourite feature about Xiaomi smartphones: the MIUI 9.5 gestures. Following the recent trend of 18:9 full screen displays, the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 comes with the option to remove the on-screen capacitive keys, using gestures such as swiping down to go to the home screen as a replacement. It feels so simple and natural that I genuinely have trouble fiddling around with devices that still use capacitive keys. However, the MIUI 9.5 isn’t without its drawbacks. The notifications are still quite wonky, and occasionally don’t appear on the lock screen. It also sometimes registers a gesture when using the keyboard; swyping from ‘p’ to the other end of the keyboard would pull down the keyboard, as though I gestured ‘back’.

Substantial Screen and Sound Quality

Speaking of the 18:9 full screen display, the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 has excellent screen quality for its price. It isn’t the best, but you must remember that this phone literally doesn’t even costs a thousand ringgit! The 5.99” screen is nice and large, comfortable for long sessions of YouTube and Netflix. It doesn’t feel bulky either as like mentioned earlier, there’s no capacitive keys and there’s not much space that’s wasted on bezels. The speakers aren’t the best out there by any means, but it is reasonably loud and clear for something in this price range. It will easily fill a small or medium sized room if you jack up the volume to the maximum. The fingerprint scanner meanwhile is also pretty good, getting it right most of the time.

Brilliant without Breaking Bank

All in all, when considering the asking price of the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5, it’s a genuine surprise how good it is. Anyone from the intern to the CEO would probably have no qualms about using this phone as their daily driver. Those who need their phones to handle heavy gaming however might want to up their budget and look elsewhere. Saying that, it’s undoubtedly no longer fair to consider Redmi devices Xiaomi’s subpar line up of smartphones, especially if they keep on releasing products as good as this one at these prices. There are a few kinks to iron out however. If Xiaomi can fix the minor issues through updates and patches, then the Redmi Note 5 can only get better from here.

Verdict: This is without a doubt one of the best smartphones you can get that’s below a thousand, albeit by a ringgit.