Redmi Note 17 Pro Max Review – Awesomely Tough Workhorse Phone Tested

Tough phones are all the rage now and Xiaomi has thrown their hat into the ring with their latest addition to the Redmi Note series that has been designed to shrug off quite a bit of punishment while featuring  a huge battery, display and decent performance.

To meet demand of the prolifically butter-fingered and/or accident prone, Xiaomi launched not one but three variants of the design, with the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max being the largest, most powerful model of the lot with the best hardware. After putting it through the wringer, here’s our Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review where we share if it’s worth what you pay for.

Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review – Build and Design

Astute readers will note that Xiaomi has skipped an entire model number when naming the Redmi Note 17 series as its immediate predecessors, the Redmi Note 15 series were launched just last year. This is presumably to keep pace with Cupertino’s current naming conventions.

Arguably its biggest selling point, the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max is built like a tank with what they refer to as Redmi Titan quality backed up by a rather impressive array of certifications.

Right out of the starting gate, the phone comes with an IP66, IP68, IP69 and IP69K dust and water resistance rating that vouches it to survive in up to 2 meters of water for up to 3 days at a time after having passed a rigorous TÜV SÜD 2-meter, 72-hour water-resistant test. The phone also takes advantage of this water resistance with the ability for underwater photography and videography.

That’s not all, the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max has certifications from both TÜV and SGS that vouch that it is able to withstand drops from heights up to 3 meters onto a granite surface which is arguably one of the more hazardous surfaces that you can drop a phone on in urban environments. 

In Malaysia, the phone comes in three different colourways – black, purple and, in the case of our test sample, a signature shade referred to as Cloud Blush. At a glance, Cloud Blush resembles an off-white silvery finish with subtle streaks like clouds across the backplate.

There’s more than meets the eye though and the backplate has a photochromic finish that changes when exposed to ultraviolet radiation ie. sunlight.

When fully exposed to sunlight, the finish turns a subtle pinkish-orange with more obvious cloud patterns which is gorgeous to behold. Sadly due to the ongoing haze, we weren’t able to trigger this particular effect to capture it outdoors but it does look gorgeous up close.

Interestingly, the squircle-shaped dual camera housing on the backplate still remains offwhite, with a transparent plastic plate protecting the main 50MP camera and a secondary 8MP ultrawide angle camera.

The left side of our Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review unit is otherwise unremarkable with the top hosting a series of holes for the speaker and a microphone. The base of the phone hosts a single USB-C port for charging duties, a SIM card tray and a grille for another speaker.

On the right, our Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review sample hosts the usual power button and volume rocker. Up front, you get a 6.83-inch AMOLED display with 3,500 nits peak brightness, a 100% DCI-P3 colour gamut and a small punch hole up top for a 32MP selfie camera.

The phone also has a small slit just above the punch hole to house the earpiece and speakers. For good measure, Xiaomi has also protected the front display with Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2 glass to resist scratches and nicks.

While it is quite obviously made primarily of polycarbonate, the phone is sturdily built, feels pleasant when held and has an even heft for comfortable one-handed carry with the Cloud Blush finish lending it a premium feel.

@hitechcentury Unboxing the durable REDMi Note 17 Pro Max 5G in Cloud Blush that boasts of a humongous 10,000mAh battery! @Xiaomi Malaysia #redminote17promax #hitechcentury ♬ Pachelbel’s Canon in D starting from the famous melody(911769) – SoLaTiDo

Xiaomi has also generously added in an assortment of kit to get you started including a soft silicone casing, a fast 100W charger and the obligatory USB-C cable, SIM eject pin and quick start paperwork. They have also preapplied a screen protector onto the display which is a welcome addition that adds extra value to the phone.

Redmi Note 17 Pro Max Review – Performance and Benchmarks

In terms of hardware, the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max is competitively equipped with competing tough phones and features the same processor – a midrange Qualcomm Snapdragon 6 Gen 5 processor of recent vintage that sees wide service due to its combination of power efficiency and performance for price.

The phone has a matching 8GB LPDDR5X RAM as the closest competing device with the option to augment it further with up to 8GB of virtual RAM off the onboard storage with your choice of either 256GB or 512GB options, all of which utilise fast UFS 4.1 storage for swifter read/writer speeds. 

Running under the hood of our Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review unit is Android 16 with Xiaomi’s own HyperOS 3.0 running under the hood.

Where Xiaomi gets the edge here is that it has committed to 4 years of OS and 6 years of security updates which is a substantial span of time compared to other midrange phones. Here’s how our Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review sample stacks up on paper:

Price	RM1,799 [256GB] RM2,099 [512GB]
Display	6.83-inch AMOLED, 2,772 x 1,280 pixels, 120Hz refresh rate, 240Hz touch sampling rate, 3,500 nits peak brightness, 100% DCI-P3, Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2
Processor	Snapdragon 6 Gen 5
OS	Android 16 w/ Xiaomi HyperOS 3.0
Memory	8GB LPDDR5X w/ 256GB/512GB UFS 4.1
Cameras	50MP f/1.5 w/ OIS + 8MP f/2.2 ultra wide angle [rear] 32MP f/2.2 camera [front]
Battery	10,000mAh w/ 100W HyperCharge wired charging + 27W wired reverse charging
Size/Weight	163.4 x 78.3 x 8.6mm / 229.5g

With the full 8GB of virtual RAM, the phone managed to score the following benchmarks:

3D Mark Steel Nomad Light	439
3D Mark Steel Nomad Light Unlimited	417
3D Mark Wildlife Extreme	2,323
3D Mark Wildlife Extreme Unlimited	1,191
Geekbench 7 Single Core	933
Geekbench 7 Multi Core	2,980
Geekbench 7 OpenCL	3,287
Geekbench 7 Vulkan	4,031
PCMark Work 3.0	12,016
PC Mark Battery Life	28 hours 16 mins

In terms of overall performance, the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max with its Snapdragon 6 Gen 5 processor featured comparable performance with other phones with similar specifications.

It will run the usuals like Call of Duty Mobile, Clash Royale and Genshin Impact on default settings. Multitasking wasn’t an issue with smooth swapping between multiple apps and open browser tabs in Chrome.

Getting about HyperOS 3.0 is a smooth affair though like many other midrange devices, it gets preloaded with bloatware including Agoda, Shopee, MooMoo and more along with a bunch of simplistic games though they can all be deleted without issue.

On top of the usual access to Google Gemini, HyperOS 3.0 also adds in several additional AI tools like an AI Ultra HD to upscale shots, an AI Beautify to clean up portraits, an Expand tool to add additional parts of the background to expand a shot, an AI Erase Pro to delete unwanted parts of a shot and an AI Skyscaping tool to dramatically change skyscapes to create surreal shots or salvage a banal one.

It’s not as dramatic as Honor’s AI Image to Video 2.0 generation tool issued in their most recent phones that can animate a short video from a still and a text prompt but the set of AI tools provided are useful and entertaining.

What makes the phone particularly appealing though is Xiaomi’s guarantee of four years of OS updates, meaning that it will eventually get Android 20 and six years of security updates, meaning that it will stay secure until 2032 which is considerably longer than competing midrange designs in the market.

When tested, the front 6.83-inch AMOLED display offered up bright and punchy colours and crisp text with good clarity under daylight.

Of note are the stereo speakers that flank the display and which have the ability to be cranked up to 400% volume if needed.

Fortunately, music tracks were significantly louder at 400% without distorting even at high volumes. Taylor Swift’s ‘The Fate of Ophelia’ offered clear vocals and boosted mids with reasonable detail at maximum volume that’s loud enough to fill a decent sized living room with sound.

When it comes to endurance, the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max is a beast. Belying its official 10,000mAh battery capacity, our Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review unit offered impressive life that comfortably spans two days of normal usage including social media, texting, a few minutes of calls and web browsing. This was borne out by its respectable PCMark battery life tests which offered 28 hours and 16 minutes of usage. 

If you keep screen brightness low and eschew heavy gaming or other demanding tasks, you’ll comfortably eke out three days of usage. Charging it was a swift affair with the provided 100W charger with the phone getting a full charge from dead zero in about an hour and eight minutes which is quite a feat seeing its large 10,000mAh battery. 

Combined, this array of features makes the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max a solid all-rounder with exceptional endurance for its price range.

Redmi Note 17 Pro Max Review – Cameras

On the imaging front, our Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review unit comes with a dual camera setup that consists of a primary 50MP main camera with an f/1.5 aperture and optical image stabilisation, paired with an 8MP f/2.2 ultra-wide angle camera that lacks stabilisation. 

There’s no telephoto camera, which is not unusual at this price point. Combined, this setup allows the phone to offer a usable 2X crop zoom from the main sensor and up to 20X digital zoom. For video, the cameras allow for up to 4K@30fps video capture, with up to 6X digital zoom. The front hosts a single 32MP f/2.2 camera for selfies and also supports 4K@30fps video capture.

In daylight conditions, the main camera in our Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review unit offers good colour rendition, dynamic range and detail at 1X, with usable results out to 2X zoom. Details become noticeably softer beyond that, particularly at higher zoom levels.

The bright f/1.5 aperture and OIS also allow the primary 50MP camera to capture decent low-light shots at 1X, although at 2X images become softer if you pixel peep.

The 8MP ultra-wide angle camera offers usable results in good lighting, but detail and low-light performance are noticeably behind the primary camera. Videos at 4K offer vibrant colours and relatively crisp detail in daylight and low-light conditions, though it’s best to stick to the main camera without kicking in the additional zoom.

Up front, the 32MP selfie camera produces good shots with generally pleasing skin tones in daylight conditions and fair performance in low light for a midrange phone. It is also perfectly serviceable for video calls.

Should you buy the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max?

On its own merits, the Redmi Note 17 Pro Max is a robustly built everyday phone with exceptional battery life, a bright and vibrant display and otherwise solid midrange specifications. Where it has the edge over competing designs is its brighter rear camera apertures for improved low-light performance, faster 100W wired charging and support for four years of OS updates and six years of security updates.

Add in the fact that Xiaomi throws in a free 100W charger and casing with the phone, and its asking price of RM1,799 for the base 256GB model looks like a bargain indeed.

Redmi Note 17 Pro Max review sample courtesy of Xiaomi Malaysia. For more details please visit https://www.mi.com/my/product/redmi-note-17-pro-max-5g/