Poco F9 Pro review
New 200MP main camera makes the 2.5x zoom redundant?
The Poco F9 Pro changes things up in the camera department compared to its predecessor and not only is it using a slightly different telephoto camera, but it's also getting the same 200MP main unit as the F9 Ultra. The selfie camera has also been upgraded (it's the same as on the Ultra too), while the ultrawide remains a modest piece of kit (the one on the Ultra is a couple of notches better).
The new man camera is using a 200MP sensor of the same optical format as the old 50MP unit, at 1/1.56" (or 1/1.55", it's not an exact science). The precise model is unknown, but just as we speculated in the case of the F9 Ultra, it's most probably the Samsung HP5 sensor, though there's also a SmartSens with the same basic specs.
As we already saw on the Ultra, that sensor is doing quite a remarkable job of zooming in to 2x, and on the higher-tier Poco model it was complemented by a 5x zoom camera, which made all the sense. Here on the Pro, however, you get a mostly familiar 60mm-equivalent 2.5x zoom camera and that's looking like it's all too close to what the main camera can already do quite well. Then again, that 2.5x zoom camera should still be usable at 5x, where you wouldn't expect the main camera to still be holding up, so there's also that.
The numbers reported in hardware apps point to a different 50MP sensor than the one used on the previous model - we're looking at 0.64µm pixel size vs. 0.61µm and a 1/2.76" optical format vs. 1/2.88", but that's about as immaterial a difference as there can be, we reckon.
The ultrawide is among the more basic units - it's an 8MP sensor paired with a fixed-focus lens. The Ultra has a larger and higher-res sensor, though it too has a fixed focus lens. In contrast, we've seen 8MP ultrawide cameras with autofocus. Well, not this one.
The selfie camera is an upgrade compared to last year's Pro and is now the same as the one found in the Ultra - we're looking at a familiar combination of a 32MP sensor and a fixed-focus lens.
- Wide (main): 200MP (1/1.56", 0.5µm - 2.0µm), f/1.68, 24mm, PDAF (9cm - ∞), OIS; 4K60 video recording.
- Telephoto: 50MP (1/2.76", 0.64µm - 1.28µm), f/2.0, 60mm (2.5x), PDAF (8.5cm - ∞), OIS; 4K60.
- Ultrawide: 8MP (1/4.0", 1.12µm), f/2.2, 16mm, fixed focus; 1080p30.
- Front camera: 32MP (1/3.4", 0.61µm - 1.22µm), f/2.2, 22mm, fixed focus; 4K30/1080p60.
Daylight photo quality
Main camera
The main camera's 1x photos in daylight are excellent. They have great dynamic range and pleasing color rendition, plus a ton of detail that's rendered with reasonably restrained sharpening.
Daylight samples, main camera (1x)
You can also count on solid people shots from the Poco F9 Pro's main camera. Skin tones are accurate and the Portrait mode blur level is conservative and thus believable.
Human subjects, main camera (2x): Photo mode • Portrait mode
The 50MP mode doesn't offer any particular detail benefits - it's looking like an upscale job from the 12.5MP regular images.
Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 50MP
The 200MP mode is something else though. The files do look sharper and better detailed than the 50MP ones and you can tell there's potential for downscaling them to a lower resolution and getting better results than the default output. Indeed, we got some pretty excellent 24MP files after a few extra steps. Well, that, plus the time it takes to actually capture the 200MP photos, which is a few seconds of staring at the screen.
Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 200MP
Daylight samples, main camera (1x), 24MP
With that in mind, you shouldn't be surprised to see some great 2x 12.5MP photos too - these have excellent detail and no real flaws.
Daylight samples, main camera (2x)
The 2x photos of people are similarly praise-worthy thanks to their superb detail and great global properties. The Portrait mode results are also top-notch.
Human subjects, main camera (2x): Photo mode • Portrait mode
Telephoto camera
The telephoto isn't going to take you much farther than that with its native zoom level which puts it at 2.5x. Admittedly, it does a great job at 2.5x capturing very good detail and rendering it in a quite likeable way. Its color rendition is somewhat more enthusiastic than the main camera's and contrast is a touch higher, making the telephoto shots more expressive overall, but not in a bad way.
Daylight samples, telephoto camera (2.5x)
Headshots at 2.5x are also excellent, with great skin tones and nice facial detail rendition. The Portrait mode results are easy to like too. The additional 3.1x zoom level (75mm equivalent focal length) in Portrait mode gives you ever so slightly tighter framing with no real quality penalty.
Human subjects, telephoto camera: Photo mode (2.5x) • Portrait mode (2.5x) • Portrait mode (3.1x)
The 50MP photos at 2.5x show some extra detail in brightly lit outdoor scenes, but not so much indoors.
Daylight samples, telephoto camera (2.5x), 50MP
The 5x zoom shots are somewhere between decent and good depending on how much light you've got - indoor scenes are softer, outdoor ones are sharper but somewhat heavily processed.
Daylight samples, telephoto camera (5x)
Ultrawide camera
The modest ultrawide takes alright photos in bright daylight, but in more demanding indoor conditions things quickly turn sour in terms of sharpness. Dynamic range and colors are quite good overall, no complaints there.
Daylight samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x)
Close-ups
Close-ups on the F9 Pro can be done on the main camera at 2x (or maybe even all the way up to 2.4x) or on the telephoto at either its native 2.5x or at 5x. We'd probably avoid the 5x option since pixel-level quality is a bit meh, even though that will get you the largest reproduction - still, if you're going to be sharing at reduced resolution, it's a valid option.
We're a little torn between the 2x and 2.5x images. We're willing to try and convince ourselves that the telephoto shots are generally slightly better, thus maybe defending the 2.5x camera's existence in this configuration. On the other hand, the main camera does quite admirably itself, and whatever advantage the telephoto might have, is probably not all that great.
Close-up samples, main camera (2x)
Close-up samples, telephoto camera (2.5x)
Close-up samples, telephoto camera (5x)
Selfies
The 32MP selfie camera gives us another chance to complain about Xiaomi's insistence on saving needlessly high-res selfies for no apparent reason other than marketing. That aside (again, as usual), the photos are actually pretty great, capturing a wide dynamic range and pleasing skin tones, and detail itself is quite good after all, just not 32MP-good.
Also worth noting is that the lack of autofocus is less of an issue than on other phones as the chosen focus distance and the depth of field cover short shooting distances reasonably well.
Selfie samples
Low-light photo quality
Main camera
The Poco F9 Pro takes very good photos with its main camera in low-light. Admittedly, they have a bit of a dark vibe to them, but overall you'd be getting nicely controlled highlights and well developed shadows. We didn't experience any white balance mishaps and we got nicely saturated nighttime colors. Detail is very good overall too.
Low-light samples, main camera (1x)
The 2x zoom results may not be quite as impressive as the daytime ones, but they're still very good in terms of detail and can rival some actual high-end cameraphones at this zoom level.
Low-light samples, main camera (2x)
Telephoto camera
The telephoto's 2.5x results are very good too, and they do have a small but relatively consistent advantage in captured detail over the main camera's 2x photos. The overall look is very similar in terms of dynamic range and colors too. Still, it's a very minor extension of reach and the sharpness advantage is not huge either.
Low-light samples, telephoto camera (2.5x)
The 5x zoom level images are usable, but not particularly good-looking - they're pretty soft when viewed from up close and there's some relatively pronounced jaggies here and there.
Low-light samples, telephoto camera (5x)
Ultrawide camera
The ultrawide camera will get you well exposed shots with good colors and as long as you don't go pixel peeping, you'll probably be fine. If you do look at the images at 1:1, you'll see there's not much detail in there.
Low-light samples, ultrawide camera (0.6x)
Photo quality verdict
The Poco F9 Pro's camera system is somewhat strangely put together, its otherwise pretty great telephoto's existence being questioned by an also excellent main camera. The main camera does an excellent job at both 1x and 2x, in both daytime and at night, and the telephoto also puts up a respectable performance at 2.5x - it's just that 2.5x is much too close to 2x. The 5x zoom results are alright, though probably not super exciting enough to warrant the extra camera all on their own. With that in mind, the F9 Ultra's configuration with a 5x telephoto makes a lot more sense. Back to the F9 Pro, the ultrawide is unremarkable, but the selfies are pretty great.
Video quality
The Poco F9 Pro can record video up to 4K60 with the main and the telephoto cameras on the back, while the ultrawide is capped at 1080p30. The F9 Ultra also has an 8K30 mode on the main camera, but not the F9 Pro. The selfie camera maxes out at 4K30 or 1080p60 depending on whether you prioritize resolution or frame rate. A 24fps option is missing, including in the Pro video mode.
The default codec is h.265 but you can switch to h.264. The phone can record in HDR10+ if you enable the toggle in settings (a more accessible button in the viewfinder would be welcome) and it's available for all resolution/frame rate settings on all four cameras.
The Pro video mode has a Log recording mode with a handful of live preview LUTs, plus the option to import your own. The usual features are available here, including audio level monitoring, zebras for highlight clipping, and a tiny histogram, which can be switched for a tiny waveform - pretty solid.
There's an always-on regular electronic video stabilization for all resolutions and frame rates.
You can hit '> play' below and use the '>| next' button to advance through the playlist of all video samples, or you can watch the full playlist on YouTube.
The F9 Pro captures very good videos with its main camera during the day. They have wide dynamic range, excellent contrast, and accurate color rendition, while detail is very good at 1x and more like alright at 2x. The telephoto will get you meaningfully better detail at 2.5x than the main camera at 2x, and it too has very good global properties. The ultrawide's 1080p clips are also looking good from afar, but there's not much detail to speak of in them.
Video screengrabs, daylight: 0.6x • 1x • 2x • 2.5x • 5x
In the dark, the main camera falls a little short of our sharpness expectations, though it's still doing alright in that respect, plus it gets the colors just right and has excellent dynamic range. 2x is on the soft and noisy side though, but still usable. The telephoto's 2.5x footage is better than 2x, again, offering an advantage in sharpness and better contrast. The ultrawide's footage is not the worst we've seen, but it's still pretty bad.
Video screengrabs, low light: 0.6x • 1x • 2x • 2.5x • 5x
As we observed on the Ultra, walking shake on the main camera isn't quite as expertly ironed out as we'd have hoped, but it's still not too bad. When shooting from a stationary position the main camera is super stable, and so too is the ultrawide, while the telephoto may have a gentle waviness left over. Pretty solid effort overall though.
Video quality verdict
The Poco F9 Pro's video camera capabilities are quite good, with 4K60 on both the main and telephoto cameras, HDR10+ all around, and a decently capable Pro mode. In practice, you can expect very good videos from the main camera and the telephoto, both in good light and at night, while the ultrawide is about as good as nonexistent when it comes to video. Stabilization is generally very good.
