Top 10 Best Chinese Smartphones Available in 2022 | Articles | Phones

Even 5–6 years ago, peo­ple treat­ed the smart­phones of Chi­nese brands with dis­trust, but the sit­u­a­tion has changed. Now these gad­gets are con­fi­dent­ly com­pet­ing with devices from such well-known man­u­fac­tur­ers as Sam­sung and Apple.

Fresh Chi­nese smart­phones look almost like the flag­ship mod­els of famous brands. Source: fan-android.com

The Chi­nese smart­phone mar­ket is over­sat­u­rat­ed with offers. This great­ly com­pli­cates the choice, so we decid­ed to col­lect a rat­ing to help with the choice. Our rank­ing of the best Chi­nese smart­phones includes ten devices from brands such as Xiao­mi, Realme, One­Plus, Hon­or and Huawei. It would be wrong to com­pare bud­get and mid-bud­get gad­gets with flag­ships, so we divid­ed the top into three parts:

• Bud­get and mid-bud­get mod­els up to 30,000 rubles.
• Smart­phones cost­ing from 30,000 to 45,000 rubles.
• Flag­ships from 50,000 rubles.

What are the rating criteria?

To buy a good Chi­nese smart­phone, you do not need to be a pro­fes­sion­al who thor­ough­ly under­stands the tech­ni­cal char­ac­ter­is­tics of devices. It is enough to take into account sev­er­al main para­me­ters:

• Frame. With this cri­te­ri­on, we com­bined design, build qual­i­ty and ease of place­ment of the gad­get in the hand. Chi­nese man­u­fac­tur­ers, when devel­op­ing the appear­ance of their gad­gets, often copy the top flag­ships from Apple or Sam­sung.
• Dis­play. Smart­phones with small dis­plays less than 5.5” were decid­ed not to be con­sid­ered, as there are very few of them. There are also few peo­ple who pre­fer to use such smart­phones. Atten­tion was paid to res­o­lu­tion, detail and col­or repro­duc­tion. All these para­me­ters depend on the type of matrix — IPS or AMOLED.
• CPU. All mid-bud­get smart­phones released from 2021 have 8‑core chips. They allow you to run mod­ern games and demand­ing appli­ca­tions.
• RAM. Stands for Ran­dom Access Mem­o­ry or sim­ply Ran­dom Access Mem­o­ry. The mul­ti­task­ing of the device depends on its vol­ume. It is bet­ter to choose gad­gets that have at least 3–4 GB of RAM on board.
• Inner mem­o­ry. This is the amount of built-in stor­age for stor­ing pho­tos, videos, games and oth­er files. Almost all mod­ern Chi­nese smart­phones have a micro USB mem­o­ry card slot.
• Cam­era. The qual­i­ty of shoot­ing pho­tos and videos is one of the pri­or­i­ty cri­te­ria when choos­ing the best Chi­nese smart­phone in 2022 for many buy­ers.
• Auton­o­my. Bat­tery capac­i­ty, soft­ware opti­miza­tion, dis­play type — all this affects the oper­at­ing time of a smart­phone on a sin­gle bat­tery charge.
• Val­ue for mon­ey. The most impor­tant indi­ca­tor when choos­ing a Chi­nese phone. The high price of a smart­phone should be jus­ti­fied from a tech­ni­cal point of view.

Smartphones up to 30,000 rubles

Our rat­ing of the top 10 Chi­nese smart­phones is opened by mid-bud­get mod­els cost­ing about 30,000 rubles. The most bud­getary gad­gets cost­ing from 10,000 to 20,000 rubles will not be, since they do not have a good cam­era, a pow­er­ful proces­sor, or a high-qual­i­ty dis­play.

Realme 9 Pro 8/128 Gb

New for 2022, which has changed a lot com­pared to the pre­vi­ous mod­el: the screen has become larg­er (6.6 “instead of 6.4”), the proces­sor is 15% more pow­er­ful, anoth­er 2 GB of RAM has been added, auton­o­my has improved. At the same time, the main mod­ule received a low­er res­o­lu­tion — 64 megapix­els instead of the pre­vi­ous 108 megapix­els, but this did not affect the qual­i­ty of pho­tos and videos. To reduce the cost of the smart­phone, the man­u­fac­tur­er decid­ed to replace the AMOLED dis­play with IPS, which is infe­ri­or in col­or repro­duc­tion and bright­ness, but increas­es auton­o­my.

The Realme 9 Pro comes in a brand-typ­i­cal bright yel­low box. Source: hungrygeeks.com

The gad­get is avail­able in dif­fer­ent col­ors, includ­ing green and black. The smart­phone runs on Realme UI 3.0 OS, based on Android 12. It has a Snap­drag­on 695 proces­sor, 8 GB of RAM and 128 GB of inter­nal mem­o­ry. There is a sep­a­rate micro USB port and two SIM slots.

Bat­tery capac­i­ty — 5000 mAh. In stand­by mode, the bat­tery lasts 124 hours, when surf­ing the web — 15, when watch­ing videos — 17.

The phone has three cam­eras:

• main at 64 MP;
• macro at 2 MP;
• wide-angle 8 megapix­el.

The res­o­lu­tion of the front cam­era is 16 megapix­els. Realme 9 Pro does not set records in terms of the qual­i­ty of pho­tos and videos, but at a price of 30,000 rubles, you do not expect more.

• dis­play — 7;
• cam­era — 8;
• proces­sor — 6;
• RAM — 8;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry ‑7;
• body — 7;
• auton­o­my — 8;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 8;
• the total score is 7.4.

Redmi Note 10 Pro 8/128 Gb

This is a 2021 Red­mi brand smart­phone with a main 108-megapix­el mod­ule and an AMOLED matrix. The dis­play refresh rate is 120 Hz. The phone has a Snap­drag­on 732G proces­sor with Adreno 618 graph­ics. They are com­ple­ment­ed by 8 GB of RAM. The inter­nal stor­age of 128 GB can be expand­ed with a micro SD card, for which there is a sep­a­rate slot.

A 5020 mAh bat­tery was insert­ed into the smart­phone, which holds a charge for 14 hours when watch­ing videos, and 10 hours when surf­ing the web.

In the bronze col­or, Red­mi Note 10 Pro looks espe­cial­ly expres­sive. Source: gizchina.it

The phone has a high-qual­i­ty 6.67-inch screen with a res­o­lu­tion of 1080x2400 pix­els and a peak bright­ness of 120 nits. There are four cam­eras on the back pan­el:

• the main one at 108 MP;
• 8 MP wide-angle;
• macro at 5 MP;
• 2MP depth sen­sor (gives bokeh effect).

The res­o­lu­tion of the self­ie mod­ule is 16 megapix­els. The main and self­ie cam­eras cre­ate high-qual­i­ty pic­tures in full light­ing. At dusk or at night, there is noise and slight grain­i­ness, but for smart­phones in this price seg­ment, this is nor­mal. The mod­el costs about 30,000 rubles and is pre­sent­ed in three col­ors: gray, blue, bronze.

• dis­play — 9;
• cam­era — 8;
• proces­sor — 7;
• RAM — 8;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 7;
• body — 8;
• auton­o­my — 7;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 7;
• the total score is 7.6.

Poco X3 Pro 8/256 Gb

Poco X3 Pro made it to the top 10 Chi­nese smart­phones in 2022 thanks in large part to its pow­er­ful proces­sor. In its class in terms of pow­er, this gad­get occu­pies the top posi­tions. At a cost of about 30,000 rubles, the device is equipped with a Snap­drag­on 860 chip that can han­dle demand­ing games. Diag­o­nal dis­play with IPS-matrix — 6.67 “. Frame rate — 120 Hz.

The main cam­era con­sists of four mod­ules:

• main at 48 MP;
• 8 MP wide-angle;
• 2 MP depth sen­sor (cre­ates a bokeh effect in por­trait mode);
• macro at 2 megapix­els.

On a clear day, the smart­phone pro­duces good shots, and the night mode is slight­ly infe­ri­or to the same Realme 9 Pro, which was pre­sent­ed above. The phone was equipped with a 5160 mAh bat­tery, which lasts for 13 hours of videos or 12 hours of web surf­ing.

A high-qual­i­ty and bright IPS-matrix was installed in the smart­phone. Source: techadvisor.com

Poco X3 Pro is pre­sent­ed in dif­fer­ent body col­ors: bronze, black, blue.

• dis­play — 7;
• cam­era — 7;
• proces­sor — 9;
• RAM — 8;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 8;
• body — 8;
• auton­o­my — 6;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 7;
• the total score is 7.5.

Final table:

Smartphones from 30,000 to 45,000 rubles

This price seg­ment of the best Chi­nese smart­phones in terms of price and qual­i­ty includes gad­gets with pow­er­ful proces­sors and high-qual­i­ty cam­eras, which are equal­ly well suit­ed for both games and for tak­ing pho­tos or videos.

Redmi Note 11 Pro 5G 8/128 GB

This smart­phone is not equipped with the most pow­er­ful proces­sor in its class, but its per­for­mance is enough for most mod­ern games. For exam­ple, in the demand­ing Call of Duty at high graph­ics set­tings, the gad­get pro­duces 60 frames per sec­ond. This is enough for a com­fort­able game.

The mat­te back cov­er of Red­mi Note 11 Pro is made of glass, rem­i­nis­cent of the iPhone. Source: pocketlint.com

Red­mi Note 11 Pro boasts a 6.67” AMOLED dis­play and a 120Hz refresh rate. Screen res­o­lu­tion — 1080x2400 pix­els.

A 108-megapix­el main cam­era was installed in the smart­phone, which cre­ates pho­tos and videos of decent qual­i­ty, albeit not reach­ing the flag­ship one. The main mod­ule is com­ple­ment­ed by an 8‑megapixel wide-angle sen­sor and a 2‑megapixel macro mod­ule. The res­o­lu­tion of the front cam­era is 16 megapix­els.

The 5000 mAh bat­tery is enough for 11–12 hours of video or 9 hours of web surf­ing. The fig­ures are not record-break­ing, but this is the price for a good AMOLED dis­play. Red­mi Note 11 Pro ver­sion 8/128 GB costs about 40,000 rubles.

• dis­play — 9;
• cam­era — 8;
• proces­sor — 7;
• RAM — 8;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 7;
• body — 8;
• auton­o­my — 7;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 7;
• the total score is 7.6.

Honor 50 8/128 Gb

In 2021, a new Hon­or 50 smart­phone was intro­duced in Rus­sia, which received an attrac­tive design, a pow­er­ful Snap­drag­on 778G 5G chip, a 108-megapix­el cam­era and 66W fast charg­ing. It deserved­ly made it to our top 10 Chi­nese smart­phones of 2022.

The devel­op­ers installed a 6.57” AMOLED dis­play with a res­o­lu­tion of 1080x2340 pix­els. Frame rate — 120 Hz. The screen pro­duces a rich and clear pic­ture even on a sun­ny day.

All ver­sions of Hon­or 50 have a glossy body. Source: sosordinateurs.com

On board 6 or 8 GB of RAM, and the amount of built-in stor­age — 128 or 256 GB. There is no micro SD card slot. The 108 MP main cam­era is com­ple­ment­ed by:

• wide-angle 8 MP;
• 2 MP macro sen­sor;
• 2 MP depth sen­sor.

The res­o­lu­tion of the front cam­era is 32 megapix­els. The phone even in low light con­di­tions allows you to cre­ate detailed high-qual­i­ty images. For a price of 40,000 rubles, the cam­era is excel­lent.

The bat­tery capac­i­ty is rel­a­tive­ly small — only 4300 mAh, but a 66 W Super­Charge pow­er sup­ply was includ­ed in the kit. It charges the bat­tery in just 45 min­utes. Despite the small capac­i­ty, the bat­tery lasts for 15 hours of watch­ing videos or 12 hours of web surf­ing.

• dis­play — 9;
• cam­era — 8;
• proces­sor — 8;
• RAM — 8;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 7;
• body — 9;
• auton­o­my — 8;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 8;
• the over­all score is 8.1.

Realme GT 5G Master Edition 8/256 Gb

The next gad­get to take a place in the top 10 Chi­nese smart­phones is the Realme GT 5G Mas­ter Edi­tion, which costs about 40,000 rubles. The Mas­ter Edi­tion mark­ing in the title means that the device has received a top-end cam­era and light­weight tech­ni­cal stuff­ing. The reg­u­lar Realme GT has a Snap­drag­on 888 chip, while our smart­phone has a Snap­drag­on 778G. The amount of RAM is 8 GB, and the per­ma­nent mem­o­ry is 128 or 256 GB. There is no mem­o­ry card slot.

The phone is equipped with a 6.43-inch dis­play. This is a Super AMOLED matrix of 1080x2400 pix­els with a frame rate of 120 Hz.

The smart­phone shoots in high res­o­lu­tion, allow­ing you to crop the frame with almost no loss of qual­i­ty. Source: digitalcameraworld.com

The main cam­era is a 64-megapix­el mod­ule that pro­duces high-qual­i­ty pic­tures and videos in any con­di­tions. The main unit also hous­es an 8‑megapixel wide-angle mod­ule and a 2‑megapixel macro lens. The man­u­fac­tur­er chose a 32-megapix­el mod­ule as the front cam­era.

The wide-angle cam­era does not dis­tort or wash the pic­ture around the edges. Source: digitalcameraworld.com

The bat­tery with a capac­i­ty of 4300 mAh is respon­si­ble for the auton­o­my of the gad­get, which is enough for watch­ing videos for 17 hours, and for surf­ing the web — for 15 hours.

• dis­play — 9;
• cam­era — 9;
• proces­sor — 8;
• RAM — 8;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 8;
• body — 8;
• auton­o­my — 9;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 8;
• the total score is 8.4.

Final table:

Flagships from 50,000 rubles

Round­ing out our top 10 best Chi­nese smart­phones are flag­ship mod­els that can han­dle every­thing from launch­ing the most demand­ing games and apps, tak­ing pho­tos or videos, and so on.

OnePlus 9 12/256 Gb

One­Plus 9 is not the most advanced smart­phone in the ninth series of the man­u­fac­tur­er. It is pre­sent­ed in two ver­sions — 8/128 GB and 12/256 GB. The cost of the younger one is about 55,000 rubles, and for the top mod­el you need to pay anoth­er 5,000 rubles. The gad­get is avail­able in dif­fer­ent col­ors: blue, pur­ple, black.

The gad­get has a built-in 6.55 ”screen — this is a Flu­id AMOLED matrix. The res­o­lu­tion is 2400x1080 pix­els, and the frame rate is 120 Hz. The phone has a pow­er­ful Snap­drag­on 888 proces­sor that can han­dle the lat­est games and pow­er­ful apps.

Built into the main unit with cam­era mod­ules on the back of the case:

• 48 MP main mod­ule;
• 50MP wide-angle;
• mono­chrome at 2 megapix­els.

The smart­phone cam­era pro­duces detailed pic­tures with good col­or repro­duc­tion. Source: theverge.com

The res­o­lu­tion of the self­ie cam­era is 16 megapix­els. There are no com­plaints about the qual­i­ty of pic­tures and videos. The smart­phone allows you to cre­ate high-qual­i­ty graph­ic con­tent even in low light.

When shoot­ing with a wide-angle cam­era, the col­ors remain the same sat­u­rat­ed. Source: theverge.com

Bat­tery capac­i­ty — 4500 mAh. It is enough for 12 hours of watch­ing videos or 10 hours of web surf­ing. The indi­ca­tors are not record-break­ing, but the bat­tery is charged from the sup­plied pow­er sup­ply in just 30 min­utes.

• dis­play — 9;
• cam­era — 9;
• proces­sor — 9;
• RAM — 9;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 8;
• body — 8;
• auton­o­my — 7;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 8;
• the total score is 8.4.

Xiaomi Black Shark 4 12/256 Gb

This is a gam­ing gad­get with a Snap­drag­on 870 chip, a high-qual­i­ty screen with a refresh rate of up to 144 Hz and remov­able mechan­i­cal trig­ger but­tons, like on full-fledged gamepads for con­soles. Thanks to all this, he deserved­ly got into the top 10 Chi­nese smart­phones. The smart­phone is pre­sent­ed in three con­fig­u­ra­tions:

• 6/128 GB;
• 8/128 GB;
• 12/256 GB.

There is also a Black Shark 4 Pro with a more advanced Snap­drag­on 888 chip, but it is almost impos­si­ble to find it on sale in Rus­sia.

On the back of the smart­phone is a rec­og­niz­able X‑shaped pat­tern. Source: andro-news.com

The main cam­era block con­sists of three lens­es:

• 48 MP main mod­ule;
• 8 MP ultra wide-angle;
• 5 MP depth sen­sor.

The cam­era does an excel­lent job of shoot­ing pho­tos and videos in poor light­ing con­di­tions, but in its class (about 70,000 rubles) there are smart­phones with more advanced sen­sors: Xiao­mi 11T Pro or Huawei P30 Pro, which are dis­cussed below.

The smart­phone pro­duces juicy and detailed pho­tos in any con­di­tions. Source: phandroid.com

A 4500 mAh bat­tery is respon­si­ble for the auton­o­my of the device. In the mode of watch­ing videos, the charge is enough for 13 hours, when surf­ing the web — for 9, and in games — about 4 hours.

• dis­play — 9;
• cam­era — 8;
• proces­sor — 8;
• RAM — 9;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 8;
• body — 8;
• auton­o­my — 7;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 7;
• the total score is 8.0.

Xiaomi 11T Pro 12/256 Gb

This is last year’s flag­ship of the eleventh series of Xiao­mi smart­phones. It has a pow­er­ful Snap­drag­on 888 chip, a 108-megapix­el cam­era and an AMOLED screen with a res­o­lu­tion of WQHD + (3200x1440 pix­els).

Depend­ing on the con­fig­u­ra­tion, the phone has 8 or 12 GB of RAM. The amount of inter­nal mem­o­ry also varies — 128 or 256 GB. There is no sup­port for micro SD mem­o­ry cards.

The back cov­er of Xiao­mi 11T Pro imi­tates a met­al sur­face. Source: itc.ua

In addi­tion to the main cam­era, the man­u­fac­tur­er installed an 8MP wide-angle lens and a 5MP telemacro lens.

The telemacro lens pro­duces good close-up macro shots. Source: gadgets360.com

The smart­phone is capa­ble of record­ing videos in 8K. The res­o­lu­tion of the front cam­era is 16 megapix­els. There are no com­plaints about the qual­i­ty of pic­tures and videos even in low light con­di­tions.

Even at night, the pho­to qual­i­ty is impres­sive. Source: gadgets360.com

A 5000 mAh bat­tery was installed in the phone, which lasts for 14 hours of video or 11 hours of web surf­ing. The price of Xiao­mi 11T Pro with 12/256 GB mem­o­ry is about 65,000 rubles.

• dis­play — 10;
• cam­era — 8;
• proces­sor — 9;
• RAM — 9;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 8;
• body — 8;
• auton­o­my — 8;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 8;
• the total score is 8.5.

Huawei P30 Pro 8/256 Gb

Our top 10 best Chi­nese smart­phones of 2022 are com­plet­ed by the Huawei P30 Pro, which posed a seri­ous chal­lenge to all cam­era phones. If you need a phone with one of the best cam­eras on the mar­ket, this is it, but you will have to pay about 75,000 rubles. The smart­phone was equipped with a high-qual­i­ty 6.47-inch AMOLED dis­play. The res­o­lu­tion is 2340×1080 pix­els.

The smart­phone is based on the Kirin 980 chipset from HiSil­i­con. Its pow­er is enough for any games and appli­ca­tions. The mod­el is pre­sent­ed in two con­fig­u­ra­tions: 8/125 GB and 8/512 GB. Inter­nal stor­age can be expand­ed with a mem­o­ry card up to 256 GB, for which there is a sep­a­rate slot.

The blue body along the edges casts with oth­er col­ors due to the strong gloss. Source: expertreviews.co.uk

The smart­phone is equipped with one of the best cam­eras on the mar­ket. When they do not have a record res­o­lu­tion of 108 megapix­els. Every­thing is much sim­pler:

• main mod­ule — 40 MP;
• wide-angle — 20 MP;
• tele­pho­to mod­ule — 8 MP;
• self­ie cam­era — 32 megapix­els.

The smart­phone impress­es with the detail of the pic­tures. Source: androidauthority.com

The pic­tures are as nat­ur­al and detailed as pos­si­ble. A dis­tinc­tive fea­ture of the cam­era is 5x opti­cal and 10x hybrid zoom. The dig­i­tal zoom allows you to get a 50x mag­ni­fi­ca­tion of the image.

Exam­ples of cam­era zoom 10x and 50x. Source: androidauthority.com

The bat­tery capac­i­ty is 4200 mAh. The indi­ca­tor is not a record, but it is enough for 16–17 hours of video or 10 hours of web surf­ing.

• dis­play — 9;
• cam­era — 10;
• proces­sor — 8;
• RAM — 9;
• inter­nal mem­o­ry — 8;
• body — 8;
• auton­o­my — 8;
• val­ue for mon­ey — 8;
• the total score is 8.5.

Final table:

Conclusion

Users who do not want to over­pay for a smart­phone that is need­ed not for games, but for using social net­works and oth­er unde­mand­ing tasks, Realme 9 Pro, Red­mi Note 10 Pro or Red­mi Note 10 Pro will do. All of them cost up to 30,000 rubles and have sim­i­lar per­for­mance and cam­eras.

If some­times you want to play not the top games, as well as take a high-qual­i­ty pho­to or video, smart­phones of the mid­dle price seg­ment are suit­able: Red­mi Note 11 Pro, Hon­or 50 or Realme GT 5G Mas­ter Edi­tion. The lat­ter out­per­forms the oth­er two in terms of cam­era, but is infe­ri­or to the proces­sor.

Users who only need a gam­ing smart­phone need Xiao­mi Black Shark 4. If shoot­ing pho­tos and videos is in the first place, the choice should be made in favor of Huawei P30 Pro. For shop­pers look­ing for a ver­sa­tile flag­ship, the Xiao­mi 11T Pro or One­Plus 9 is the way to go.