Xiaomi on Wednesday officially announced the Mi 5X, its latest Android-powered smartphone that’s meant to compete in the mid-range segment of the market. The Chinese original equipment manufacturer (OEM) has been teasing the device for some time now, with the company now confirming that most recent leaks pertaining to the handset were accurate; as expected, the Mi 5X boasts a 5.5-inch display panel with a resolution of 1,920 by 1,080 pixels, which translates to 401 pixels per inch. The handset is powered by the Snapdragon 625, Qualcomm’s mid-range system-on-chip (SoC) and the same quad-core piece of silicon that already proved its worth inside the likes of the Moto Z Play, Huawei Maimang 5, and some members of the ASUS ZenFone 3 series. The phone’s SoC is backed by 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal flash memory that can be expanded by up to 256GB via a microSD card slot.
The Mi 5X boasts a unibody design solely reliant on metal with noticeably rounded edges that are meant to make the handset more comfortable in one’s hand. The rear plate of the device features a dual camera setup comprised of two 12-megapixel sensors arranged in a horizontal manner and situated in the top-left corner of the panel. The primary camera module of the Mi 5X is accompanied by a dual-LED (dual tone) flash unit, while the back side of the handset also features a circular fingerprint reader. The position of the latter allowed the Beijing, China-based consumer electronics manufacturer to ship a device without a physical Home button that instead relies on capacitive keys. The back side of the device sports Xiaomi’s standard Mi branding and doesn’t house a heart rate monitor. The handset sports an 8-megapixel front camera, is 155.4 x 75.8 x 7.3mm in size, weighs 165g, and will be available in black, gold, and rose color options.
Save for the system-on-chip (SoC) powering the smartphone, the Mi 5X is largely similar to Xiaomi’s high-end Mi 6 that the company introduced earlier this year. One other notable difference between the two is the fact that the Mi 5X ships with MIUI 9 based on Android 7.1.1 Nougat out of the box, whereas the Mi 6 is only expected to be upgraded to the latest iteration of the firm’s proprietary user interface in the coming days. The company claims that the device isn’t a fingerprint magnet due to a special coating layer, adding that it’s powered by a 3,080mAh non-removable battery. The handset will retail for 1,499 yuan in Xiaomi’s home country, which translates to approximately $222, and will officially hit the market next month. The OEM has yet to clarify whether the Mi 5X will eventually be released in more countries later this year.
