Xiaomi 13 Professional evaluate: Leica-powered digital camera champ

Xiaomi could also be recognized for launching a plethora of different phones as part of the same series, to the purpose the place it will get fairly complicated. However for many who solely care about having one of the best all-round flagship expertise, there’s one mannequin every year value taking note of: the numbered ‘Professional’.

For 2023, the Xiaomi 13 Professional is taking on the mantle of ‘flagship’, promising one of the best of every thing. From show by way of cameras and outright efficiency and pace, it is obtained all of it. On paper not less than. Whereas imperfect, there’s lots to like right here that makes it fairly a particular machine.

Design

• 162.9 x 74.6 x 8.38mm – 229g
• Ceramic again – Gorilla Glass Victus entrance
• IP68 water/mud resistant – Ceramic Black or Ceramic White colors

Few supplies are as time-consuming to work with on smartphones as ceramics (or bio-ceramic on this case). Additionally they occur to be inherently extra sturdy than the glass that coats the rear of most gadgets. Understandably then, it is seen very a lot as the last word high-end materials to make use of in a smartphone. Which is precisely what Xiaomi has carried out with the 13 Professional.

The bio-ceramic again on the Xiaomi 13 Professional seems to be and feels virtually indistinguishable from glass, however offers off a smoky chromed look. At the least on our black evaluate unit. The look on the Ceramic White model is sort of totally different and is perhaps the one to go for in case you’re significantly averse to fingerprint and palm grease smudges in your cellphone. It is virtually as in case you solely have to consider touching it for a greasy smear to indicate up.

Regardless of that, it is obtained an expensive end, and one we have grown to like. The digital camera island ramps up seamlessly from the rear panel and – like earlier fashions – it has minimal strains separating the three lenses. It is also obtained the delicate Leica branding on it as an indicator to substantiate that Xiaomi labored with the enduring digital camera firm on its optics. It is stylish as heck.

It isn’t a small machine by any means and has that heft we have turn out to be accustomed to seeing on premium flagship fashions. On first impressions, it is also fairly a heavy machine and is comfortably over the 200-gram mark. This reality alone could make the usual Xiaomi 13 a bit extra interesting for some.

In any other case, every thing is fairly customary from a flagship perspective. The back and front each curve in direction of the perimeters, to assist in giving it a extra comfy really feel within the hand than if it was a flat, right-angled machine just like the iPhone 14 collection.

Including to its sturdiness credentials, Xiaomi has additionally seen match to get it licensed for water and mud resistance. It’s IP68 rated, which is about pretty much as good because it will get for a smartphone and means it will not let mud in and may survive being submerged in shallow water for as much as half-hour. So you need to use it within the bathe, or within the rain, and it will be simply high-quality.

• 6.73-inch AMOLED show – 3200 x 1440 WQHD+ – 551ppi
• 120Hz adaptive refresh – 240Hz contact response
• Dolby Imaginative and prescient, HDR10+, HDR10 and HLG assist – 10-bit color – 1200nits typical – 1900 nits peak brightness
• Dolby Atmos twin audio system

In recent times Xiaomi’s ‘Professional’ fashions have featured a few of the finest shows in the marketplace, and the Xiaomi 13 Professional isn’t any totally different. Its 6.73-inch AMOLED show boasts excessive decision, excessive dynamic vary, excessive refresh charges, excessive peak brightness and excessive contact response. It is obtained every thing.

The WQHD+ decision ensures that particulars are pin-sharp, with a pixel density of 551 pixels per inch. It is value noting – as appears to be the development – that this is not enabled by default. So in order for you the crispiest particulars and textual content, you will want to enter settings and allow it.

Pocket-lint

Being a contemporary flagship cellphone additionally means you get quick refresh charges, however greater than that, adaptive refresh charges. The show can attain a peak of 120Hz refresh rate and drop as little as simply 1Hz when required, serving to the cellphone save on battery use when it does not have to refresh shortly. With 240Hz contact response onboard as effectively, the content material on-screen reacts shortly to interplay.

Add to that the very fact it is obtained 1200 nits typical brightness, peaks of as much as 1900 nits, assist for over a billion colors and assist for all of the popular HDR formats (Dolby Imaginative and prescient, HDR10+ and HLG), and also you get probably the most dynamic, colour-rich and vivid shows round. It is a very sturdy show, in each measurable approach. It is a sensible show.

Simply so as to add to the media expertise, the cellphone additionally has stereo audio system. A kind of is inbuilt simply above the highest of the show on the entrance, and the opposite is positioned on the underside fringe of the cellphone close to the USB-C port. These are boosted by Dolby Atmos assist, to supply dynamic audio.

As for software program, that is MIUI 14, Xiaomi’s newest pores and skin constructed on top of Android 13. It is about as far faraway from the Pixel software program as you may think about, that includes many design and performance selections we discover irritating at occasions. It takes a bit wrestling to get it behaving in a approach we would like, however even then, it isn’t superb.

It isn’t the primary time we have talked about our frustrations with MIUI, actually, it crops up just about each Xiaomi, Redmi or Poco cellphone evaluate. Latest adjustments have moved it additional into the realms of counter-intuitive and cumbersome perform. Easy issues like selecting a wallpaper or a hoop/alert tone power you into Xiaomi’s Theme Retailer app, so you may’t simply merely select from a listing or pre-selected group of choices.

It isn’t our solely bug bear both. The software program always pesters you to attempt the Wallpaper Carousel function till you both disable the notifications or allow the function and even in case you do, the lock display screen – by default – has a shortcut to the function within the backside left nook. We regularly discovered we would by chance faucet it when selecting up the cellphone as a result of it is so near the sting on the curves of the show.

Different annoying components embrace the truth that the ‘Management Centre’ and notifications are break up between the appropriate and left sides of the display screen when the cellphone is first arrange. Meaning a little bit of an uncomfortable stretch to get to your notifications in case you’re right-handed. At the least, till you manually go into settings and change it again to the ‘Previous Mode’ which drops the fast settings toggles and notifications collectively.

Add that to the truth that when it is first arrange, it plasters the house screens with your whole apps, as a substitute of hiding them away within the app drawer. It is lots to attempt to wrestle with simply to get it performing intuitively. It is virtually like Xiaomi’s design workforce purposefully ignored all of the issues that make Android 13 nice – just like the lacking wallpaper color theming – and added a bunch of its personal options, which add nothing to the usability of the cellphone, then attempt to power you to make use of these options.

{Hardware}, battery and efficiency

• Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 – 12GB/256GB or 12GB/512GB – Wi-Fi 7
• 4820mAh battery – 120W HyperCharge (1-100 per cent in 19mins) – 50W wi-fi charging

Like the remainder of the 13 Professional, the internals promise top-of-the-line efficiency – and ship. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip has provided a wonderful efficiency in each machine we have examined it in to this point, whether or not that is the OnePlus 11 or Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra, and that is the identical with the Xiaomi 13 Professional – particularly paired with the newest LPDDR5X RAM and UFS 4.0 storage for actually fast learn/write speeds. It is even future-proofed as one of many first telephones to launch with support for Wi-Fi 7.

Whatever the activity, Xiaomi’s flagship was greater than as much as it. It launches apps shortly, and all the highest {hardware} inside means the sensation is one in every of responsiveness. We have been by no means left in lag-land and by no means skilled any noticeable stutter within the consumer interface, or whereas enjoying video games that require fast reactions. It is easy, fast, and powers by way of every thing like a champion.

This give attention to pace is seen within the battery charging know-how too, with Xiaomi bundling a 120W HyperCharge adapter in with the Xiaomi 13 Professional. What meaning – extremely – is that you simply solely want 19 minutes of charging to go from an empty battery to 100 per cent. It is fairly staggering, and has some actual advantages in on a regular basis utilization, particularly in case you usually overlook to plug your cellphone in at night time. Even wi-fi charging is quick. At 50W speeds, the wi-fi charger is about as quick as they arrive, however you will want to purchase Xiaomi’s bespoke charging stand to make the most of these speeds.

It is fairly a releasing expertise by no means having to recollect to plug the cellphone in at night time time, and it was by no means wanted in our testing. We might merely wait till the cellphone hit underneath 20 %, then plug it in for 10-Quarter-hour, take it off cost, and repeat the cycle. It was often sufficient time to convey us again to a full battery once more.

Due to that, battery life is rarely a priority. Not that it struggles to make it by way of a day. Even with our heavy testing the digital camera, gaming, and video watching we did not handle to empty the battery in any 24-hour interval. It is obtained glorious standby efficiency and copes even if you use the cellphone for usually battery-intensive duties.

Digicam specs

• 50MP f/1.9 Leica major digital camera – IMX989 1-inch sensor – HyperOIS
• 50MP f/2.0 floating telephoto digital camera – OIS
• 50MP f/2.2 115-degree ultrawide digital camera
• Dolby Imaginative and prescient 4K/60 video recording – Portrait Evening Mode – 8K video

There isn’t any doubt that the digital camera system is the principle occasion on the 13 Professional, for a couple of causes. First, it contains a triple digital camera system made up completely of 50-megapixel sensors. Second, the first digital camera options a big 1-inch kind sensor, first featured on the 12S Ultra launched in China in 2022. It is a bigger sensor than what you will discover in most smartphones which – in flip – implies that every pixel is bigger than the standard, and that is nice information for images fans as a result of it means higher low-light efficiency and fewer noise on the whole.

Evaluating all three lenses, it is clear this major digital camera is one of the best of the lot from trying on the total picture high quality. Pictures have a very genuine high quality to them; particulars and textures look clear, with none extreme over-sharpening that we have seen on a whole lot of smartphones lately. Pairing with Leica lenses and dealing with the enduring digital camera firm has clearly helped Xiaomi right here. In low mild, the principle digital camera does a fantastic job of lifting mild and delivering a picture with out extreme, distracting noise within the shadows.

It isn’t lacking something on the options entrance both, in order for you close-up macro pictures it makes use of the ultrawide lens to good impact, supplying you with the power to get proper up near topics and get a pointy picture with a lot of depth, element and background blur.

As for colors and distinction, that will depend on which default color profile you employ. Xiaomi presents each ‘Leica Genuine’ and ‘Leica Vibrant’ choice and – as you’d suspect – the previous produces pictures with barely muted, practical colors and fewer distinction, the place the Vibrant choice cranks it up barely, making colors extra saturated and distinction larger for extra visible influence. No matter which one you select you will by no means get colors pushing too far into the realm of oversaturation. The element and texture stay clear and clear.

For probably the most half, the colors and distinction are comparatively constant throughout all three lenses as effectively, which actually helps and ensures you already know what you are going to get whatever the focal size you select.

Our solely actual criticism with the Xiaomi images is that – on the whole – the darker shadowed components of pictures in some scenes is usually a little too darkish. It does not use HDR as successfully as you may like to brighten up the colors and light-weight within the darker areas typically. Nonetheless, if that is the compromise for having extra practical, clearer pictures with no noise, we’re proud of that.

The first digital camera is joined by what Xiaomi calls a ‘floating telephoto digital camera’, which allows you to zoom in simply over 3x with ‘optical zoom’ and a spotlight vary from as shut as 10cm to infinity. In brief, you may zoom in shut, with out dropping element, and be capable to give attention to objects even after they’re pretty near the digital camera. You may zoom as much as 70x digitally, however clearly, the element falls off significantly by the point you attain the higher limits, however even as much as about 10x or (at a push) 20x zoom, the photographs are nonetheless greater than usable.

Xiaomi’s zoom and a few good computational processing have additionally enabled a few options we have been delighted with too: Portrait Results and Supermoon mode. The previous of these allows you to change between 4 totally different portrait settings, every with a special focal size, color impact, distinction and bokeh model. We beloved utilizing the black-and-white mode, which delivers a contrast-rich, sharp picture with a pure background blur. The second ‘Swirly Bokey’ mode provides a heavier blur and a tender (however not too tender) picture, which is nice for pet images. The truth is, we took a few of our favorite footage of our cat with this digital camera.

As for Supermoon, that is on one other planet to so many different smartphones. Not actually, the moon’s not a planet in spite of everything. Nonetheless, with the mode chosen from the listing of digital camera choices, you may take a photograph of the moon from 5x zoom to 60x zoom, and it’ll ship a picture that lowers the publicity, and – even on the excessive zoom ranges – evens out the inevitable handshake and motion. The result’s a picture with craters, shadows and element on full show. The additional you zoom, the larger the moon will get (clearly), and there’s something of a element fall-off the extra zoom you employ – nevertheless it’s spectacular nonetheless. To have the ability to shoot it fully handheld, with no tripod and no professional settings tweaking, is other-worldly.

We talked about that the first digital camera is clearly the strongest digital camera of the three, however that is actually solely clearly seen if you transfer into excessive low-light conditions. Evening mode, for instance, is an actual wrestle when you do not have quantity of avenue/constructing lighting to work with. Within the lowest mild conditions, the first works rather well, pulling in a whole lot of mild from all components of the picture, whereas the first and zoom lenses do not appear anyplace close to as succesful, typically leaving you with a shot that does not appear like it is a night time mode shot in any respect. On the plus aspect, you do not get a lot of blur. The main points you may see are typically sharp and in focus, with no movement blur.

As for video efficiency, you get a lot of energy right here. The cellphone can movie Dolby Imaginative and prescient content material at 4K/60, supplying you with sharp, easy content material with deep distinction, broad color assist and vivid peaks. Should you’re simply after the best decision video, you may shoot at 8K, however you do not get Dolby Imaginative and prescient recording at that degree.

Even the selfie digital camera performs effectively, though – as typical – not as sturdy because the rear cameras. It is at all times extra handy and straightforward to make use of your selfie cam to shoot your self, however you probably have a bit time, it is effectively value utilizing the portrait lens results to take images of your self or different folks. There is a richness, element and depth of subject you simply cannot actually get from the entrance digital camera, even in its portrait mode with the background blur. On that word, it is good sufficient that it hardly ever misses on edge detection, so if you do use it, you are not left with unnatural-looking separation between the foreground topic and the background.

Verdict

Xiaomi’s newest Professional mannequin is a high-quality machine, combining unbelievable efficiency with an distinctive digital camera, nice battery life and a shocking show. The truth is, we favored all of it a lot we have been completely happy to place up with our frustrations with the software program as a way to make the most of its capabilities.

The worth level is not precisely low-cost, and that is definitely one thing to contemplate with the Xiaomi 13 Professional. Our preliminary knee-jerk response was that it is too costly, however if you take a look at the function set, the {hardware} and the efficiency it presents, and realise it is going up in opposition to the Galaxy S23 Ultras and iPhone 14 Pro Max‘s of the world, you get a little bit of a special perspective. In comparison with Samsung and Apple’s prime greenback telephones, it isn’t terribly priced in any respect.

For some, the MIUI hurdle will probably be too nice, however in case you’re completely happy to sit down and tame the cellphone, you are left with one thing of a diamond from Xiaomi which exceeded our expectations from the model, and that units the tone going ahead. It is a really fantastic machine and one which delivers in buckets.