Reviews of Xiaomi Poco M5s phone, price, technical specifications, design, screen, software, hardware, battery life and charging and other specifications of this phone.

Review of Xiaomi Poco M5s phone, price and technical specifications

The Poco M5s that we are going to review today, along with the Poco M5 – were two phones that were launched under €250 and aimed at the EU market. The standard Poco M5 was also launched in India, but the Poco M5s did not make it to the Indian market.

To simplify this comparison, we can say that the Poco M5 has a 90Hz LCD screen, while the Poco M5s uses a 60Hz OLED and a better all-round camera setup. That’s why we decided to focus our attention on Poco M5s with more features.

And yes,  Xiaomi has done it again. The Poco M5s is actually a Redmi Note 10S that was released across the EU and Asia over a year ago. And while India isn’t getting the M5s, it did get the Redmi Note 11 SE in August, another twin device. You can compare all three here or check out the specs link below.

  
Xiaomi Poco M5s • Xiaomi Redmi Note 10S • Xiaomi Redmi Note 11 SE (India)

The Poco M5s offers a 6.43-inch 1080p OLED with superior brightness capabilities. Even though the M5s has a more powerful chipset and a better panel than the M5 with a 90Hz LCD, the refresh rate is limited to 60Hz.

When  it comes to hardware, the M5s is based on the Helio G95, a platform that offers a 2+6 CPU and a 4-core Mali-G76 MC4 GPU that works very well for gaming on the go. You can choose between 4 and 6 GB of RAM and 64 and 128 GB of expandable memory.

In addition to the brighter OLED, the Poco M5s also outperforms the cheaper Poco M5 in the camera department. The Poco M5s offers four cameras on its back – a 64-megapixel primary camera, an 8-megapixel ultrawide camera, a 2-megapixel macro and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. There is no UW camera on the M5 and the main resolution is 50MP.

The selfie camera  on the Poco M5s is also better, with a 13-megapixel front-facing camera versus the M5’s 5-megapixel selfie shooter. The Poco M5s offers a very rich connectivity package without 5G – dual SIM with dual dedicated SIM trays, 4G LTE, dual-band Wi-Fi, NFC, FM radio, 3.5mm jack, IR port. This phone runs on Android 12 with MIUI 13 user interface.

The Poco M5s supports 33W wired fast charging for its large 5,000mAh battery, and the manufacturer advertises a 64% charge in 30 minutes. We’ll see about that in a bit.

Finally, the Poco M5s is a splash-resistant device with an IP53 rating, which is certainly better than nothing.

Check the specifications of Xiaomi Poco M5s at a glance

Body:  160.5×74.5×8.3mm, 179g; Glass front, plastic frame, plastic back; IP53, resistant to dust and water splash.

Screen: 6.43 inches AMOLED, 450 nits (typ), 700 nits (HBM), 1100 nits (peak), resolution 1080×2400 pixels, aspect ratio 20:9, 409ppi.

Chipset: Mediatek Helio G95 (12 nm): Octa-core (2×2.05 GHz Cortex-A76 & 6×2.0 GHz Cortex-A55); Mali-G76 MC4.

Memory: 64 GB RAM 4 GB, 128 GB RAM 4 GB, 128 GB RAM 6 GB; UFS 2.2; microSDXC (dedicated slot).

OS/Software: Android 12, MIUI 13.

Rear camera: Wide (main): 64 MP, f/1.8, 26 mm, 1/1.97″ 0.7 µm, PDAF; Ultra-wide angle: 8 MP, f/2.2, 118˚, 1/4.0″ 1.12 µm; Macro: 2 MP, f/2.4; Depth: 2 MP, f/2.4.

Front camera: 13 MP, f/2.4, (wide), 1/3.06 inch, 1.12 µm.

Video recording: Rear camera: 4K@30fps, 1080p@30/60/120fps, 720p@960fps. Front camera: 1080p@30fps.

Battery: 5000 mAh; 33W fast charge, 64% in 30 minutes (advertised).

Other specifications:  Fingerprint reader (mounted on the side). NFC; FM radio; infrared port; 3.5 mm jack; stereo speakers; Virtual proximity sensor

Well  , for a phone that is available at a price of 210 euros, we cannot ignore any basic features. The M5s looks like a pretty cool device, so without further ado, let’s get this phone out of the box.

You can also see review of Xiaomi Poco F4 GT phone, price and technical specifications

Unboxing 

The Poco M5s comes in a large box with Poco’s signature yellow color. There are many accessories inside.

The Poco M5s comes with a 33W charger and a 3A-rated USB-A-to-C cable. Then there’s a soft clear case for extra protection and a SIM eject tool.

Finally, there is a thin protective layer inside the box that you have to stick on the phone yourself. Other Xiaomi-made phones usually have this pre-applied at the factory.

 Design and build quality 

The Poco M5s looks fairly familiar, but that’s okay. Redmi and Poco phones have been good looking for a long time, and there’s only so much you can screw up with a smartphone’s design. The affordable Poco M5s uses flat glass to keep the screen safe, a thin plastic frame, and a slightly curved matte plastic for the back panel.

One of the best things about the M5s is its IP53 rating for dust and light splash resistance. While the Poco M5s isn’t completely waterproof, it isn’t completely protected from the elements either. We saw rubber insulation around the SIM and microSD trays, and we’re guessing the other openings have similar protection.

The OLED display, one of the key features of the Poco M5s, is protected by a Gorilla Glass 3 screen. This is a popular option among Xiaomi’s low-mid range. Unlike its Redmi counterparts, the Poco M5s didn’t have a factory screen protector, although it does come in the box.

The frame is plastic and shiny and is a little slippery. It’s thin around the left and right sides of the Poco M5s, and thicker and smoother at the top and bottom. Our unit has a silver frame that is a large fingerprint magnet.

Then there’s the back, which is similar to the Redmi phones with a similar build, but with this spread of black spots next to the camera that contains the POCO logo. The back panel has a matte finish and feels good in the hand. The stains are not visible and it does not make you feel bad to get it.

And now let’s take a closer look at the Poco M5s.

On the front, there is a 6.43-inch OLED screen. It has relatively thin bezels and a small hole for the 13-megapixel selfie camera. The display’s refresh rate maxes out at 60Hz, which is a bit disappointing, but Poco promises a maximum brightness of 1100 nits and possibly HDR10 support.

There’s a barely noticeable grille above the display, which is one of the directional speaker outputs that doubles as an earpiece. The external output is located at the top of the Poco M5s along with the IR blaster and one of the microphones.

The back of the phone is where you can see the quad camera in a dedicated glass island that sticks out from the back, but not as much as other phones. Here you’ll find a 64-megapixel primary camera, an 8-megapixel ultra-wide camera, a 2-megapixel macro camera, and a 2-megapixel depth camera. Around is the LED flash and some kind of sensor next to it.

The back is really great and it’s like a frosted glass, even though it’s a piece of plastic. And while we’re not fans of big POCO logos, we can’t help but admit that this one actually sits well with the camera and gives the Poco M5s some personality.

The Poco M5s offers a triple card tray on its left side that can hold two nano SIM cards and one microSD card.

There’s an always-on fingerprint sensor on the power/lock button, conveniently located on the left side of the phone, just below the volume rocker. The sensor can be activated by contact or pressure. You can choose its behavior from within the fingerprint settings.

The Poco M5s has a stereo speaker setup. We already talked about the top speaker with its two sound outputs. The other one is at the bottom of the phone and it is louder. Also at the bottom, you can see the USB-C port, 3.5mm audio jack and the main microphone.

The dimensions of Poco M5s are 160.5 x 74.5 x 8.3 mm and weight is 179 grams, which according to the standards of 2022, has a decent weight.

Overall, we found the Poco M5s to be quite comfortable to hold – it’s a good shape and size, and despite the sleek frame, the grip is secure enough that it doesn’t immediately need a case. Of course, the Poco M5s comes with an included case, so if you need one – it’s already there. No need to buy.

We also appreciate the splash resistance and Gorilla Glass 3 protection. The M5s is solidly built and we had no issues with it.

 Display

The Poco M5s  has a 6.43-inch OLED display with 1080p resolution. It has a small punch hole and Gorilla Glass 3 protection as well.

The OLED panel has a resolution of 2400 x 1080 pixels or 409ppi. Poco promises 450 nits of normal brightness, 700 nits of maximum brightness and 1100 nits of maximum brightness. And while the display isn’t advertised as HDR10, it actually is.

It can be a little disappointing that the display’s refresh rate is locked at 60Hz, while the cheaper Poco M5 offers 90Hz for its IPS LCD display. We don’t really know the reasons for this decision, but we hope that OLED will become a valuable example.

So, we’ve completed our screen measurements and the brightness is pretty good. When manually adjusting the brightness, we recorded a maximum brightness of 473 nits. But this number increased to 756 nits with the option of automatic brightness and increased sunlight. These numbers are even higher than Poco promised.

Minimum white point brightness is 3.0nits – excellent for such a budget device.

Color accuracy

Poco M5s display supports DCI-P3 wide color space. Display settings offer three different color models – Vivid (default, DCI-P3), Saturated (DCI-P3 with saturation boost), and Standard (sRGB). You can change the color temperature for each mode.

 

The default Vivid option is set to faithfully reproduce DCI-P3. We found the screen to be fairly accurate, with the exception of bluish and gray colors and the occasional not-so-accurate red. You can get rid of the blue color by choosing a warm color temperature.

On the other hand, the standard mode has a very good accuracy compared to sRGB.

HDR and streaming

The Poco M5s supports Widevine L1 DRM and can stream 1080p content from all popular video services. YouTube is the only app that offers HDR10 streaming.

 Battery life 

Like most Redmi and Poco phones, the Poco M5s  is powered by a large 5000 mAh battery. And just like Xiaomi’s other mid-rangers with large batteries, this phone also participated in our battery test.

The Poco M5s scored an excellent endurance of 132 hours. It was great in all our tests – calls, web, video playback.

The Poco M5s also offers economical standby consumption (1% reduction every 6 hours), which significantly improves the overall endurance rating.

 Charging speed 

Poco M5s supports 33W fast charging and the phone comes with Mi 33W Power Adapter. Poco advertises that the phone will go from 0% to 64% in 30 minutes with the said charger, which is faster than any other phone Xiaomi has offered so far with a similar battery and charging speed.

No matter how hard we  tried, we couldn’t reach Poco’s numbers. Our Poco M5s reached 53% in half an hour, matching Xiaomi’s other 5,000mAh phones with 33W chargers. It took a total of 36 minutes for the Poco M5s to reach Poco’s promised 64%. This is still a great result, mind you.

A full charge  takes 84 minutes, an excellent charging speed for this budget phone.

 Speakers

Poco M5s has two speakers placed on the top and bottom sides. The top speaker has two outputs – one facing the front and one from the top. It is much weaker than the bottom, although the overall balance is satisfactory.

The Poco M5s  scored very well in our loudness test, as did the entire Redmi Note 11 lineup.

Sound quality from the speakers is good – vocals are good and high notes are well presented. On the other hand, the bass is lacking and music sounds a little flat when played through the speakers.

Xiaomi Poco M5s software review

Just like the latest Poco flagship, the Poco M5s boots Android 12 with the latest MIUI 13 for Poco. As usual in the MIUI camp, the custom skin version is more important than the original OS. However, some native features of Android 12, such as the redesigned widgets interface and privacy dashboard, are still missing.

The MIUI interface  is more or less standard MIUI, with minor Poco twists. There is always-on display capability, but, unfortunately, it can never be always on. Appears only 10 seconds after tapping. At the very least, there are plenty of AOD themes to choose from. Some of them can also be customized.

The M5s still supports the Notification effect. It lights up the edges of the display when new notifications come in, but aside from a few different colors and a “Starlight” option, there’s little customization possible. This effect can work with or without AOD.

     

You unlock the screen through the fingerprint scanner installed on the side . The reader is easy to set up, very fast, and extremely accurate. You can set the unlock method to ‘Touch’ or ‘Press’ – if you’re using a bezel-less phone, the Press option prevents incorrect palm reading (which ultimately leads to PIN entry). 2D Face Unlock is also available, but it is much less secure than the fingerprint option.

    

Home screens are nothing out of the ordinary – they are filled with shortcuts, folders and widgets. The leftmost screen, if enabled, is Google’s Discover. Unlike the Xiaomi or Redmi MIUI builds, the Poco version only has a two-layer App Drawer-style interface – you can’t disable the app drawer and put all your apps on the home screen. The app drawer itself is the same, though – by default, it automatically organizes your apps into categories that you can edit or disable altogether.

     

Just like MIUI 12, MIUI 13 offers a standalone shader and control center. You summon them like you would on iPhones – swipe down from the left side of the screen for Notification Center, swipe down from the right for Control Center. You can also swipe left to switch between them.

If you don’t like this iPhone split – you can disable Control Center and the shadow will return to its normal appearance and functionality.

   

If you’ve ever used a Xiaomi, the task switcher is also familiar. It shows all your recent apps in two columns. But tapping and holding on the card doesn’t create a split view or popup. Instead, it goes to app info and settings, which is weird.

While split screen is not supported, the floating window is available even if not from Task Switcher. You can minimize some system apps like the calculator into a floating window, but this can only happen from within the app itself. Or you can pull down notifications to launch compatible apps in a popup view from within Notification Center.

The regular task switching option with side scrollable cards is not available in Poco Launcher.

 

Themes have always been a big part of MIUI, and they’re available in MIUI 13 – the same goes for Poco. You can download new ones from the theme store, and they can change wallpapers, ringtones, system icons, and even the always-on display style. Fantastic wallpapers are also available.

     

MIUI comes with its own multimedia apps – there’s Gallery, Music and Mi Video (both with local and streaming options). A MIUI file manager is also on board. And of course, a Mi Remote app that uses the integrated IR blaster.

     

MIUI also offers a security app. It can scan your phone for malware, manage your blacklist, manage or limit your data usage, configure battery behavior and free up some RAM. It can also manage the permissions of your installed apps, define the battery behavior of selected apps, and apply restrictions to specific apps only.

And speaking of memory, MIUI 13 offers Memory Extension option which is enabled by default (you can disable it if you want). In our review unit, 2GB of internal storage was reserved to serve as RAM expansion. Less important memory blocks should go here.

    

The sidebar itself is not available. However, its video toolkit is available, and basically includes the entire sidebar functionality, but you have to manually make it available in a set of apps. When enabled, a small icon is visible at the edge of the screen that expands into a menu whenever you swipe on it. From here you run programs in pop-up windows.

Recommended for multimedia applications (such as YouTube, Mi Video, Gallery, etc.). In addition to options for floating windows, it contains shortcuts for Screenshot, Record screen, Cast and Play Video with the screen off that works on YouTube, without the need for a Premium subscription. But, as we mentioned, you need to whitelist the apps beforehand where you want this feature to be enabled.

   

Also widely available on other MIUI phones, Game Turbo is both a hub you can use to launch your games and an in-game tool to enhance your gaming experience. It includes classic functions such as screen recording and limiting incoming notifications.

 
 

Some MIUI ROMs include ads in default apps. This is a known thing. And the Poco M5s comes with a lot of ‘promotional recommendations’.

 

You can disable them, even if it’s a bit tedious to do since you have to do it for every system app that has them. For example, if you’re annoyed by the app’s scanner ads, just tap the settings gear and disable the recommendations. Ads in File Manager – Settings->About should do it. Themes – Go to settings and disable recommendations. It’s certainly not ideal, but at least you can get rid of them all.

 Performance and benchmarks 

Poco M5s runs on MediaTek Helio G95. It’s a mid-range entry-level gaming SoC built on TSMC’s legacy 12nm FinFET manufacturing process. The G95 has an octa-core CPU with two high-performance Cortex-A76 cores clocked at 2.05 GHz and six low-power Corext-A55 cores clocked at 2.0 GHz.

The quad-core Mali-G76 MC4 GPU operates at a frequency of 900 MHz. It should provide proper functionality for the class. The global version of the Poco M5s is available in three LPDDR4X/UFS memory configurations – 4GB/64GB, 4GB/128GB and 6GB/128GB (ours).

And now, let’s run some benchmarks.

The Helio G95 CPU is one of the fastest processors in the Poco M5s price range.

 

 

The GPU performance is excellent for a €200 smartphone and can run many popular games well.

Finally, the AnTuTu 9 composite test seems to agree with us, placing the Poco M5s among the best-scoring phones in the mid-range class.

Poco M5s is equipped with enough processor and graphics to provide a smooth Android experience and satisfying gaming performance. We played a few games for a long time and Poco did a great job.

We also ran the CPU Throttle test, and the Poco M5s scored an excellent 89% stable.

Sometimes (say 1 out of 3) running the CPU at 100% for an hour would cause the M5s to heat up enough for a heating warning to pop up, but it wouldn’t cause any apps or services to overheat or force them to overheat. It felt warm on the back of the phone, but not hot anywhere.

Unfortunately, 3D Mark failed to run on our unit and we were unable to complete the 3D Mark GPU stress test. The chipset was found to produce around 85% stability score in this test, so we expect the Poco M5s to achieve a similar number if possible.

And with both stability scores north of 80%, we can easily rate the Poco M5s’ stability performance as excellent.

 Camera 

The Poco M5s offers a quad camera setup on the back, which is known as Premium Ultra by the manufacturer. We saw this camera on older, more expensive devices last year, so we’re glad it’s made its way to cheaper phones as well. This setup includes a 64-megapixel main sensor, an 8-megapixel ultra-wide sensor, a 2-megapixel macro sensor, and a 2-megapixel depth sensor. There is also a 13-megapixel selfie camera on the front.

The Poco M5s has a 64-megapixel 1/2-inch OmniVision OV64B sensor with a Quad-Bayer filter. The sensor has 0.7μm pixels, and after the 4-in-1 placement, you’ll get a 16MP photo with 1.4μm equivalent. The sensor sits behind a 26mm f/1.79 lens, supports PDAF, but no OIS. High resolution 64MP mode, Pro mode as well as night mode are available for this camera.

The second sensor is an 8-megapixel 1/4-inch Sony IMX355 with a 16mm f/2.2 ultra-wide lens. Focus is fixed at infinity.

The macro camera has a 2MP GalaxyCore GC02M1 sensor with an f/2.4 aperture lens, and focus is fixed at a distance of about 4cm.

Finally, there’s a 2-megapixel OmniVision OV02B1 monochrome depth sensor.

The selfie camera relies on a 13MP OV13B 1/3.06-inch sensor with 1.12µm pixels. This camera sits behind a 26mm f/2.45 lens. Focus is fixed as usual.

The default camera app is a typical MIUI affair – switching between modes is done by swiping left and right, and all modes except macro are in this rolodex. There are zoom level shortcuts in the viewfinder as well as one of the beautification shortcuts.

On the opposite side of the viewfinder, you have a flash mode switch, an HDR switch, an AI switch, and a magic wand with beauty effects and filters. You’ll find more options behind the hamburger menu, including macro mode and a settings shortcut. What you won’t find is an option to adjust the output resolution.

There is a Pro mode for all rear cameras. 64MP manual and RAW images for the main camera are available here. You can use shutter speed up to 30 seconds (0.4 seconds for macro) and ISO up to 6400.

     

The quality of photos taken during the day

The main camera saves 16MP by default, and they look good on the phone’s screen, but viewing them at 100% zoom shows that they’re over-processed.

Photos show good colors, great dynamic range and lovely contrast, and there’s no visible noise.

But all photos show average detail at best. They are heavily processed, over-sharpened and sometimes even smudged.

   
   
   
   
Main camera, 16MP

There’s a 2x zoom key, but as expected, it doesn’t offer any sort of smart zoom – photos are cropped and upscaled from the default photos.

   

Main cam 2x zoom

The 64MP shooting mode  offers a bit of a smart upscaling boost, but the super-hard processing makes them rather poor, sometimes noisy and smeary. Zooming them down to 16MP doesn’t produce any better photos than the default ones, at least not as clearly.

   
Main camera, 50MP

The ultra-wide camera’s 8-megapixel photos  show good detail for such a camera and lens, and offer sharp colors and good contrast. There is no noise.

Dynamic range is fairly average, sharpening can be a bit excessive at times, and the look remains over-processed.

   
   
   
  
Ultrawide camera, 8MP

The macro camera’s focus is 4-5cm, but even if you’re in control, the photos are rather poor – soft and smeary, with poor dynamic range and, indeed, over-processed.

   
Macro camera, 2MP

There’s a 2-megapixel depth sensor on the Poco M5s, and it helps the main camera to capture subjects accurately and pleasantly. The blur is nice, even if it’s not the best looking we’ve seen.

Meanwhile, subjects are detailed, well-exposed, and vividly colored. Indeed, solid portraits for such a cheap phone.

   

Portraits, 16MP

Even though the 13-megapixel selfie camera looks simple, it delivers sharper and sharper subjects than any of Xiaomi’s recent 20-megapixel Quad-Bayer selfie cameras. How about that?!

13MP selfies are excellent – ​​detailed and colorful, noise-free, with good exposure and good contrast. Dynamic range isn’t as great, but we still liked what we got.

   
Selfies, 13MP

Portrait selfies are available, and even without a depth sensor, isolation is quite satisfactory. Subjects are once again well developed with plenty of detail, colors and contrast are good and we liked the simulated blur.

   
Portrait selfies, 13MP

The quality of photos taken at night

Low-light shots from the main camera are good – they deliver good exposure and maintain accurate color saturation. Contrast is good and dynamic range is also good.

Images provide poor detail and zoom is not 100% optimal. Sometimes the noise is smeared too and finally – the heavy processing makes the subjects look rather bad.

   
   
 
Main camera, 16MP

There is a night mode  for the main camera, but it’s useless. It takes about 2s-3s, and the results are often worse than the default photos. Night mode introduces more noise and reduces dynamic range, and the only good thing it sometimes does is restore some highlights with questionable success.

   
   
 
Night Mode main cam, 16MP

Low-light photos from the ultra-wide camera provide enough color saturation that you can see what’s on them. But that’s the best we can tell – the photos are affected by noise.

   
   
 
Ultrawide camera, 8MP

And here are some of our regular poster shots taken with the Poco M5s. You can see how it stacks up against the competition. You can easily browse around and compare it against other phones in our extensive database.

  

 Video 

The main camera of the Poco M5s is capable of recording 4K@30fps as well as 1080p at 60fps. The ultra-wide camera maxes out at 1080p@30fps, while the 2MP macro supports 720p@30fps.

There’s an always-on electronic stabilizer that works at 30fps in all modes. Here, we have encountered a familiar problem that we thought Xiaomi had left in the past. If you switch to ultra-wide mode and then switch back to native mode, the camera app will always downgrade the main camera’s video resolution to 1080p.

On the plus side, audio in all videos is recorded at 128kbps for 4K and 192kbps for 1080p clips. It is stereo and has a good sound.

4K videos captured on the main camera are excellent. There is a lot of resolved detail and balanced sharpness, noise is very low, and everything is great – smoothness, colors, dynamics and even contrast. Of course, the video’s high bitrate, which is north of 50 Mbps, helped.

4K video from the main camera is good – there is a lot of resolved detail, the dynamic range is very wide, noise is low and colors are excellent. However, videos could use a contrast boost.

1080p videos  from the ultra-wide camera suffer from the over-processing we saw in photos. Dynamic range is good, and colors are accurate, but detail is poor, and so is presentation. A little more contrast would be nice.

There is a 2x zoom key. It saves cropped and upscaled footage from the main camera, and we don’t recommend shooting 4K footage with it. The 1080p resolution, on the other hand, delivers very satisfying results and videos look good, if a bit soft – colors and overall performance are good.

Finally, here’s the Poco M5s in our video tool so you can make your own comparisons.

  

Alternative offers

The Poco M5s was a great smartphone for its lower mid-range segment. It has a great OLED display, a gaming-friendly chipset, a versatile camera, a large battery with fast charging, and many fan-favorite features like an audio jack and a microSD slot. Everything is housed in a splash-proof body.

The 4/64 version of the Poco M5s was released at a price of 210 euros. And that’s a price that’s really hard to beat these days, especially with prices constantly changing on everything.

The first phone that springs to mind is Poco’s own M5 – an even cheaper model at €170, which has a faster 90Hz display and a more power-efficient Helio G99 chipset with less GPU. The M5 has fewer, lower-resolution cameras, but it’s a lower-end smartphone thanks to its incredibly long battery life and snappy user interface.

The Realme 9 5G can be found at retailers for between €230 and €270. It offers a smooth 120Hz LCD screen and 5G connectivity, but you miss out on splash resistance, an ultra-wide camera and stereo speakers.

Or you can go for the Realme 9 which is available in different markets for the same price as the Realme 9 5G. The 4G model beats the Poco M5s with a 90Hz OLED and 108MP primary camera. It has poor performance, lacks stereo speakers, and lacks splash resistance.

The Galaxy A33 5G is around €80 more expensive in retail stores, but if you get it with a carrier discount, it’s a great value smartphone. The A33 is IP67 rated for dust and water resistance, has a 90Hz Super AMOLED and offers an even more powerful chipset. The main camera has OIS and the photo quality is much better on the A33. We recommend getting this A33 if possible. Otherwise, the Poco M5s seems to be one of the best choices for its price.

   
Xiaomi Poco M5 • Realme 9 5G • Realme 9 • Samsung Galaxy A33 5G

Our verdict

The Poco M5s is a great all-rounder for its near entry-level price – a splash-resistant design, a bright AMOLED display, a gaming-friendly chipset, a versatile camera and a large, fast-charging battery.

There are good perks like stereo speakers, audio jack, IR blaster, FM radio, 3.5mm jack. And we were surprised by its good selfies and selfie portraits. Even expensive Xiaomi phones cannot match these features. All this makes the M5s a killer proposition at around €200.

Of course, the Poco M5s isn’t perfect – it offers poor picture quality, and the 60Hz refresh rate for the display may be a problem for many.

If we’re being honest – we could live with 60Hz – no unnecessary strain on hardware and battery life, even if the Poco M5s can handle it.

On the other hand, the quality of the camera depends on your needs – if you show photos and videos on the phone’s screen or share them on social networks – they will do well. But if you’re planning on doing more—like printing them out for albums or using them as wallpaper, or maybe sharing videos on YouTube—you’ll need a more capable, more expensive phone.

And with those two flaws, we still recommend the Poco M5s as one of the most feature-rich smartphones in its price range. This phone has just one spec sheet that’s really hard to ignore, and in the end, it’s a solid and reliable phone.

Why should we buy Xiaomi Poco M5s?

• No-nonsense design , IP53 rated.
• Bright OLED screen, small notch, support P3.
• Great battery life, fast charging.
• Stereo speakers, loud and good quality.
• Excellent performance for the class even though the chipset is old.
• Great selfies
• NFC, microSD, IR blaster, FM radio, 3.5 mm jack.

Why should avoid buying Xiaomi Poco M5s?

• Poor photo quality  from all rear cameras, hence the video.
• No high screen refresh rate.

Source: GSMARENA.COM