In a world where flagship smartphones rocking the quickest Fortnite-supporting chipsets can cost in excess of R20 000, Xiaomi has this week launched a device for a little over R4300 (directly converted from Rupees).
Introducing the Chinese company’s latest brand and device: the Pocophone F1.
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Now, Poco isn’t the strongest name to lead the line of new, affordable but stupidly quick devices, but at that price, anything will do.
The F1 launched in India earlier this week and will sell there for Rs. 20 999 — less than a quarter of the price of the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 and iPhone X.
Best of all? It’s sports a Snapdragon 845 — Qualcomm’s current chipset seen in the likes of the LG Q7 ThinQ, Sony Xperia XZ2 and the OnePlus 6.
Beyond that, it features a notched 6.18 inch screen, a 2246×1080 resolution IPS panel, a maximum RAM capacity of 8GB, and 256GB of internal storage for the higher specification model.
At the rear, there’s a dual camera setup of 12MP and 5MP, the latter acting as a depth sensor. The primary camera however has an aperture of f/1.9 and phase detection autofocus. Up front, there’s a 20MP f/2.0 selfie camera.
There’s a fingerprint reader, USB-C, Qualcomm QuickCharge 3.0 fast charging, Bluetooth 5.0, a microSD card slot, a headphone jack, and stereo speakers.
So what doesn’t it have?
For those who like metal phone bodies, be disappointed. Xiaomi has opted for glass and plastic for the device. Additionally, there’s no NFC, so no future wireless payments option. Wireless charging is also lacking, and so is any water or dust ingress protection.
There’s no word on whether the Poco F1 will make it to South African shore — it’ll be sold through flash sales initially — but if it does, it’ll probably be a lot cheaper than its competitors.
Feature image: Xiaomi
