Xiaomi 14 Intro
The Xiaomi 14 series has been officially unveiled in China, and it looks like it will be the Android series to beat when it arrives globally later this year. The new Xiaomi 14 and Xiaomi 14 Pro come with a slew of improvements in almost every area. They have one of the brightest displays, the latest flagship processor from Qualcomm, new camera tricks, super-fast charging, and last but not least, a titanium option for the Pro model.While we wait for the Xiaomi 14 and Xiaomi 14 Pro to arrive on our test benches, we decided to give you a little preview of all the information we have and an interpolation of what to expect from Xiaomi’s latest flagships. Of course, we’ll update this preview with all the numbers from our meticulous test procedures once we lay our hands on the devices. But let’s get to it, shall we?
What’s new about the Xiaomi 14 and Xiaomi 14 Pro
- Snapdragon 8 Gen 3
- 3,000-nit screens
- ƒ/1.42-ƒ/4.0 variable aperture on the Xiaomi 14 Pro
- 120W HyperCharge wired charging
- Titanium frame option on the Xiaomi 14 Pro
- HyperOS
Table of Contents:
Unboxing
Specs
Design and Colors
Display
Camera
Performance
Software
Battery and Charging
Alternatives
Summary
Xiaomi 14 Unboxing
The photo of the unboxed Xiaomi 14 and 14 Pro will go here, but obviously, as we don’t have the phones yet, we can only speculate about what will be included in the box.
Judging from the Xiaomi 13 series, we can expect a lavish retail box by modern smartphone standards, with a fast charging brick included, as well as a USB-C cable, and maybe even a simple case or back cover.
Xiaomi 14 Specs
Top silicon and camera tricks
| Xiaomi 14 | Xiaomi 14 Pro | |
|---|---|---|
| Size, weight | 152.8 x 71.5 x 8.2 mm 188 g |
161.4 x 75.3 x 8.5 mm 223 g |
| Display | 6.36″ OLED 120Hz dynamic 3,000 nits peak |
6.7″ OLED 120Hz dynamic 3,000 nits peak |
| Processor | Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 for Galaxy | Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 |
| RAM, Storage | 8/256GB 12/256GB 12/512GB 16/1TB LPDDR5X |
12/256GB 16/512GB 16/1TB LPDDR5X |
| Cameras | 50MP main (f/1.6) 50MP ultra-wide f/2.2 50MP 3.2X telephoto f/2.0 32MP front |
50MP main (f/1.42-4.0) 50MP ultra-wide f/2.2 50MP 3.2X telephoto f/2.0 32MP front |
| Battery | 4,610 mAh | 4,880 mAh |
| Charging | 90W wired 50W wireless |
120W wired 50W wireless |
The things that catch the eye in the table above are the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset, coupled with a healthy amount of RAM and storage. We can see a 1TB option, which is getting more and more common these days. This is a welcome sign in the absence of a microSD card slot. The cited 3,000-nit peak brightness is indeed an eyebrow-raiser, as is the variable aperture on the main camera of the Xiaomi 14 Pro. These are all just specs on paper, though, and we have to test the phone to see what’s what.
Xiaomi 14 Design & Colors
Titanium is the new hype
Xiaomi 14 Pro Gallery
The design of the Xiaomi 14 series follows in the footsteps of its predecessor. We have the curved screen and back, the rectangular camera isle, and the premium titanium frame of the Xiaomi 14 Pro. But even the vanilla Xiaomi 14 looks gorgeous and stylish.
Xiaomi 14 Gallery
Last year, Xiaomi launched leather and ceramic options for the 13 Pro model, but there’s no information on exotic materials in the 14 series other than the aforementioned titanium. Xiaomi boasts a new type of glass to protect the front and back of the Xiaomi 14 series, called Ceramic Glass. It’s a proprietary material developed by the company in-house, much like the Kunlun glass that Huawei is using on its models.
We still don’t know how the new Xiaomi 14 and 14 Pro feel in the hand, but we do know the available colors.
Xiaomi 14 colors:
- Jade Green
- Black
- White
- Snow Mountain Pink
Xiaomi 14 Pro colors:
Xiaomi 14 Display
Brightness wars
The Xiaomi 14 Pro features a 6.7-inch AMOLED display, LTPO 4.0 technology, and a new C8 light-emitting material. The latter allows the phone to go all the way up to 3,000 nits of peak brightness when needed, while the LTPO tech gives you that dynamic 1-120Hz refresh rate. The resolution of that panel is 1440 x 3200 pixels, resulting in a pixel density of around 522 PPI.The vanilla Xiaomi 14 comes with a smaller, 6.36-inch AMOLED screen with 1200 x 2670 resolution and 460 PPI. This one also boasts 3,000 nits of peak brightness and a 120 Hz refresh rate. It looks like the only differences between the two panels are size and resolution, but we have to run our display test to be sure, so stay tuned for that.
Xiaomi 14 Camera
Variable aperture makes a debut
The ultrawide camera has also been redesigned on both phones. The resolution is now 50MP. The third snapper in the system is a telephoto (3,2x optical), featuring Leica’s 75mm floating lens technology and allowing users to focus from 10cm to infinity. Both the Xiaomi 14 and 14 Pro can shoot up to 8K@24fps videos, with a couple of more practical resolutions and frame rates also available.
Nothing speaks better than some samples in this category, so we will add a detailed breakdown of each camera once we get the phones in our hands.
Xiaomi 14 Performance & Benchmarks
Cream of the Qualcomm crop
The Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 is on duty in both phones, and there are already some videos showing Geekbench scores (2134 single and 6757 multicore results). We have to test the phones ourselves, but from what we’re seeing so far, the new Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 could bring the fight to Apple and make the A17 break a sweat. The storage situation is as follows: The vanilla Xiaomi 14 is available with an 8/256GB base memory configuration, and you can get it with up to 16/1TB. The Xiaomi 14 Pro starts at 12/256GB and also goes all the way up to 16GB of RAM and 1TB of storage.
Stay tuned for some hard numbers once we run all the benchmarks.
Xiaomi 14 HyperOS
Another cool addition to the new features of the Xiaomi 14 family is the transition from MIUI to HyperOS. Both the Xiaomi 14 and Xiaomi 14 Pro run Android 14 out of the box, with the aforementioned HyperOS on top.
Stay tuned for a full breakdown of this new user interface, but according to Xiaomi, the new OS is focused on four main pillars: Low-level Refactoring, Cross-End Intelligent Connectivity, Proactive Intelligence, and End-to-End Security.
AI algorithms and neural network processing on-device is the new hype in smartphone software, so expect some clever AI tricks from HyperOS. There’s no word on software support, though, but if we extrapolate from the last generation of Xiaomi flagships, we should expect at least four years of major OS updates.
Xiaomi 14 Battery
There’s a 4,880mAh cell inside the Xiaomi 14 Pro and a smaller, 4,610mAh battery inside the core model. These are pretty decent capacities, given the overall size and thickness of both devices and the fact that both phones support wireless charging as well.
We can’t comment on battery life, but our common sense tells us we can expect at least a full day of heavy use, with benchmarks to follow soon. On the charging front, we have 120W fast wired charging support on the Pro model and 90W on the vanilla.
The cited charging times from 0 to 100% are 18 minutes for the Xiaomi 14 Pro and 31 minutes for the Xiaomi 14. We’ll be testing those as well. Meanwhile, both phones also support up to 50W of wireless charging power and 10W reverse wireless charging to top up QI-compatible gadgets.
Xiaomi 14 Models
Xiaomi has a tradition of launching the vanilla and Pro versions of its series and then later offering an Ultra model to showcase some super-cool features. We expect this to be the case with the Xiaomi 14 Series as well. The sad part is that most of the Ultra models are hard to get; they’re meant for the Chinese market only. Let’s hope this year’s Xiaomi 14 Ultra makes it to the global scene.
Xiaomi 14 Competitors
Obviously, Xiaomi is gunning for the upcoming Galaxy S24 series, given the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor and all the AI tricks onboard.
Another indirect competitor series is, of course, the iPhone 15, with the usual caveats applying here as well. Xiaomi phones are hard to get in the States, and being Android devices, they mostly compete with other fellow Android phones. That being said, we can definitely see people choosing a Xiaomi 14 Pro instead of an iPhone 15, so there’s also that.
Xiaomi 14 Summary and Final Verdict
The Xiaomi 14 and Xiaomi 14 Pro look very solid on paper and promise a tough fight for the Android crown. With the Galaxy S24 series launch moving closer and closer, the competition will be as fierce as ever.
Will all the new hardware and software tricks be enough to give the Xiaomi 14 Series an edge over the competition? It’s too early to say, but things are looking very promising.