Which is the best flagship killer – Xiaomi 11T Pro vs OnePlus 9RT?
The value flagship segment has seen a couple of launches from brands like Samsung, OnePlus, and iQOO which came with very strong offerings and also had all the features present in premium flagships. This year also there are a lot of smartphones from each of their brands. OnePlus flagships have been successful and the standout point for OnePlus smartphones has always remained the software experience with no bloatware.
This year we have the OnePlus 9RT (Review) which seems to be a perfect all-rounder from OnePlus as it brings along some flagship specifications like a premium build and design, a 120Hz AMOLED display, a powerful Snapdragon 888 chipset, 50MP triple camera setup, a 4500mAh battery with support for 65W fast charging, and much more.
Xiaomi lately came up with its 11T series where we saw the Xiaomi 11T Pro which also brings some very good specifications like a premium build and design, a 120Hz AMOLED display, a powerful Snapdragon 888 chipset, 108MP triple camera setup and the biggest standout feature it brings is support for 120W fast charging and comes with a larger 5000mAh battery.
Since there are a lot of common things between both smartphones, which one of them provides the better value and is worth considering? Let’s find out in the full comparison.
OnePlus 9RT vs Xiaomi 11T Pro Design:
Both the OnePlus 9RT and the Xiaomi 11T Pro have a premium glass sandwich design both at the front and back. The OnePlus 9RT has a smooth matte finish at the back which has some glittery finish with a sandstone-like finish that looks premium but does feel slightly slippery while holding in hands. On the other hand, the Xiaomi 11T Pro has a glossy finish at the back.
The back of the Xiaomi 11T Pro has a rainbow pattern of different colors which shows up when you tilt the smartphone to varying angles if you consider the Celestial Blue color variant. Other colors like Moonlight White and Meteorite Gray have a simple and plain look on the back. Both the smartphones have a rectangular camera module at the back that houses the triple cameras with a LED flashlight.
The Xiaomi 11T Pro does feel slightly heavier at 204 grams compared to 198grams on the OnePlus 9RT but the difference is marginal. The latter also is less thick at 8.3mm compared to the former’s thickness at 8.8mm. The back of the Xiaomi 11T Pro has an IP52 rating which makes it dust and splash resistant whereas the OnePlus 9RT does not have any official IP rating but you get P2i coating at the back.
On the sides, the OnePlus 9RT has an aluminum frame whereas the Xiaomi 11T Pro houses a plastic frame, and both of these have the power button and the volume buttons on the sides but the OnePlus 9RT gets an alert slider to control different volume profiles. On the top, both smartphones have a secondary noise-canceling microphone.
But the Xiaomi 11T Pro gets speakers at the top tuned by Harmon Kardon and an additional IR Blaster to control different devices. The bottom of both the smartphones houses a USB Type-C port which is of USB 2.0 speeds, a speaker grille, a dual SIM card slot, and a primary microphone. Neither of them has any microSD card slot nor a 3.5mm headphone jack.
On the front, both these displays have a punch-hole at the top with the OnePlus 9RT at the top left corner and the Xiaomi 11T Pro having at the top in the center. So in terms of build and design, both are premium and it all depends on personal preference which one to choose.
OnePlus 9RT vs Xiaomi 11T Pro Display:
In terms of display, the Xiaomi 11T Pro has a slightly larger 6.67-inches display compared to the 6.62-inches display on the OnePlus 9RT. Both these are AMOLED displays and but the display on the Xiaomi 11T Pro has a 10-bit panel compared to the 8-bit panel on the OnePlus 9RT also the display on the Xiaomi 11T Pro has support for Dolby Vision which enhances the watching of the content on the display.
In terms of display protection, the Xiaomi 11T Pro is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass Victus which happens to be slightly better than the Corning Gorilla Glass 5 on the OnePlus 9RT. Both these displays have a 120Hz refresh rate which is not an LTPO one but the 120Hz refresh rate on the Xiaomi 11T Pro when set to 120Hz can scale between 30Hz, 60Hz, or 120Hz depending on the content in the display.
The OnePlus 9RT, on the other hand, has a standard 120Hz refresh rate where the display only switches between standard 60Hz or 120Hz depending on the content on the screen. Everything works smoother on both these displays whether it is scrolling through web pages, playing games, streaming social media, etc.
The Xiaomi 11T Pro has a 480Hz touch sampling rate whereas the OnePlus 9RT has a 360Hz touch sampling rate that changes to 600Hz during gaming. Both of them support HDR content on Youtube and have support for Widevine L1 so you can stream HDR content on OTT platforms like Netflix, Prime, etc. easily.
As both these are AMOLED displays, the color reproduction and viewing angles are very good on the display but the Xiaomi 11T Pro has more vibrant colors compared to the OnePlus 9RT but the difference is very marginal. In terms of display brightness, the display on the OnePlus 9RT has a peak brightness of 1300nits compared to 1000nits on the Xiaomi 11T Pro.
Both these displays have good visibility under sunlight. The OnePlus 9RT has an optical in-display fingerprint scanner that works accurately and faster whereas with the Xiaomi 11T Pro you get a side-mounted fingerprint scanner which works well but considering this is a value flagship Xiaomi should have given an in-display one.
OnePlus 9RT vs Xiaomi 11T Pro Performance:
Both the OnePlus 9RT and the Xiaomi 11T Pro are powered by 2021’s flagship Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 chipset and in all tasks, both smartphones could handle everything easily whether web browsing, rendering videos, streaming social media, and also playing games. In games like BGMI, both of them could run HDR graphics with Extreme frame rates.
After 4-5 hours of gaming continuously on both smartphones, the back of the Xiaomi 11T Pro did feel warmer compared to the OnePlus 9RT though still, the OnePlus 9RT was slightly warmer at the back. Both get a dedicated vapor cooling system that does dissipate heat faster and in benchmarks, both scored equally good.
In terms of CPU throttling test, the OnePlus 9RT maintains better-sustained performance compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro which does throttle quite a bit. e.g. in 10 minutes of CPU throttling test, the OnePlus 9RT could achieve a sustained performance of around 80-85 percent whereas the sustained performance was around 65-70 percent on the Xiaomi 11T Pro.
Both of them have support for good carrier aggregation but in terms of 5G support, the Xiaomi 11T Pro has 13 bands of 5G compared to 8 bands of 5G on the OnePlus 9RT. Both these smartphones come in two variants – 8/12GB LPDDR5 RAM with 128/256GB storage of UFS 3.1 speeds. Overall, the performance is good on both smartphones but the OnePlus 9RT edges out slightly ahead in terms of gaming.
OnePlus 9RT vs Xiaomi 11T Pro Software:
The OnePlus 9RT runs on OxygenOS 11.3 whereas the Xiaomi 11T Pro runs on MIUI 12.5 with both running Android 11 out of the box. This seems to be slightly disappointing as you are not getting the latest Android 12 on either of these smartphones. Both these have a lot of customizations like changes in shape and size of icons, different wallpapers, themes, and also different styles for Always-On display.
In terms of software experience, the OnePlus 9RT holds an edge as it provides a clean software experience without any bloatware present compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro which has a considerable amount of bloatware that can be uninstalled easily. However, the MIUI on the Xiaomi 11T Pro is much better optimized for a better software experience compared to previous Xiaomi flagships.
In terms of software updates, both are assured of another three years of software updates and four years of security patches. So overall, with no bloatware, the OnePlus 9RT holds a slight edge over the Xiaomi 11T Pro in terms of software experience.
OnePlus 9RT vs Xiaomi 11T Pro Cameras:
Both the OnePlus 9RT and the Xiaomi 11T Pro have a triple camera setup at the back. The OnePlus 9RT has a 50MP f/1.8 Sony IMX766 sensor for the main camera, a 16MP f/2.2 ultrawide camera, and a 2MP f/2.4 macro camera. On the other hand, the Xiaomi 11T Pro has a 108MP f/1.8 Samsung HM2 sensor for the main camera, an 8MP f/2.2 ultrawide camera, and a 5MP f/2.4 telephoto macro camera.
On the front, both these cameras are 16MP each.
The images from the main camera come out with excellent details and the dynamic range is also very good on both. The Xiaomi 11T Pro does very heavy oversharpening in the images and also has slightly more noise compared to the OnePlus 9RT. The contrast is slightly higher on the OnePlus 9RT and does come out
At night, both the cameras captured a good amount of details, and here the Xiaomi 11T Pro had a slight edge in terms of dynamic range but the details come out slightly better on the OnePlus 9RT as it also has low noise in the background compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro. In terms of color reproduction, the Xiaomi 11T Pro maintains a natural color tone whereas the colors on the OnePlus 9RT look oversaturated.
With the night mode turned on both smartphones, the details come out equally good on both cameras but the Xiaomi 11T Pro captures slightly better details and dynamic range compared to the OnePlus 9RT but that difference is very marginal.
In terms of the ultrawide camera, the OnePlus 9RT holds the clear edge as it boasts a larger 16MP camera compared to an 8MP camera on the Xiaomi 11T Pro. The images captured come out with good details and dynamic range on both smartphones, but the details look much sharper, and the dynamic range is also better on the OnePlus 9RT. The Xiaomi 11T Pro has a lot of distortion around the edges which is not much present on the OnePlus 9RT.
At night, the ultrawide camera on both smartphones results in good details and dynamic range. But there is a significant difference in terms of details which are way better on the OnePlus 9RT and also noise is much lower compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro but colors do look oversaturated on the OnePlus 9RT compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro which has natural colors.
Both the ultrawide cameras have a dedicated night mode using which details come out good on both the cameras but here also the OnePlus 9RT has better dynamic range and details look sharper compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro. The OnePlus 9RT comes with a 2MP macro camera which comes with decent details, noise is present on a larger margin, and colors look washed out.
The Xiaomi 11T Pro, on the other hand, with its 5MP macro camera captures an excellent level of details and colors and also looks natural with good dynamic range with less noise. Both lack a dedicated telephoto camera but using the main camera you can achieve a 2x digital zoom and these 2x zoomed images come out with good dynamic range and details on both smartphones.
In terms of portraits, both smartphones capture images with good edge detection, and noise is also lower on both. The Xiaomi 11T Pro does have slightly better edge detection and dynamic range compared to the OnePlus 9RT. The background blur is equally good on both and the colors also look slightly oversaturated compared to that of the Xiaomi 11T Pro.
On the front, the 16MP camera on both the smartphones takes selfies with excellent dynamic range and details look sharper but the Xiaomi 11T Pro does apply a lot of oversharpening in the selfies and there is a lot of skin smoothening on the Xiaomi 11T Pro whereas the OnePlus 9RT captures selfies with much natural-looking skin tones and has less noise in the background compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro.
In terms of selfie portraits, the edge detection is slightly better on the OnePlus 9RT, and oversharpening in the background is very less compared to the OnePlus 9RT. In terms of videos, both the OnePlus 9RT and Xiaomi 11T Pro can capture 4K videos at 60fps from the main camera, but the Xiaomi 11T Pro supports 8K video recording at 24fps which is not present on the OnePlus 9RT.
The 8K videos on the Xiaomi 11T Pro come out with a decent dynamic range and details look good. The videos from both the cameras come out with an excellent level of detail and dynamic range but the details look slightly sharper on the OnePlus 9RT and the noise is also very less compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro.
This is due to the OIS present which provides stabilized videos on the OnePlus 9RT compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro. In terms of color reproduction, the Xiaomi 11T Pro has natural colors compared to the OnePlus 9RT. The OnePlus 9RT can record 4K videos at 30fps from the ultrawide camera whereas the Xiaomi 11T Pro can only record 1080p videos at 60fps.
The videos come out with a good dynamic range and details look much sharper on the OnePlus 9RT ultrawide camera compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro. On the front, both the cameras cannot record 4K videos but the Xiaomi 11T Pro can record 1080p videos at 60fps whereas the OnePlus 9RT can only record 1080p videos at 30fps.
The videos come out slightly better on the Xiaomi 11T Pro in terms of details but the dynamic range is slightly better on the OnePlus 9RT and skin tones look natural whereas the Xioami 11T Pro does apply some oversharpening in the videos. Overall, the cameras are good on both but still, the OnePlus 9RT holds a slight edge over the Xiaomi 11T Pro.
OnePlus 9RT vs Xiaomi 11T Pro Battery Life:
The OnePlus 9RT has a smaller sized 4500mAh battery compared to a slightly larger 5000mAh battery on the Xiaomi 11T Pro. The battery on the Xiaomi 11T Pro lasts slightly better than the OnePlus 9RT whether it is normal usage or heavy usage. With normal usage, the Xiaomi 11T Pro can easily last for two days or slightly more whereas the OnePlus 9RT can last only for two days.
In terms of heavy usage that includes gaming continuously for three to four hours, streaming social media, rendering videos, and talking for 7-8 hours with the display set to 120Hz, the battery easily lasted for a single day on both smartphones. The standard screen-on time was around 5-6 hours on the OnePlus 9RT whereas the Xiaomi 11T Pro had a screen-on time of around 6-6.5 hours.
When it comes to charging, the Xiaomi 11T Pro comes with a massive 120W fast charger which takes around 21 minutes (17 minutes claimed by Xiaomi) for a full charge from 0 to 100 percent whereas the OnePlus 9RT with its 65W fast charger takes around 32 minutes for a full charge from 0 to 100 percent completely. None of them have support for wireless charging though.
Overall, the battery life definitely feels slightly better on the Xiaomi 11T Pro, and also it has better charging speeds compared to the OnePlus 9RT.
OnePlus 9RT vs Xiaomi 11T Pro Audio Quality:
Both the OnePlus 9RT and the Xiaomi 11T Pro have a set of dual stereo speakers with support for Dolby Atmos. The audio experience on both of them is very good and here the Xiaomi 11T Pro has dedicated speakers on the top that are tuned by Karmon Kardon and at the bottom also, so the sound is slightly better than the OnePlus 9RT that uses the earpiece and the bottom speaker together.
In terms of bass level and loudness, the Xiaomi 11T Pro is also better than the OnePlus 9RT. Neither of them has a 3.5mm headphone jack though.
Verdict:
Both the OnePlus 9RT and the Xiaomi 11T Pro are very good budget flagships with all the specifications like a premium build and design, a 120Hz AMOLED display, a powerful Snapdragon 888 chipset for excellent performance and gaming, a good set of cameras, and good battery life with faster charging speeds. However, there are some areas, one excels over the other and vice-versa.
The OnePlus 9RT has a slightly better camera setup when compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro but the difference is very marginal, the gaming performance is also slightly better on the OnePlus 9RT, software experience in the form of OxygenOS is better than MIUI as it does not have any bloatware and also it feels slightly lighter and easier to hold compared to the Xiaomi 11T Pro.
On the other hand, the Xiaomi 11T Pro has a slightly better display compared to the OnePlus 9RT, better battery life, the audio experience is also better and the cameras are very good though not as good as the OnePlus 9RT. The Xiaomi 11T Pro is also slightly cheaper compared to the OnePlus 9RT which also makes it a good value for money proposition.
So if media consumption and battery life are your highest priority and you do not want to spend much, then the Xiaomi 11T Pro is better or else if you can pay the extra money for the best gaming and performance as well as premium software experience with no bloatware, then the OnePlus 9RT is the one to be considered. It all depends on personal preference and you cannot go wrong with either of these.