Poco M4 Pro 4G review: A good phone, but doesn’t stand out

Poco M4 Pro Specs:6.43 inch AMOLED, 90Hz display | MediaTek Helio G96 | 64MP+8MP+2MP camera, 16MP front camera | 5,000mAh battery + 33W fast charging|

Poco M4 Pro: What’s good?

Design

Poco M4 Pro features a large camera island on the back coupled with bright yellow and blue colours. However, the textured back that I really liked is now gone in favour of a more brushed metal-like finish. It’s still plastic though.

The design around the rest of the phone remains fairly simple. The camera setup on the back is made to look like a quad-camera setup, but is actually just a triple camera one. While I like the large camera island look on phones, the Poco branding takes away from the aesthetic, just like it did on the Poco M3.

The phone feels well built and has tactile buttons, including the fast and accurate side-mounted fingerprint sensor. A 3.5mm port on the top is also nice to have. You still get the IR blaster also on top. The stereo speakers are well-balanced, but not the loudest.

Display

The 6.43-inch FHD+ panel is good enough for everyday use. It’s an AMOLED display that shows punchy colours and is great for movies and social media. It’s always great to see a good AMOLED panel in the budget segment. I liked the 1000 nits of brightness that the panel offered that made it bright enough to be used under direct sunlight. The 90Hz refresh rate is also a nice addition, making this a great display in this price segment.

Performance

The MediaTek Helio G96 is a well tried and tested chip at this point, and you get the same performance more or less as compared to other phones with the chip. The Poco M4 Pro is good enough for everyday use and can handle multiple apps easily. However, you may see the occasional stutters when there’s a lot going on simultaneously.

You can even enjoy casual games on the phone, but more intensive titles mean your graphics and framerates will be kept in check. With Battlegrounds Mobile India, for instance, the phone can either offer Smooth graphics + Ultra framerate or Balanced graphics with High framerate. Interestingly, the device didn’t get very hot even after about an hour of gameplay.

Camera

The Poco M4 Pro has a good camera setup on the back in this segment. There’s a 64MP main camera + 8MP ultrawide camera combination along with a 2MP macro sensor. The camera setup captures good colours and photos that look pleasing to the eye, but isn’t the best with details. Colours don’t look oversaturated here, something that we have seen with some budget phones.

Performance in indoor lighting is surprisingly good, but low-light and night shots come out very noisy and offer nothing special.

Check out our camera samples by clicking on the image below.

Battery Life

The 5,000mAh battery on the Poco M4 Pro can last for a day or two depending on your usage. That’s pretty good at this price. The 33W fast charger isn’t the fastest right now, but still good enough and gets your phone juiced up in a little over an hour.

Poco M4 Pro: What’s not good?

Poco M4 Pro doesn’t get a lot wrong for its price, like many entries in this segment before it. But this one does somewhat miss out on the value-for-money factor that Poco smartphones are known for. The M4 Pro hence, ends up feeling like a generic device with a good-looking outer shell, not offering anything extra to help make it stand out from the competition.

There’s also no 5G due to the Helio G96 chip, which means you’re going to be stuck with 4G networks on the Poco M4 Pro.

Verdict: Should you get the Poco M4 Pro?

If you’re looking for a good overall phone under Rs 15,000 that also looks more premium, the Poco M4 Pro is a solid choice. However, if it is a major performance you’re looking for in this segment, there’s not much here to differentiate the phone from competitors. Also since there’s no 5G support here, we’d suggest looking elsewhere if you’re looking for something a little more future-proof.

If you like everything else about the phone, check out the Poco M4 Pro 5G which also starts at Rs 14,999 but starts at 4GB RAM instead of 6GB, which I think is a fair trade off for 5G support via the Dimensity 810 chip.