Poco’s whole pitch used to be simple: near-flagship performance at prices that made Samsung’s marketing team nervous. The F9 Ultra blows that deal up entirely. At €1,099.9 full price — early-bird drops it to €829.9 — this isn’t a scrappy challenger anymore. It’s a full premium swing, backed by three hardware bets you won’t find bundled anywhere else: a rear-mounted subwoofer tuned by Bose, an 8,050mAh silicon-carbon battery that dwarfs the competition, and a 200MP camera stack Poco has never attempted before. If you’re weighing imaging options, consulting a guide to the best cameras puts that 200MP ambition in useful context.
Sound, Speed, and Serious Thermal Engineering
The F9 Ultra’s Bose-tuned 2.1-channel system puts an independent rear subwoofer in a smartphone — genuinely unusual hardware that could matter for gaming and media, if it delivers on its promise.
The Ultra’s audio setup is rare territory for a smartphone. Dual 1115D stereo speakers flank an independent 1620 subwoofer mounted on the rear panel, all tuned by Bose with Dynamic and Balanced profiles plus a dedicated game audio mode. Whether it produces bass you’ll actually feel — or bass you’ll only notice on a spec sheet — is something independent testing will settle. None has been published yet.
On the display side, both phones run 185Hz AMOLED panels. The dedicated VisionBoost D8 chip handles AI Super Resolution, frame interpolation, and game HDR simultaneously, reportedly pushing supported titles to 185fps. The Ultra’s 3D triple-layer IceLoop cooling is, according to Poco’s launch materials, what keeps sustained performance manageable under load. The F9 Pro skips the subwoofer but retains Bose-tuned symmetrical stereo speakers and the same 185Hz spec on a more compact 6.59-inch panel.
Key specs at a glance:
- F9 Ultra: Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5, 8,050mAh silicon-carbon battery, 100W wired / 50W wireless HyperCharge, up to 1TB storage
- F9 Pro: Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 V Series, 6,330mAh battery, same charging speeds, up to 512GB storage
- Both: 200MP f/1.68 main camera with OIS, 32MP selfie, 185Hz AMOLED (6.9-inch Ultra / 6.59-inch Pro)
A phone with a rear-mounted subwoofer isn’t a spec sheet flex — it’s a statement about where Poco thinks it belongs now.
200MP Cameras, Glowing Backs, and Zero U.S. Stores
Poco’s first 200MP camera with OIS anchors both phones, but the telephoto choices split their personalities — one shoots far, one shoots close.
Both phones share a 200MP main sensor on a 1/1.56-inch chip — Poco’s first with OIS — alongside a 32MP selfie camera. Past that shared foundation, they diverge sharply:
- The Ultra stacks a 50MP 5x periscope telephoto with OIS (up to 20x AI zoom, per Poco’s launch materials) alongside a 50MP ultrawide.
- The Pro trades reach for intimacy: its 50MP 2.5x floating telephoto focuses down to 10cm, effectively doubling as a macro lens, paired with an 8MP ultrawide.
Design-wise, Poco has abandoned the utilitarian approach entirely. The F9 series is clearly performing for an audience. The Ultra’s rear dynamic light ring pulses with calls, notifications, and game events. The Pro’s Aurora Green variant features a full luminous back panel that glows in the dark and can reportedly be pattern-customized using a laser pointer — which is either delightfully unhinged or exactly what a certain kind of enthusiast has been waiting for.
One hard truth: there’s no official U.S. channel. Import only, with all the warranty friction that implies.
Independent benchmarks don’t exist yet. Until real-world testing catches up to the spec sheet, Poco at €1,099 is asking to be judged on faith — and on whether that subwoofer actually hits.
