Xiaomi Mi Watch goes official with MIUI-skinned Wear OS
In addition to the brand new Mi CC9 Pro, Xiaomi also unveiled its Mi Watch – the first smartwatch to feature the Mi brand. It provides some serious features so much that Xiaomi markets the devices as a “small phone on the wrist”.
The watch comes with a 1.78-inch AMOLED display with always-on capabilities housed in a 44 mm casing. The backside is made of ceramic and there are a single button and crown on the right side which is used to control the interface. To the left is a single speaker and microphone. There is also Bluetooth, NFC and eSIM support that enable the smartwatch to work completely autonomously.
Mi Watch runs on Xiaomi’s MIUI to look on top of Google’s Wear OS – the first customized version of Google’s smartwatch platform to date. MIUI for Clock has 40+ built-in apps and a separate app store that is now open to third-party developers. It also provides all the usual fitness tracking features including swimming tracking and is compatible with Firstbeat’s performance analysis which gives you a detailed breakdown of your heart rate data based on various exercises.
Under the hood, we have the Snapdragon Wear 3100 4G chip paired with 1 GB RAM and 8 GB storage. Battery life is up to 36 hours of continuous use with 4G turned on. Xiaomi used a 570 mAh battery inside the MI Watch, which is the largest cell ever placed in a smartwatch.
For the moment, Mi Wach will remain exclusive to China and there is no word on international availability. It is scheduled to hit the Chinese market on November 11 and will sell for CNY 1,299 ($ 185).
There is also a Premium Edition Mi Watch that comes with a sapphire crystal display, stainless steel frame, and strap. It will go for CNY 1,999 ($ 285) and is expected to come out before the end of the year.