POCO F9 Ultra Hands-on: Top-Tier

The POCO F9 Ultra is the kind of phone that makes its priorities obvious the moment you pick it up. It is big, substantial, and built around the idea that more is more: more screen, more battery, more performance, and more hardware dedicated to gaming.

But unlike earlier POCO flagships that could sometimes feel like performance machines first and smartphones second, the F9 Ultra makes a stronger case for itself as an all-around premium device. Here’s what we think about it with our quick hands-on.

POCO F9 Ultra Specifications

• Display: 6.9-inch HyperRGB AMOLED, 2,608 × 1,200, up to 185Hz, up to 4,500 nits peak brightness, up to 10,000 nits HDR
• Processor: Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 Mobile Platform
• GPU: Adreno 840
• Dedicated Gaming Chip: VisionBoost D8
• RAM: 12GB / 16GB LPDDR5X
• Storage: 256GB / 512GB / 1TB UFS 4.1
• Rear Cameras: 200MP main with OIS + 50MP 5x periscope telephoto with OIS + 50MP ultrawide
• Front Camera: 32MP
• Battery: 8,050mAh, 16% silicon-carbon content
• Charging: 100W wired + 50W wireless + 27W wired reverse + 22.5W wireless reverse
• Operating System: Android 16 with HyperOS 3
• Connectivity: 5G, Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6.0, NFC, infrared, USB Type-C
• Audio: Dual symmetrical 1115D stereo speakers + 1620 independent subwoofer, 2.1-channel, Sound by Bose
• Security: Ultrasonic in-display fingerprint sensor
• Durability: IP69
• Colors: Dark Cherry, Black

The F9 Ultra is the larger and more ambitious of the two F9 Series models. It comes in Dark Cherry and Black, with the design taking a more premium approach while retaining the visual identity expected from POCO. The rear features a dynamic light system that can be personalized for incoming calls, notifications, gaming, and music, giving the phone a visual element that changes depending on what is happening on the device.

At this size, the F9 Ultra is naturally a substantial phone. The large display and enormous battery dictate much of its physical presence, but that also gives it the reassuring feel of a device packed with serious hardware.

The Ultra designation is therefore appropriate even before getting into the specifications. This is not simply a larger F9 Pro.

The centerpiece of the F9 Ultra is its 6.9-inch HyperRGB AMOLED display. AIt supports an extremely high 185Hz refresh rate, making the screen particularly well suited to the phone’s gaming ambitions. Scrolling through the interface feels exceptionally fluid, while compatible games can take advantage of the additional refresh-rate headroom.

The display uses POCO’s HyperRGB technology, which employs a full RGB subpixel structure. POCO says this makes full use of the red, green, and blue subpixels to produce crisp and vibrant visuals while consuming less power.

The panel also uses the new M11 luminescent material, reaching up to 4,500 nits of peak brightness across multiple scenarios and up to 10,000 nits for HDR content. That combination makes the F9 Ultra’s display more than a gaming feature. The size is excellent for video, browsing, photo viewing, and essentially anything that benefits from more screen real estate.

POCO has also incorporated Xiaomi Vision Care, with the display receiving TÜV Rheinland Quadruple Eye Care certification.

The F9 Ultra’s display becomes even more interesting when combined with its gaming hardware. The phone is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 Mobile Platform, paired with POCO’s dedicated VisionBoost D8 chipset.

This is the first time POCO has introduced the dedicated VisionBoost platform to the F Series, and it plays an important role in the F9 Ultra’s high-frame-rate gaming capabilities.

Through Smart Frame Rate technology, the F9 Ultra can reach up to 185FPS in supported games. POCO says more than 20 titles support 185FPS natively, with another five capable of reaching the frame rate through Smart Frame Rate.

The phone also supports a 4,800Hz instant touch sampling rate, 480Hz 10-point touch sampling rate, and 200Hz gyroscope sampling rate. In practical terms, POCO isn’t simply relying on a high refresh rate to sell the Ultra as a gaming phone. Touch, motion, frame generation, and cooling are all part of the broader system.

The WildBoost Engine and 3D IceLoop cooling system round out that package, with the latter designed to help the phone maintain stable performance during extended workloads.

Perhaps the most interesting non-display feature of the F9 Ultra is its audio hardware POCO has equipped the phone with dual symmetrical 1115D master-grade stereo speakers and an enormous 1620 independent subwoofer, creating a true 2.1-channel audio system.

That is a much more ambitious setup than the typical stereo speakers found on smartphones. The dedicated subwoofer is designed to provide deeper bass, while the symmetrical speaker arrangement helps produce a more stable sound image and wider soundstage.

The F9 Ultra also benefits from Sound by Bose joint acoustic tuning. Two sound profiles are available: Dynamic, which emphasizes a fuller bass character, and Balanced, which focuses on overall balance and vocals.

For gaming, POCO adds a dedicated Game Audio mode. This increases the prominence of footsteps while retaining other important sounds such as gunfire, voices, and environmental effects. The goal is to make directional audio cues easier to identify.

It is a feature that makes particular sense on a phone with a 6.9-inch display. The F9 Ultra is clearly intended to be used as a portable gaming and entertainment machine, and the audio hardware helps complete that experience.

Then we get to perhaps the F9 Ultra’s most remarkable specification: its battery. The phone packs an 8,050mAh battery, the largest capacity ever used in a POCO F Series smartphone.

The battery uses 16% silicon-carbon content, allowing POCO to increase energy density while maintaining the phone’s overall form factor. The company rates it for up to two-day battery life.

Charging is equally aggressive. The F9 Ultra supports 100W wired HyperCharge and 50W wireless HyperCharge, meaning users get both rapid wired charging and the convenience of wireless charging. It can also reverse charge other devices, supporting up to 27W wired reverse charging and 22.5W wireless reverse charging.

For a phone built around gaming, this combination makes considerably more sense than simply chasing the biggest possible charging wattage. The huge battery provides the endurance, while HyperCharge provides a fast way to replenish it.

The F9 Ultra also introduces POCO’s first 200MP ultra-clear camera system, with OIS. The high-resolution main camera can shoot in a dedicated 200MP mode, giving users additional room to crop, reframe, and edit their photographs.

The camera system is more versatile than the Pro’s, however, thanks to the inclusion of a 50MP periscope telephoto camera. The telephoto offers 5x optical zoom, with POCO also supporting 10x lossless zoom and up to 20x AI Ultra Zoom. A 32MP front camera handles selfies and video calls.

That gives the F9 Ultra a genuine long-range photography advantage and makes it considerably more versatile than a camera setup built around the primary sensor alone.

The phone also supports Live Cinematography, with 4K video capture, automated focal transitions, and fluid lens shifts designed to give videos a more cinematic presentation.

The F9 Ultra runs Android 16 with HyperOS 3 and brings the connectivity expected from a current flagship, including 5G, Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6.0, NFC, infrared, and USB Type-C.

An ultrasonic in-display fingerprint sensor handles biometric security, while the phone carries an IP69 rating for protection against dust and water.

Storage is another area where the Ultra pushes further. The lineup includes configurations reaching 16GB RAM and 1TB storage, giving users considerable room for large games, applications, photos, and video.

The POCO F9 Ultra is difficult to describe as merely a gaming phone. Yes, gaming is clearly at the center of its identity. The 185Hz display, VisionBoost D8 chipset, WildBoost Engine, high touch sampling rates, and 3D IceLoop cooling system leave little doubt about that.

But the more interesting part of the F9 Ultra is how much attention POCO has given to everything surrounding the gaming experience.

The 6.9-inch HyperRGB AMOLED display is excellent for practically any kind of content. The 2.1-channel Bose-tuned audio system is unusually ambitious for a smartphone. The 8,050mAh battery addresses one of the biggest concerns with powerful phones. And the 200MP main camera paired with a 5x periscope gives the Ultra a more complete imaging setup.

The result is a POCO that feels genuinely Ultra.

WalasTech Worthy Feature: The 8,050mAh battery paired with 100W wired and 50W wireless HyperCharge. The F9 Ultra isn’t just fast—it has the battery capacity to sustain that performance for much longer.

The POCO F9 Ultra comes in three Philippine configurations, starting at PHP 55,999 SRP for the 12GB + 256GB model. The 16GB + 512GB version is priced at PHP 59,999, while the top-end 16GB + 1TB configuration reaches PHP 89,999 exclusively on Shopee (BUY HERE). During the Early Bird period, prices drop to PHP 45,999, PHP 48,999, and PHP 79,999, respectively, with additional Shopee rebates available.