Xiaomi Mi 11 review: Flawless display

For its latest Mi 11 flagship, Xiaomi continues to do what it does best. Which is to offer a near premium smartphone experience for less. The Mi 11 certainly looks the part. For starters, it has that curved near-bezel-less glass facade that seems to be the go-to design for such phones. The back has a matte finish that is surprisingly resistant to fingerprint smudges. It feels good in the hand — slim, balanced and handy — despite weighing almost 200g.

Quick specs

6.81-inch AMOLED (3,200 x 1,440 pixels), 120Hz
Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 5G chip with 8GB RAM and 128GB storage
Triple cameras: 108MP (main), 13MP (ultrawide) and 5MP (telemacro)
4,600mAh battery

The Mi 11 has one of the best displays in the market. It's a lovely state-of-the-art AMOLED screen that is sharp (1,440p) with vibrant and accurate colours. It also gets very bright, topping out at 1,500 nits. And thanks to its 120Hz refresh rate, it feels smooth while scrolling webpages and navigating the user interface. Xiaomi says the phone will automatically adjust the refresh rate (between 30Hz and 120Hz in 30Hz increments) to optimise power consumption. Completing that immersive all-screen look, the Mi 11 has a small hole-punch selfie camera and an in-display fingerprint sensor. I have mixed feelings about in-display fingerprint readers in general. Most are too inconsistent for my liking. But not the one on the Mi 11, which detected my fingerprint flawlessly during my week with the phone.

The Mi 11 comes with three cameras. They are housed in a three-layer camera bump that protrudes out, even when the phone is in the included protective case. The 108MP main camera is very good. I was impressed by the details, dynamic range and low noise in the photos. Colours look natural and not overly saturated. It can even do 8K video recording at 30fps, though I would stick to 4K at 60fps as the phone lacks a microSD card slot. The camera fared decently in low-light with acceptable softness and noise. But there is a drop-off in quality when switching to the ultrawide camera. Pictures look more washed out and colours are slightly off. The Mi 11 also lacks a proper telephoto camera, opting for a “telemacro” camera instead. As a result, shots taken with the zoom feature (up to 30x digital) are noisy with artifacts, even at 5x.

With a flagship Snapdragon 888 5G chip inside, the Mi 11 feels fast and benchmarks confirm its speed. But more pertinent is the Mi 11's charging speed, which is excellent. It has 55W wired charging, which works out to around 45 minutes for a full charge. The Mi 11 also has ultra-fast 50W wireless charging (zero to 100% in 53 minutes), though Xiaomi only bundles the wired charger, not the wireless one. The Mi 11 lasted about a day for me with the screen set at 1,440p and 120Hz. It also clocked 13hr 5min in a video playback test with the screen at maximum brightness.

For those who need the features missing from the Xiaomi Mi 11, such as a telephoto camera, faster wireless charging, and IP water and dust resistance, go for the souped-up Ultra variant that has these features, and more. Note that the Ultra (priced at 1,199 euros) is not available yet in Singapore. Personally, I'm fine with the Mi 11's lack of a telephoto camera, though a IP67/68 rating would have been perfect. For everything else, the Mi 11 provides a flagship smartphone experience at a very reasonable starting price of S$999. It is available now on Amazon, Lazada and Shopee.

Note: Review unit provided by Xiaomi.

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