The Xiaomi Mi 11 is the latest flagship phone from the Chinese tech giant, notable for being the world’s first Snapdragon 888 phone, and also the company’s first to feature a 2K 120Hz display.
First announced in China in December, the Mi 11 is slowly rolling out in Europe and the rest of Asia in March, while we’re also waiting for Xiaomi to unveil the expected Mi 11 Ultra, Mi 11 Pro, and Mi 11 Lite variants – though there are plenty of leaks about all three already. Here’s what we know.
When is the Xiaomi Mi 11 coming out?
The Mi 11 is available now in China, along with select other Asian and European markets.
Here in the UK, the Mi 11 is available to pre-order now through Vodafone, and will be available more widely – including Amazon and Mi.com – from 22 March.
As usual with Xiaomi products, there are no official plans for a US release. American fans can have it shipped from China or Europe, but at the cost of long shipping turnarounds and possible import fees.
We don’t yet know when the Mi 11 Ultra, Mi 11 Pro, and Mi 11 Lite might arrive, but we round up the latest rumours on all three below.
How much does the Mi 11 cost?
Remarkably, despite serious specs, the Mi 11 costs even less than the Mi 10 in Europe and the UK.
Xiaomi has confirmed that the base 8GB/128GB handset will start from just £749/€749, making it £50/€50 cheaper than its predecessor. It is joined by an 8GB/256GB version, which costs just £799/€799. It’s worth noting that in China there’s also a model with 12GB of RAM, but this version isn’t coming to Europe or the UK.
To make the price even better, Xiaomi is including a 55W charger in the box in Europe – despite including no charger at all with the phone in China.
In the UK, pre-orders with Vodafone will also get a free Mi Electric Scooter Essential, while for a limited time Amazon orders will get £100 off, and Mi.com orders will come with a £100 voucher for the Mi Store.
There will also be a limited edition version of the phone available in Europe in “extremely limited” quantities, but specific pricing for that model hasn’t been confirmed.
We also have our first leak on Mi 11 Lite pricing, though it’s not much to go on. A European retailer listing had the phone for €408.18 for a 5G-enabled 6GB RAM + 128GB storage variant, leading some to assume a €399 RRP for that model, and perhaps a cheaper €349 variant with lower storage – though this all remains unconfirmed.
What are the Mi 11’s features & specs?
We’ve reviewed the Mi 11 already, so read that to find out what we think of the phone. But the long and short is that from a hardware perspective, this is a seriously good phone. It weighs just 196g, and is a tiny 8mm thick. In Europe, it’s launching in two colours: ‘Horizon Blue’ and ‘Midnight Grey’.
Here are some more details on its specs:
Display
The Mi 11 has a 6.81in AMOLED display, and is the first Xiaomi phone to date to feature a 2K (3200×1440) resolution, which brings a 515ppi pixel density. This is also a 120Hz panel, primed for the fast-paced framerates of entertainment and gaming, with an incredibly responsive 480Hz touch-sampling rate and edge sensors for accuracy.
Capable of 1500 nits of brightness on average (though a maximum of 1771 nits has been recorded), with 8,192 levels of auto-brightness, 5,000,000:1 contrast ratio, and support for high dynamic range and motion smoothing through HDR10+ and MEMC, DisplayMate has rated this panel A+.
Xiaomi fits Gorilla Glass Victus to protect this display from damage. This is Corning’s toughest glass, with drop protection to 2m and improved resistance to scratches.
The Mi 11 also has an antibacterial protective film, and is supplied with an antibacterial protective case.
Processor & memory
Xiaomi’s desire to launch the world’s first Snapdragon 888 smartphone is likely what pushed it to launch the Mi 11 in China so much earlier than originally anticipated, in the final days of 2020. The Galaxy S21 has since beat it to market in the US, but here in Europe where Samsung uses Exynos chipsets, we’re actually still waiting for a Snapdragon 888 phone to launch, and the Mi 11 may still be the first.
This 5nm chip presents a leap forward in AI, gaming, and camera performance with a CPU performance increase of 25%, and a matching 25% improvement in energy efficiency. Meanwhile, Qualcomm says the Adreno 660 represents its most significant GPU upgrade yet, with support for QHD+ displays at 144Hz.
The Hexagon 780 AI processor boasts peak performance of 26 TOPS (tera operations per second), up from 15 TOPS in the previous-gen Snapdragon 865. The Spectra 580 image signal processor delivers 35% more computational photography power, too, at up to 2.7 gigapixels per second.
To accompany the Snapdragon 888, Xiaomi includes either 8GB or 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM (though Europe is only getting the 8GB models), paired with either 128GB or 256GB of UFS 3.1 storage.
The 888 is 5G-enabled, and integrates the Snapdragon X60 5G modem, which should mean it is able to support both mmWave and Sub-6 across all major bands worldwide, along with 5G multi-SIM and back-end network tech like carrier aggregation and dynamic spectrum sharing. There’s also enhanced Wi-Fi 6, with seamless switching between mobile and wireless networks.
In terms of performance, Xiaomi referred to an Antutu benchmark score of 745,942 points for the Snapdragon 888, whereas 2020’s Snapdragon 865 recorded 599,253 in the same test.
Battery
The Mi 11 is fitted with a 4600mAh battery, and is able to support 55W wired, 50W wireless, and 10W reverse wireless charging.
The company claims the battery will reach 100% in just 45 minutes over a wired connection, or in 53 minutes when charged wirelessly.
While in China Xiaomi does not supply a charger in the box, in Europe the company will include a 55W GaN charger in-box. The company explained that it considered removing the chargers entirely, but decided to ship this one since few European customers will already own a charger of this speed.
Cameras
Xiaomi has opted for a triple-lens camera on the Mi 11, sitting in a square formation on the phone’s rear at the top-left corner, alongside an LED flash.
Headlining is a 108Mp camera with a seven-piece lens, which features a 1/1.33in sensor, 1.6um pixels (4in1), f/1.85 aperture and optical image stabilisation.
Supporting the main act are a 13Mp ultra-wide camera with a five-piece lens, 123-degree FOV and f/2.4 aperture, and a 5Mp telephoto/macro camera with a four-piece lens, f/2.4 aperture and autofocus.
On the front of the phone you’ll find a 20Mp, f/2.4 selfie camera in a punch-hole design within the display.
From a software side, Xiaomi now supports night mode on three cameras: the main lens, ultrawide, and selfie camera. There’s also a new and improved video night mode, and a set of six new ‘AI cinema’ filming modes to create effects like freeze frames and magic zoom shots, not to mention support for HDR10+ recording.
Sound
Harman Kardon tuning and dual stereo speakers are said to offer immersive sound. There is support for Hi-Res Audio and Hi-Res Audio Wireless.
The Mi 11 also lets you share audio with friends by connecting two pairs of wireless earbuds, or you can connect two wireless speakers to create stereo sound.
Haptics have also been improved, with a large horizontal linear motor that is both more responsive and more capable. This is said to provide a more natural experience.
Fingerprint sensor with a heart-rate sensor built-in
Mi 11 has an in-display fingerprint sensor, which is integrated with a heart-rate sensor. To take a reading you must launch the Xiaomi Health app, so it doesn’t happen automatically when you unlock the phone, but the company claims it is as accurate as those found on smartwatches.
We discussed the Mi 11, along with the ZTE Axon 20 5G and Vivo X60, on an episode of our podcast Fast Charge which you can watch right here:
Will there be a Mi 11 Pro?
It certainly looks like it, and we’re expecting to see something pretty special.
One reason is the charging speeds. While early reports suggested that Xiaomi was working on 80W wireless charging for the new phone, more recent reports suggest that the phone will ‘only’ support 67W speeds for both wired and wireless charging.
The 67W wireless speed comes from an XDA Developers code dive into the MIUI 12.5 beta build, which reveals a string array titled “keyguard_wireless_strong_charge_67w” connected to two devices, codenamed ‘star’ and ‘mars’ with model numbers K1 and K1A.
Meanwhile a 3C certification reveals two Xiaomi phones – with model numbers that also end with ‘K1’ and ‘K1A’ – certified for 67W charging, suggesting that the wired speed is capped to match the wireless.
We’ve seen a few renders of the rear of the phone so far, all of which differ subtly but agree on the broad strokes of what to expect. First was this image that appeared online in late December:
Prolific leaker Ben Geskin then added his own render into the mix. The design of the camera module is a little different, but it shares the same 120x hybrid zoom headline claim (reportedly from a 48Mp 5x zoom periscope), along with the detail that the main camera will use a 50Mp sensor – less than the 108Mp of the standard Mi 11, but reportedly a larger sensor which should net better results despite that.
This is widely tipped to be the upcoming Samsung ISOCELL GN2, the larger phone camera sensor yet, and tipster IceUniverse predicts that it – and the Mi 11 Pro and Ultra – will arrive in late March.
Geskin’s render also shows off the front of the phone – largely expected to use the same panel as the regular Mi 11: a 6.81in AMOLED with 1440p+ resolution, 120Hz refresh rate and 480Hz touch sampling rate.
Finally, late January brought with it what’s purported to be an official Xiaomi poster for the phone. It’s fairly low resolution, but mostly matches the first render that appeared other than some tweaks to the design of the periscope camera module, which appears to have been rotated 90 degrees.
It’s likely we’ll see the Mi 11 Pro announced some time in April, but there’s been no official word from Xiaomi just yet.
What about the Mi 11 Ultra?
In addition to the Pro, we’re expecting an even more souped up Mi 11 Ultra to arrive too. For a while we knew almost nothing about this phone, and then all of a sudden the Filipino YouTuber Tech Buff PH dropped a ten-minute hands-on video with what appears to be a pair of genuine prototypes of the phone.
The video went private pretty quickly, but not before it got mirrored elsewhere on YouTube, so you can still watch it right here – though note that it’s not in English.
If you don’t want to watch the video, let’s break down what the leak appears to confirm.
The most striking thing is the camera module. Not only does it once again sport the 120x zoom of the Mi 10 Ultra, but supposedly the triple camera array is a beast: 50Mp main sensor, 48Mp wide-angle, and 48Mp periscopic telephoto zoom lens.
As with the Pro, tipster Ice Universe says that the 50Mp main sensor is none other than the brand-new Samsung ISOCELL GN2, which at 1/1.12in is the largest smartphone sensor yet and features new autofocus tech Samsung is calling Dual Pixel Pro. Xiaomi has been the first to use several prior Samsung image sensors, so it wouldn’t be any real surprise to see the same happen here.
That’s not all though: the camera module appears to have its own screen. This looks to be capable of mirroring the main display or showing any apps, though presumably the main purpose is to use it for pulling up the the camera app to help you take selfies with the rear cameras.
Despite that, there is still a 20Mp front-facing camera within a hole-punch cut-out for the 6.8in, WQHD+, 120Hz, quad-curved OLED display. Gorilla Glass Victus completes the panel, along with IP68 water protection.
Unsurprisingly it’s apparently powered by the Snapdragon 888, with a 5000mAh battery. It also boasts 67W wired and wireless charging, matching the 3C certification above, with 10W reverse wireless. Note though that this means the wired speed is actually a downgrade from the Mi 10 Ultra’s incredible 120W speeds.
Outside of the camera setup, these specs are mostly similar to the regular Mi 11, except the IP rating, larger battery, and faster charging speeds essentially. For now this leak remains unverified – but looks pretty plausible – so we’ll wait to see what else we hear about the Mi 11 Ultra.
If you want to hear more, we discussed the Mi 11 Ultra leak in much more detail in our regular podcast Fast Charge.
And the Mi 11 Lite?
In addition to a Pro variant, we’re also expecting to see a Mi 11 Lite arrive at some point, and as with the Pro we have some early rumours on what to expect – though those rumours do conflict at times.
The biggest disagreement comes on the phone’s chipset. Leaker Digital Chat Station claims the phone will run the SM7350 chipset – an unknown chip that’s most likely the unannounced Snapdragon 775 (on the basis that the 765 is numbered SM7250). That seems to be backed up by a leaked image on Weibo of the phone’s about screen, which shows an unnamed octa-core processor clocked at 2.3GHz – claimed by the leaker to be the unannounced Snapdragon 775.
Complicating this is an earlier leak from The Pixel that claims the phone will instead use the 4G-only Snapdragon 732G chipset. This seemed implausible at first, but with other evidence mounting that there may be separate 4G and 5G models of the Mi 11 Lite, the 732G may indeed be what powers the 4G model, and may be the only point of difference between the handsets.
Then again, yet another leak from Mukul Sharma shows a Google Play Console listing for the phone with the SM7250 – which, as mentioned above, is in fact the year-old Snapdragon 765 platform, giving us a third potential chipset for the phone.
The good news is that for the most part there’s more consistency elsewhere in the leaks. Most agree that the phone will use a 1080×2400 flat OLED panel with a punch-hole selfie camera, best seen in the render below from Digital Chat Station. The phone’s TENAA certification reveals that this will be a 6.55in panel.
Digital Chat Station also points to a quad camera setup, led by a 64Mp main camera and backed up by a 5x telephoto – which would be curious if true, since even the regular Mi 11 doesn’t feature a zoom lens.
The same design is seen in another render leak, this time from 91 mobiles. This leak also points to the supposedly final colours, with black, peach, and blue available. Note that unlike the Mi 11 there’s no ‘5G’ next to the Xiaomi logo on the rear, so this may be a render of the 4G model – though it’s likely that both will be near-identical.
The TENAA certification mentioned above also suggests that the phone will be impressively slender. The dimensions listed are 160.53 x 75.72 x 6.81mm – the latter of which is unusually slim, enough to make this one of the thinnest phones on the market.
Most leaks point to 6GB of RAM, with storage coming in both 64GB and 128GB variants – though the Sharma leak above instead claims a higher 8GB RAM allocation. Battery is tipped to be either 4250mAh or 4150mAh, with 33W fast charging – most of these specs were seen in an FCC certification listing, which is fairly reliable.
A phone believed to be the Mi 11 Lite has also popped up on a few other certification systems, hinting at a few more specs. The Bluetooth SIG and Malaysia SIRIM certifications only really confirm Bluetooth 5.2 support and a dual-SIM setup. A more recent certification leak confirms 5G support, but differing model numbers suggest that there may in fact be separate 4G and 5G models of the phone on the way, as mentioned above.
