Xiaomi Mi Mix 2 review

We have seen some fascinating smartphone innovations in recent years, but if there's one evolution that has gone on to become a genuine head-turner, it would be 2016's Xiaomi Mi Mix.

This trend-setter kicked off a bezel-less trend which has arguably culminated in the wallet-destroying iPhone X, and now the entire industry appears to be gripped with the desire to drastically reduce those bezels at all cost.

With the Mi Mix, Chinese firm Xiaomi made a striking statement, not just from a design perspective but from a business one, too – it wants to be considered an equal to the big players in the global smartphone arena.

The company has now reworked the original design and returned with the new Mi Mix 2, a more refined, logical and a favorable implementation of the bezel-less concept it did so much to promote.

Since the Mi Mix blazed its trail a year ago, we have seen a handful of smartphones thinning down the bezels and maximizing that all-important screen-to-body ratio.

From the Samsung Galaxy S8, LG G6 and Essential Phone to the aforementioned iPhone X, the big talking point of 2017 is minimal bezel design – so much so that otherwise excellent devices like the standard-sized Google Pixel 2 have been branded "old-fashioned" for failing to follow the same trend.

The downside for Xiaomi is obvious; while the Chinese firm may have started this particular party, it's been joined by some pretty popular new guests.

The Mi Mix 2 is Xiaomi's chance to reassert its dominance in this particular realm – and it's also the handset that the company has chosen to spearhead its expansion into Europe. Can it hope to compete with the likes of Apple, Samsung and LG? Let's find out.

Xiaomi Mi Mix 2 price and availability

• Starts at approximately £430/$575/AU$840
• Available from online re-sellers

The Xiaomi Mi Mix 2 has launched in certain parts of Europe but isn’t officially available in the UK, US or Australia. However, it does support LTE just about everywhere in the world, so you can safely import it from online re-sellers such as Gearbest.

The Mi Mix 2's pricing places it firmly in the mid-range sector of the market, where it is likely to face stiff competition from the OnePlus 5T, another big-screen challenger.

The base model comes with 6GB of RAM and 64GB of storage for around £430/$575/AU$840. If you want more internal space then you can go all the way up to 256GB for roughly £100/$75/AU$85 extra.

A super-premium model is also available in China which has 8GB of RAM and an entirely ceramic body.

As there's not currently a means of purchasing the phone without importing, expect to pay a little for international shipping and potentially some more on top if your parcel is intercepted by customs when it arrives in the country.

Design

• Ceramic back, metal on the edges and Gorilla Glass 4 on front
• Stunning finish on the scratch-proof ceramic back
• Back is fragile and attracts fingerprints

When it comes to aesthetics the Mi Mix 2 really hits the ball out of the park. Conceived by famous French designer Philippe Starck, the phone combines a premium feel with gorgeous looks which are relatively unique in this price bracket.

Many of the design cues witnessed in the Mi Mix have been retained, but the use of a 5.99-inch display in place of the huge 6.4-inch panel seen on its predecessor makes the Mix 2 shorter by 7mm and narrower by 6.4mm. It's also slightly thinner.

All of this trimming has resulted in an overall weight of 185g, which is 24g lighter than the original Mi Mix. Some complained that the 2016 model was simply too large to use, and it seems that Xiaomi has taken this feedback on board and created a more manageable device.

The Mi Mix 2 has a ceramic back reinforced by an aluminum frame. Ceramic isn't a common material when it comes to smartphone manufacture, and it comes with positives and negatives.

It looks amazing and cannot be scratched easily, but it is very fragile and picks up fingerprints with alarming regularity; it's also incredibly slippy.

The sides are aluminum, which lends the phone a robust feel, while the screen is covered with Corning Gorilla Glass 4 for protection.

A plastic hard-case is included in the box – Xiaomi's way of admitting that it has created a beautiful but easily-dropped handset – and while it still looks great with the case fitted, it's a shame to have to cover up that stunning design.

On the front of the Mi Mix 2 there's no space for bezels except on the chin, just below the screen. Xiaomi didn't go the Apple or Essential route by including an obtrusive "notch" for the front camera at the top of the display.

Instead, the camera is located below the screen, a move which is sure to divide opinion and something we'll talk about later.

Xiaomi didn't just banish bezels this time around - it has also done away with a 3.5mm audio jack, with a USB Type-C to 3.5mm connector (kindly provided in the box) providing your only means of using wired cans.

On top of the display, you'll see a small earpiece which peeps out of a tiny cut-out in the middle of the glass; the impressive but ultimately flawed "cantilever piezoelectric ceramic acoustic technology" earpiece used on the original Mi Mix has gone, which is definitely a positive as it was hard to hear in noisy environments.

In terms of the more mundane design details, the dual-SIM slot is on the left and the right edge has the volume rocker and power/lock key.

The super-fast and reliable fingerprint scanner is placed in an optimal position on the rear – just where your index finger rests, in fact – and is accompanied by Xiaomi's branding that reads "MIX designed by Xiaomi" in gold.

Speaking of which, the camera has a gold ring around it which really pops against that lovely black ceramic.

Xiaomi has bucked the trend of 2017 by not giving the Mi Mix 2 any kind of water or dust resistance, so be careful using it near water – it might not survive an accidental dunk.

Display

• 5.99-inch IPS FHD display
• 18:9 aspect ratio

With a screen-to-body ratio of over 80%, it should come as no surprise that the defining feature of the Mi Mix 2 is its display. Xiaomi has gone with a 1080 x 2160 resolution despite the massive 5.99-inch screen, which showcases an 18:9 aspect ratio with round corners.

While some may grumble about the lack of a QHD panel, the display looks great regardless and it's practically impossible to pick out individual pixels, even close up.

The IPS display slightly softens its punch to retain an eye-pleasing viewing experience, while the screen brightness is akin to what we've seen on LG displays and offers a good balance of brightness and color.

Compared to AMOLED panels on phones like the Galaxy S8 or OnePlus 5T, it is a little less saturated. Color reproduction is on point, and if you like vivid colors then you can always tweak things from the settings – just don’t expect it to get anywhere near the impact of the Galaxy S8’s Super AMOLED screen.

Using the Mi Mix 2 outdoors is not a problem as it adjusts the brightness to a readable limit in almost no time.

One minor complaint is that the adaptive brightness is often a little too aggressive when indoors, dimming the screen down to the point where it's hard to make out images – thankfully you can adjust this from the swipe-down notification pane at any time.

If you're on the hunt for the best possible smartphone display then you might prefer the Galaxy S8 to this. But on a phone with such an immersive front panel, the display on the Mi Mix 2 certainly does not disappoint; it's great for reading, watching video content or just browsing the web. Viewing angles are also really impressive, even in well-lit conditions.

Battery life

• You'll easily get a full day's use from a single charge
• Quick-charge 3.0 support and power-saving modes
• No wireless charging

The Mi Mix 2 comes with a 3,400mAh non-removable battery packed inside its 7.7mm-thick body. There's a 1000mAh drop down on battery size when compared to the Mi Mix, but the Mi Mix 2 still manages to impress with its stamina. It easily lasted us a day on a single charge with around 10 to 15% battery left on moderate usage.

With Xiaomi's aggressive app management enabled, the staying power of the Mi Mix 2 is astronomical, but that's largely because it throttles background processes to the point of them being almost useless – hardly ideal when you want notifications to come through instantly.

Having said that, turning off this feature doesn't cause battery levels to nosedive as you might expect and the Mi Mix 2 is still perfectly capable of getting you through a full day without any issues.

Here are some rough estimates when it comes to battery consumption:

• 20 minutes of browsing consumed 3% of battery.
• 20 minutes of video streaming consumed 5% of battery.
• 30 minutes of gaming consumed 7% of battery.

Another plus point here is the support for Quick Charge 3.0. If you are about to head out for a party and have limited time to charge your phone, a quick top-up before you leave will literally give you hours of usage.

We often plugged the phone in for what felt like a short space of time only to discover that it had charged fully and was good to go, which isn't something you can say about all smartphones with batteries over 3,000mAh.

Xiaomi bundles a Quick Charger inside the retail box, but it's not a three-point UK plug so you'll need a travel adaptor. If you have another Quick Charge-compatible charger in the house then you can try using that, but not all will work.

We used a charger from our old Google Nexus 6 and that worked fine. It should be noted also that unlike many other flagship phones in 2017, the Mi Mix 2 lacks wireless charging support.

Camera

• Rear camera takes good shots in well-lit conditions
• Front camera placement is aggravating

The Mi Mix 2 comes with a 12MP Sony IMX368 rear sensor which features HDR, face detection and 4-axis OIS (optical image stabilization). On the front, it has a 5MP camera that has been awkwardly placed at the right corner of the chin to achieve the seamless bezel-free design.

The camera software is similar to what we have seen on other MIUI-based phones and takes a lot of inspiration from Apple's software.

The interface is clean and clutter-free and it has all the necessary modes to let you play with the shutter. Xiaomi didn’t try to do anything extra with the rear camera on the Mi Mix 2, like it did with the dual-camera Mi 6. There isn't really a lot special about the camera apart from stabilization and 4K video, which is a shame.

When under a decent level of natural light, the Mi Mix 2 does a stellar job, even if you have very little knowledge of photography. It captures punchy colors with great dynamic range and is quick to focus and shoot.

In low-light conditions the 4-axis OIS aids the camera performance to a degree and the phone's dedicated low-light enhancement kicks in when needed, but image quality is sadly quite poor.

Even when you're holding the phone very still it's common to get blurry photos and there's a lot of noise in dim shots. Compared to the camera on the Pixel 2 or even last year's iPhone 7, this isn't all that impressive.

The front-facing selfie camera is oddly placed and taking a video call via a third-party app is a total mess, with many apps not compensating for you having to hold the phone upside down. The angle is very narrow, too – which is odd when you consider that the trend is for phones to have wide-angle front cameras.

All in all, the Mi Mix 2 doesn't have the photography talents to compete with the best mobile snappers in the business, but in the right conditions it can take lovely snaps.

Camera samples

Interface and reliability

• MIUI is a clean and customizable Android skin
• Number of pre-installed apps is unnecessary

Xiaomi has cleaned up its Android MIUI skin greatly over the past year or so, and while it's a long way from being a "stock" style experience like OnePlus' Oxygen OS, you do get a neater on-screen interface which borrows elements from iOS as well as other Android skins.

The most obvious difference from stock Android is the missing app drawer, which is something of an acquired taste and definitely makes things look cluttered. You either need to rearrange the apps in folders or you can install a third-party app drawer for a more typical Android-style experience.

While many Mi Mix 2s ship with MIUI 8, MIUI 9 is available now and will most likely download the moment you take your phone out of the box.

Running underneath is Android 7 Nougat which puts the phone behind the curve slightly when compared to some rivals, but Xiaomi has already begun testing an Android Oreo upgrade, which we'd imagine will arrive next year.

Even if you prefer the stock Android experience, MIUI remains one of the finest Android skins available right now.

Exclusive features like the Quick Ball – which almost makes the navigation keys redundant – and dual apps – which let you use two instances of a single app on the same phone – are baked in, while almost every element of the interface can be customized using themes.

Xiaomi also has its own screen recording application, which is easy to use and pretty unique.

Having said all of that, Xiaomi certainly does things its own way with MIUI. In its native China, Xiaomi's phones are sold with Xiaomi services installed, not Google ones. So the Mi Store supplants the Google Play Store and you're expected to sign in with a Mi Account first and foremost.

The international MIUI ROM which comes installed on the Mi Mix 2 we reviewed strips away some of these connections, but you still have to contend with other Xiaomi foibles, such as a needlessly aggressive memory optimization system which causes notifications to be delayed or not come through at all.

Thankfully a few tweaks are all that are required to disable these features and get things working like normal.

For all of its quirks, it's impossible not to fall in love with MIUI. It's such a clean and refined UI that it even puts stock Android to shame; little features like the wallpaper carousel – which automatically downloads gorgeous lock and home screen wallpapers from Xiaomi's cloud servers – really add to the user experience.

It's also rock solid from a reliability standpoint, and we noticed very few force-closing apps or stutters.

Music, movies and gaming

• Videos look stunning
• Gaming is smooth
• Stereo speakers

With processing power to spare, stereo speakers and a massive, full HD edge-to-edge display, the Mi Mix 2 is a good choice for multimedia aficionados.

The flagship Snapdragon 835 chipset is present inside the Mi Mix 2, along with 6GB of RAM to ensure impressive gaming capabilities, meaning this handset can handle anything you throw at it.

Holding the phone in landscape while gaming may block the loudspeaker on the bottom edge or result in accidental touches here and there due to those thin bezels, but it's not hard to adopt the ideal holding position over time.

There's also a front-facing speaker in the earpiece which fires audio directly towards your face, but it's disappointingly weak.

As noted earlier in this review there's also no 3.5mm headphone jack, so you'll have to use the included adaptor or wireless headphones if you're not happy with the speakers.

Performance

• Fast, fluid operation with no lag
• Apps open quickly and multitasking is smooth

As mentioned above, the Snapdragon 835 chipset along with 6GB RAM is a great combination to take on almost any task you could ask a smartphone to do in 2017.

Apps load swiftly, Android runs smoothly, and the Mi Mix 2 can run multiple apps at the same time without breaking a sweat. It will also keep your minimized tasks saved for a long time and let you jump between them without a hitch.

During our entire time with the phone we've yet to experience any stutter, pauses or freezes – the Mi Mix 2 is butter-like in its smoothness and that goes a long way to ensure the user experience is a pleasant one.

If you've purchased Xiaomi phones in the past then you may be aware that some of their devices have had issues operating on all global LTE network bands.

Thankfully the company has included support for a massive range of international bands with the Mi Mix 2, so it should work on your network no matter where in the world you happen to be from.

The Xiaomi Mi Mix 2 is one-of-a-kind in its price range; from its stunning bezel-less design and powerful hardware under the hood to an excellent display and impressive battery life, it has all the elements to justify the very reasonable price.

Even so, it's expensive when compared to other Xiaomi handsets and doesn't have this sector of the market all to itself. The most notable rival is the recently-released and similarly-priced OnePlus 5T, and every month seems to bring more mid-range challengers.

If looks could kill then the Mi Mix 2 would be an undisputed champion, but it's not perfect. MIUI takes some getting used to, there's no water or dust resistance and from a photography perspective, the phone isn't top-class.

Who's this for?

If you want cutting-edge performance and great looks but you can't afford the massive price tag Apple has slapped on the iPhone X, then the Mi Mix 2 is a solid choice.

For less than half the price of Apple's latest device you can get a very similar proposition – that massive screen really is the star of the show here and as we can attest, the Mi Mix 2 gains admiring glances from all who lay their eyes on it.

It's arguably more than a match for the iPhone X in terms of looks and pure desirability, even if it lacks brand recognition.

Should you buy it?

For under £450/$600/AU$850, the Mi Mix 2 is definitely a good deal when it comes to overall experience, processing power and design; Samsung's Galaxy Note 8 uses the same chipset but costs almost twice as much.

However, if you prefer stock Android over MIUI and don't care about the looks – and also feel a little nervous about ordering a phone from overseas – then you might be better off with the OnePlus 5T.

But while that device boasts a similar spec sheet and a large screen, it arguably lacks the drop-dead gorgeous looks of Xiaomi's offering.

First reviewed by TechRadar India, updated by TechRadar UK