A new smartphone render has just surfaced, and it’s allegedly showing off one of Xiaomi’s upcoming devices, the Xiaomi R1. According to the source, this is Xiaomi’s upcoming, budget-friendly smartphone, which is expected to arrive before the end of the year. Having said that, as you can see, this phone will adapt to today’s trends, its bezels will be rather thin, especially for a budget smartphone.
The upcoming Redmi Note 5 is actually expected to sport such thin bezels as well, though the Xiaomi R1 will probably be even more affordable than the Redmi Note 5. If the source is to be believed, the Xiaomi R1 will cost 1,499 Yuan ($227) though its specs have not leaked just yet. The phone is expected to sport a rear-facing fingerprint scanner, and chances are that it is made out of metal. The device will utilize on-screen buttons, and there is no 3.5mm headphone jack included at the bottom of the device, which means that it’s either placed at the very top of the phone, or not included at all, the latter is quite probably the case here, though. We’ve seen a number of such ‘full-screen’ smartphones arrive this year, and some of them are even quite affordable, like the OPPO F5, for example. The OPPO F5 is, however, considerably more expensive than the Xiaomi R1 is rumored to be, so chances are that these two smartphones will not cater to the same group of people, there’s certainly a market for the Xiaomi R1 out there, especially in countries like India where budget devices are selling like hotcakes.
It’s also worth noting that Samsung is planning to release some mid-range smartphones with thin bezels, smartphones that will sport the company’s Infinity display, the Galaxy A5 (2018) and Galaxy A7 (2018), both of which are expected to arrive either next month, or in January. These two handsets will be considerably more expensive than the Xiaomi R1 as well, at least if rumors are to be believed. In any case, if the Xiaomi R1 is really on the way to be announced, we’ll get more info in the near future, probably really soon, actually, so stay tuned for that.