Best Smartphones Under ₹ 15,000 (September 2020)
Realme 7
Realme 7 The main features of the Realme 7 are a new chipset, a bigger battery, and a new primary rear camera. It also has a new design, so it looks nicer than the Realme 6. However, the thickness and weight of the phone increases slightly due to the bigger battery. The Realme 7 is thicker and heavier.
The rest of the features are similar to the Realme 6. The Realme 7 is fast to use due to the good chipset and the display panel comes with a 90Hz refresh rate which makes the experience even smoother. Gaming performance is also very good, the display has good brightness and battery life is excellent. 30W fast charging also helps in charging the battery quite quickly.
The primary rear camera is slightly better than the Realme 6 in day and night photos, but the rest of the camera sensors perform similarly. Video quality could have been better, especially in low light. If you don’t already have the Realme 6, the Realme 7 is a good option to buy.
Motorola Moto G9
Motorola’s G-series has long been the backbone of the company’s lineup and has been the first phone in India Moto G9 is the first country to get the device. Considering what the phone offers, we think Motorola has launched it at a pretty competitive price. The eye-catching feature is a clean version of Android, which Motorola now calls MyUX. It’s almost stock Android, with some classic Moto customisations.
The Moto G9 has a good build quality, but it feels a bit big and bulky. It is one of the few phones that still has a dedicated Google Assistant button, which is a nice touch. It is the first phone in India to feature the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 662 chipset, which handles tasks well. Apart from games taking a little longer than usual to load, overall performance was good. Battery life is also better than average.
Camera quality was pretty good during the day. Close-ups were generally full of detail and colours came out well. Low-light photography is where the Moto G9 struggled a lot, though the Night mode helped massively. Overall, the Motorola Moto G9 is a decent phone if you’re looking for a clean Android experience.
Redmi Note 9
redmi note 9 The smartphone is the latest entry-level smartphone in the Redmi Note 9 series. The design of this phone is quite similar to the Redmi Note 9 Pro and Redmi Note 9 Pro Max. This phone comes with a 6.53 inch display and hole-punch front camera design. Corning Gorilla Glass 5 protection has been provided to protect the phone panel from scratches. The phone’s display has thick borders, but it can be accepted in this price range.
The phone uses MediaTek Helio G85 processor. 4 GB and 6 GB RAM are available for pairing. There are two options for inbuilt storage – 64 GB and 128 GB. If needed, a microSD card of up to 128 GB can be used. The price of 4 GB RAM and 64 GB storage variant of the phone is Rs 11,999 in India, while the 4 GB RAM and 128 GB storage variant of the phone will be sold for Rs 13,499. The most premium variant of Redmi Note 9 comes with 6 GB RAM + 128 GB storage and will be sold for Rs 14,999. The battery of Redmi Note 9 is 5,020 mAh, which comes with a 22.5 watt charger.
Like the rest of the phones in the Redmi Note 9 series, it also has a quad camera setup, which is housed in a square module. There is a 48-megapixel Samsung GM1 primary sensor here, with an F / 1.79 lens. There is also an 8-megapixel secondary camera here, with an ultra-wide-angle F / 2.2 lens. Apart from this, there is a 2-megapixel depth camera and a 2-megapixel macro camera. The phone has a 13-megapixel selfie camera.
Realme 6i
The Realme 6i is a toned down version of the Realme 6. However, this version includes the key hardware of the Realme 6, such as the MediaTek Helio G90T and 90Hz refresh rate, which you may not find in this price range. Realme 6i It has a 6.5-inch display with a hole-punch design. The Funo also has a side-mounted fingerprint scanner.
Realme 6i has a plastic body, while this phone will be available in two color options. The MediaTek Helio G90T processor is perfect for handling day-to-day tasks and the gaming experience is also going to be good with it. In this phone, you will get two variants 4 GB RAM and 6 GB RAM, but for storage you will only get the option of 64 GB. The battery of the phone is 4,300 mAh, which is capable of 30 watt fast charging but only a 20 watt charger is given in the box.
Realme 6i is a smartphone with four rear cameras. The camera setup has a 48-megapixel primary sensor. This is accompanied by an 8-megapixel ultra-wide angle camera, a 2-megapixel monochrome sensor and a 2-megapixel portrait camera.
This Realme phone has a single 16-megapixel selfie camera on the front. The front camera comes with portrait mode, time lapse, panoramic view, AI beauty, HDR, face recognition, filters and bokeh effect control. Photos taken with the Realme 6i are good, and the phone’s camera offers better dynamic range.
Poco M2 Pro
poco m2 pro has been introduced in the budget segment. It has a premium design and a large 6.67-inch display just like the Poco X2. It has a panel with a standard 60Hz refresh rate. Poco has used Corning Gorilla Glass 5 on the front and back and has given P2i coating on the M2 Pro, which makes it splash resistant to some extent.
The smartphone comes powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G chipset, which we have also seen in competing models like the Redmi Note 9 Pro. The Poco M2 Pro has three variants; 4GB RAM with 64GB storage, 6GB RAM with 64GB storage, and 6GB RAM with 128GB storage. These three variants are priced at Rs 13,999, Rs 14,999, and Rs 16,999, respectively.
The Poco M2 Pro packs a 5000mAh battery and was able to deliver very good battery life when we tested it. The company also ships a 33W charger, which charges its battery up to 95 percent in an hour. The Poco M2 Pro sports a quad rear camera setup with a 48-megapixel primary sensor. The phone captures good-looking photos in daylight, but we noticed faded colors and low detail in photos taken with its wide-angle camera. In low light, both the primary and wide-angle cameras struggled to produce detail. Night mode wasn’t very impressive either.
Samsung Galaxy M21
We were quite surprised that Samsung Galaxy M30s That’s how similar the Galaxy M21 was compared to the Galaxy M21. In fact, apart from a higher-resolution selfie camera on the newer model, the two phones are nearly identical. The best part is that Samsung Galaxy M21 It is priced lower than the Galaxy M30s, making it a better option.
Some of the strong points of the phone include its excellent AMOLED display, low weight, very good battery life and decent app performance. It runs on Samsung’s One UI 2.0 interface based on Android 10. It is powered by the Exynos 9611 chipset, which is not the most powerful chipset, especially when you have better Qualcomm and MediaTek chipsets available on some smartphones in the same segment. Still, for normal use and light gaming, the Exynos 9611 chipset does the job well.
The triple rear cameras work fine during the day, but they struggle a bit in low light. The 20-megapixel selfie camera is a nice improvement over the Galaxy M30s. Photos taken during the day have good detail and low light shots aren’t bad either.
Samsung Galaxy M21 has recently received a price hike, now its 4GB RAM and 128GB storage variant is priced at Rs. 13,999 in India and its high-end variant comes with 6GB RAM + 128GB storage, which is priced at Rs. 15,999.
Realme Narzo 10
Realme recently launched its Narzo 10 series. Realme Narzo 10 The smartphone is a good offering under Rs 15,000. Realme is looking to focus on the youth here. Hence, the company teases the phone to have better gaming performance. The Narzo 10 features the MediaTek Helio G80 chipset, which handles games well and is also solid in terms of app loading and multitasking performance. One of the USPs of this smartphone is also the good battery life.
The main area where the Narzo 10 could have done better is its cameras. Daylight performance was good with all the rear cameras and the single front one, but low-light performance didn’t impress us much. The camera app could have been a little more intuitive. The Realme UI looks fresh and interesting, but it still comes with a lot of bloatware.
It has only one configuration with 4 GB RAM and 128 GB storage. Its price is Rs 11,999. At this price, the small issues of Narzo 10 can be forgiven.
Redmi Note 9 Pro
One of the best phones in the Rs 15,000 segment, launched recently Redmi Note 9 Pro Smartphone. The dual-SIM Redmi Note 9 Pro comes with a 6.67-inch full-HD + (1080×2400 pixels) IPS display. Although it weighs a bit more at 209 grams, its design is such that you will not feel its weight much.
The Redmi Note 9 Pro uses an octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 720G processor and comes in two variants, one with 4GB RAM and 64GB storage and the other with 6GB RAM and 128GB storage. The first variant is priced at Rs 13,999. However, at the time of launch, its price was Rs 12,999, but due to the increased GST rate, its price has increased slightly. The 6GB RAM + 128GB storage variant of the phone is priced at Rs 15,999.
