Redmi Note 13, Vivo X100 series, OnePlus 12, 12R, and more: The biggest smartphones to launch in January 2024 – Technology News

It’s a new dawn, it’s a new year and smartphone brands –it seems— don’t want to waste any minute of it, from the get-go. A lot of these brands like Xiaomi, Vivo and OnePlus took the remainder of last year to tease their upcoming phone launches, no holds barred, while some like Realme and Poco left you with a sneak-peek of what’s coming. Then there was Samsung, that kept its cards close to the chest, even if leaks took the better of it, to no one’s surprise.

Cut to the chase, January 2024 is packed to the gills, with multiple smartphone launches in the pipeline starting as soon as January 4. Those that we officially know of anyway. There are of course some that are yet to be confirmed as well but at this point, it feels more like a formality. Samsung for instance will most definitely launch its premier Galaxy S24 line-up this month even if it is yet to announce a proper launch date for the Galaxy S24, S24 Plus, and S24 Ultra. iQOO’s Neo 9 could be heading to India, too, while Oppo seems to be burning the midnight oil to bring the Reno 11 to India sooner rather than later, albeit with a few changes that could irk some potential buyers.

So without any further ado, here are the biggest smartphones to launch in India in January 2024:

1. Xiaomi Redmi Note 13 series: The Redmi Note 13 series will make its India debut on January 4, 2024, headlined by the top-of-the-line Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus. The Redmi Note 13 series was launched in China in September 2023 as a follow-up to the Redmi Note 12 line-up. The Note 13 Pro Plus packs high-end specs including a 6.67-inch 1.5K OLED display with a 120Hz refresh rate and up to 1,800 nits of peak brightness, the MediaTek Dimensity 7200 Ultra processor, and a 5,000mAh battery with 120W fast wired charging al put together inside an IP68-rated chassis. There will also be a Redmi Note 13 Pro. You can think of it as a Redmi Note 13 Pro Plus with a watered-down Qualcomm Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 processor, a slightly larger 5,100mAh battery with slower 67W fast wired charging and no IP68 rating. The Redmi Note 13, which is the most affordable of the lot, is powered by the Dimensity 6080 chip and supports 33W fast charging.
2. Vivo X100 series: The camera-centric Vivo X100 series, headlined by the X100 Pro, was launched globally on December 14 following its China unveiling in November. Vivo will launch the X100 Pro and X100 in India on January 4, 2024. Both the phones will be powered by the new MediaTek Dimensity 9300 processor. The X100 Pro has a 50MP 1-inch IMX989 VCS bionic sensor paired to an f/1.75 aperture lens with optical image stabilisation, another 50MP 150-degree field-of-view ultrawide, and 50MP periscope telephoto certified by ZEISS APO for 4.3x optical and up to 100x digital zoom. The X100 has a 50MP 1/ 1.49-inch IMX920 VCS bionic sensor paired to an f/1.57 aperture lens with optical image stabilisation, 64MP f/2.57 aperture telephoto aperture for 3x optical zoom. It has the same 50MP ultrawide as the pro model.
3. OnePlus 12R: The OnePlus 12R was expected to launch alongside the OnePlus 12 under OnePlus’s China-only Ace branding but it was a no show during the company’s December 5 event. OnePlus has now confirmed that the 12R is launching globally, India included, on January 23, 2024. The OnePlus R-series, which has remained India exclusive so far, is going global with the OnePlus 12R, for the first time. But you won’t have to wait that long to get a lowdown on specs as the OnePlus Ace 3 is launching in China way before that on January 4, 2024. Unless OnePlus pulls a rabbit out of its hat on D-Day, the 12R should be the same phone as the Ace 3.
4. OnePlus 12: The OnePlus 12 is set to launch globally, India included, on January 23, 2024 (alongside the 12R), OnePlus has confirmed. Top specs include: a 6.82-inch 2K or 1440p LTPO AMOLED display with peak brightness of 4,500 nits, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 and a 5,400mAh battery with 100W fast wired and 50W wireless charging, and a 50MP wide+48MP ultrawide+64MP telephoto setup.
5. Samsung Galaxy S24 series: The Galaxy S24 series headlined by the top-tier Galaxy S24 Ultra is expected to launch on January 17, 2024 at Samsung Unpacked in San Francisco, California. While hardware upgrades are a given, Samsung’s new Galaxy AI smart features based on its home-grown Gauss LLM model would be the bigger takeaways from the upcoming smartphones.
6. Poco X6 series: The Poco X6 series is confirmed to launch in India soon, possibly within this month. The line-up will mark the India debut of MediaTek’s Dimensity 8300-Ultra. That signals another thing. The Poco X6 Pro is all but confirmed to be a rebranded Redmi K7oE, corroborating rumour mills that have all been pointing toward the same for weeks now. The mention of a “series” also suggests that Poco may be gearing to launch the Poco X6 alongside which itself is rumoured to be a rebranded Redmi Note 13 5G.
7. Realme 12 Pro series: Realme has started teasing its next phone launch in India kicking off the hype-train for its next phone, which as per rumour mills could be the Realme 12 Pro Plus, by teasing what’s set to be one of its big marquee features. The Realme phone, whatever it turns out to be, will be the first after the Realme X3 SuperZoom from 2020 to launch in India with a periscope telephoto camera. Realme has launched a phone called the Realme GT 5 Pro with a periscope camera in China recently but that is highly unlikely to launch elsewhere going by the history of these phones. But we’ll see. More details will be revealed on January 3.
8. Oppo Reno 11 series: Oppo is set to launch its Reno 11 series smartphones, Reno 11 and Reno 11 Pro, in global markets kicking off with Malaysia on January 11. As per a new leak, the company is tipped to launch the two phones in India, too, on the same day. The models launching globally, India included, could be a bit different though. Rumour has it that Oppo might launch the Chinese Reno 11 as the global Reno 11 Pro which is to say that the global Reno 11 could end up becoming even more inferior as far as specs go. But we’ll see.
9. iQOO Neo 9 Pro: iQOO launched the iQOO Neo 9 series in China in late December. There are two phones— iQOO Neo 9 and Neo 9 Pro— with the largely the same specs and design. The iQOO Neo 9 brings Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for under Rs 30,000 while the iQOO Neo 9 Pro gets you the MediaTek Dimensity 9300 at around Rs 35,000. Buzz has it that the iQOO Neo 9 could be heading to India soon as the iQOO Neo 9 Pro. Watch this space for more.

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