Xiaomi launched the Redmi K30 Pro Zoom in India last year. On December 10, 2019, the Chinese phone maker introduced the phone alongside its cousins in the K30 series. This is the successor of the K20 series that was launched in India in July 2019.

Apart from the K30 Pro Zoom, the series also includes the standard Redmi K30, the Redmi K30 5G, Redmi K30i 5G, and the Redmi K30 5G Racing. At the price of Rs 32,290, this K30 Pro Zoom is a bit more expensive than its predecessor K20 Pro whose price was Rs 29,999.

Display

This smartphone comes with a Super AMOLED screen that measures 6.67 inches, an aspect ratio of 20:9, a resolution of 1080x2400 pixels, and a pixel density of 395 ppi. It’s protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 5 for enhanced safety, featuring HDR10+ and a maximum brightness of 500 nits.

AMOLED, or active-matrix organic light-emitting diode, is an OLED screen technology. OLED refers to a screen technology that uses thin films with organic compounds to form the electroluminescent material while active-matrix describes the tech behind pixel addressing. Over that past 13 years, AMOLED has become more and more popular in making smartphone displays, in addition to TVs, digital cameras, and media players. The reason is that it allows for large screens, high resolutions, low production costs, and lower energy consumption.

Thanks to the pop-up selfie camera, which we will go into detail later, you will get a screen with no notches or punch-holes. This design is exactly the same as the K20 series as well as other devices in the K30 series.

With very thin bezels and no notches, the phone offers an amazing viewing experience, which will prove amazing in watching videos and playing games. The 20:9 aspect ratio means the screen is tall, suitable to be used with one hand, but still offers a wide field of view when you hold it horizontally for gaming.

Featuring a pixel density of 395 ppi and 500-nit brightness, the color on this display is a bit dimmer than that on the K20 series and the standard K30. It offers high contrast, deep black, and enough visibility for use outside under the sunlight. As a bonus, you can also use the dark mode when navigating on the phone, meaning less eye strain and more power efficiency.

The Redmi K30 Pro Zoom has a 60Hz refresh rate, the average level for most current smartphones on the market. With this rate, you can surely play any mobile titles, including the popular PUBG Mobile.

Chip

This phone is powered by the Snapdragon 865, the most powerful smartphone processor you can get right now, especially for the price point of the K30 Pro Zoom. This is an octa-core chipset that consists of a 2.84GHz core, triple 2.42GHz cores, and quad 1.8GHz cores.

The Snapdragon 865 is currently the best chip, comparable to the Bionic A13 chip from Apple. For the same processor, other smartphones cost a lot more, for example, the Black Shark 3 Pro at the price of Rs 49,190, Rs 17,000 higher than the K30 Pro Zoom’s price.

On Antutu, this processor gets 583599 points, including 222572 points for GPU performance. That means the images in the game will look beautiful and smooth.

The Snapdragon is also the best processor for Android smartphones to handle gaming, even intensive titles like PUBG Mobile and Free Fire.

Storage

When it comes to RAM and ROM, there are three options for users. First, you can opt for 8GB RAM with 128GB of internal memory, or 8GB RAM with 256GB of onboard memory, or 12GB RAM with 512GB of internal storage.

While 8GB is the lowest RAM capacity, it’s already enough for handling games, including PUBG and all the titles you love.

In a gaming test that lasts for 30 minutes, the Redmi K30 Pro Zoom offered a really smooth experience with hardly any frame drop. There were only few drops when it was loading the games and settings. The phone didn’t seem to have any overheating issues either, its temperature went up during the gaming process but just slightly to 33 degrees C, making it one of the coolest devices to hold when playing games.

Battery

The Redmi K30 Pro Zoom packs a 4700mAh battery with support for 33W fast charging that can juice up the entire capacity within 63 minutes. However, it doesn’t allow for wireless charging.

With this capacity, paired with a powerful processor, the smartphone allows for using all day long, even if you perform intensive tasks. The 30-minute gaming test drained only 8 percent of the battery capacity, from 24% to 16%, which is impressive.

And as we mentioned in the previous part, the phone heats up very little during gameplay and the heat likely comes from RAM and chip as they process the game. Also, the heat is distributed evenly across the device.

Camera

The camera module is where the Redmi K30 Pro Zoom differs from the K30 Pro the most. On the back, there are four cameras, including a 64MP wide-angle lens, an 8MP telephoto lens, a 13MP ultra-wide-angle lens, and a 2MP depth lens. The telephoto lens also offers 30x optical zoom that allows you to see an object from a distance 30 times its actual size.

The rear camera setup is placed on a round module, with the LED flash at the center. It supports HDR mode, panorama mode, and allows for video recording at 8K, 4K and 1080p resolution with 24/30/60/120/240/960fps frame rates.  

Meanwhile, on the front, there is a single 20MP selfie lens mounted in a motorized pop-up mechanism. The front camera also supports HDR mode and video recording at 1080p resolution and 30fps frame rate.