UMIDIGI F1 Play, an incremental version to UMIDIGI’s big hit phone UMIDIGI F1, also the second phone from the company to sport a 48-megapixel rear camera after UMIDIGI S3 Pro, kicks off global sale now at US$199.99 on AliExpress. At its price point, the smartphone competes with Xiaomi’s Redmi Note 7 in similar specs, but which one is better?
UMIDIGI F1 Play and Redmi Note 7 both feature the similar shaped notch design. UMIDIGI calls it the ‘waterdrop’ while Xiaomi calls it the ‘dot drop’. Both of them have the 6.3-inch display with FHD+ resolution (2340×1080). It seems the bezel and chin of F1 Play is smaller than Redmi Note 7 from the photos.
Performance
UMIDIGI F1 Play is powered by Helio P60 AI SoC like the UMIDIGI F1, while Redmi Note 7 comes with the similar performance Snapdragon 660 processor. On AnTuTu benchmark, both Helio P60 and Snapdragon 660 score about 140k so they have the similar good performance that can handle heavy games well. In terms of memory, you can get 6GB RAM + 64GB ROM in UMIDIGI F1 Play at $200 but only 3GB RAM + 32GB ROM you can get in Redmi Note 7 at the same price.
F1 Play packs a huge 5150mAh battery while Redmi Note 7 have a 4000mAh battery. Both phones support 18W fast charging, and UMIDIGI F1 Play gets 18W Type C charger in box but Redmi Note 7 ships with only 10W Type C charger.
Camera
Both phones boast a 48-megapixel primary camera with 1/2″ image sensor and 1.6-micron super-pixels (via pixel binning that merges four 0.8 micron pixels into one when in low light). But it’s 8MP secondary camera in F1 Play while 5MP in Redmi Note 7. About selfies, there’s a 16-megapixel front camera in F1 Play while 13-megapixel front camera in Redmi Note 7.
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System and Connectivity
On the software front, F1 Play runs on stock Android 9 Pie without ads. Redmi Note 7 runs on MIUI 10 based on Android Pie. Both phones get the 3.5mm headphone jack. But UMIDIGI F1 Play has NFC for Google pay and bus payment while Redmi Note 7 doesn’t. Also, UMIDIGI F1 Play supports global bands while Redmi Note 7 just supports local bands.
Price
UMIDIGI’s new phone also kicks off global sale now at US$199.99 on AliExpress. It offers a better set of specifications but the price is lower than Redmi Note 7. UMIDIGI F1 Play with 6GB RAM and 64GB storage is priced at US$200, while Redmi Note 7 starts at US$200 for the base model with 3GB RAM and 32GB storage. It needs US$230 for Redmi Note 7’s 4GB RAM and 64GB storage version.
AliExpress 9th Anniversary 3.28 Promotion
Besides, UMIDIGI also offers some generous price cuts for other devices during the Aliexpress 9th Anniversary activity from March 28 to March 31. The UMIDIGI S3 Pro will be priced at $275.99, UMIDIGI F1 $179.99, One Pro $139.99, and A3 Pro $79.99. Decent prices for decent smartphones. Check out all the deals on their activity page.
While at first the f1 looks like a great buy. Good performance, big battery, good screen to body ratio. After i bought the device i noticed some annoying issues screen bleeding bottom of the screen where also the touch screen doesn work as expected. But the most annoying part is bad blue tooth signal (not stable) and 4g signal is pretty bad. Often I have weak or no 4g signal while with my oneplus 5t at the same locations I do have 4g.