Xiaomi 14 Review: Pro-grade camera on a non-Pro phone?

This is probably one of the very few times when a company launches a non-pro model that is so well-rounded that the said company needed to skip the Pro and jump directly to the Ultra in order to differentiate the two. This, of course, is pure speculation, but the fact of the matter is that the vanilla Xiaomi 14 has a lot going on for it. So, let's dive straight in.

As seen in the rating widget abov, thee Xiaomi 14 total score is lower than one might expect. That is not because of a flaw, but because we have implemented a new rating system at PhoneArena that gives readers a better idea of the performance of a phone across different categories. Remember to look at the scores and compare them to the average for the class, and we believe you will find these scores tremendously useful. Learn more about the new PhoneArena Review Scoring system here.

What’s new about the Xiaomi 14

• Snapdragon 8 Gen 3
• 6.36" CrystalRes AMOLED 1.5K (2670 x 1200)
• 3,000-nit peak brightness
• Next gen Leica optics with Summilux
• 90W HyperCharge wired/50W wireless charging
• 4,610 mAh battery
• HyperOS with AI magic inside

Table of Contents:

• Unboxing
• Specs
• Design and Colors
• Display
• Camera
• Performance
• Software
• Battery and Charging
• Alternatives
• Summary

Xiaomi 14 Unboxing

It's refreshing to see that some companies haven't bent over due to pressure from the industry and still supply their customers with a full package regarding the retail box. In the case of the Xiaomi 14, you're getting a 90W fast charging brick, a USB-C cable, a plastic back cover to protect the glass back from scratches, and a SIM ejector tool.

Five years ago, this retail box would've passed as not a big deal, or even a bit scarce, as there were earbuds bundled inside and whatnot, but in the modern smartphone reality, this is pure lavishness.

Xiaomi 14 Specs

Top silicon and camera tricks

 
The things that catch the eye in the table above are the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset, coupled with a healthy amount of RAM and storage. The cited 3,000-nit peak brightness is indeed an eyebrow-raiser, and the charging speeds also look very promising. These are all just specs on paper, though, scroll down to the test portion of the review to see the actual results.

Xiaomi 14 Design & Colors

Flat screens for everybody!

The design of the Xiaomi 14 series follows in the footsteps of its predecessor. We have the flat screen and curved back, the rectangular camera isle, and the premium aluminum frame. The phone feels great in the hand, mainly due to its compact size. The trend with flat displays is getting strong but we like it that way, as there are less distortion, and flat displays are generally easier to use.

Display Measurements:

Main Camera

Ultrawide Camera

Zoom Quality

Selfies

Video Quality

Here's a quick test of the Xiaomi 14 and its video recording capabilities. The phone can do 8K at 30fps but for all intents and purposes 4K should be enough for the majority of people out there. You can zoom in and out while recording, switch between the different lenses, and the quality is pretty decent across the board. Maybe not at the level of big guns such as the iPhone 15 Pro Max but still not bad at all. What do you think about it?

 

As you can see from our sophisticated and pretty detailed camera rating widget, the Xiaomi 14 does a really great job and it's right up there with a camera champions such as the Google Pixel 8 Pro (just one point difference), and the Oppo Find X7 Ultra, a designated camera phone. You can find more about our new camera rating procedure here.

Just like its bigger brother, the Xiaomi 14 comes with the latest and greatest Qualcomm silicon onboard. The Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 performs as expected, and the synthetic benchmarks put the Xiaomi 14 right where it belongs, on par with other flagships such as the Galaxy S24 and the iPhone 15.

The phone handles sustained load pretty well, without much throttling or getting uncomfortably hot. In real-life day-to-day use, the Xiaomi 14 is smooth and snappy. You won't notice any performance drop, hiccups or stutter, everything works fast and flawlessly.

  

The storage situation is as follows: The vanilla Xiaomi 14 is available in two memory configurations both featuring an ample 12GB of RAM and either 256 or 512GB of storage. There's no microSD card slot, so if you want to go higher on the storage side, you need to jump straight to the Ultra model (available with up to 1TB of storage).

Xiaomi 14 HyperOS

Another cool addition to the new features of the Xiaomi 14 family is the transition from MIUI to HyperOS. The Xiaomi 14 runs Android 14 out of the box, with the aforementioned HyperOS on top.

⁠⁠⁠AI algorithms and neural network processing on-device is the new hype in smartphone software, and the Xiaomi 14 series is no exception. LLM (Large Language AI models) can be found across the OS and integrated into various applications to help users get more while doing less.

AI Subtitles is one such feature, enabling real-time transcription with subtitles, as the name suggests, when you consume video content. There's also AI Album Search, a cool option that allows you to search images inside your album just by describing them to the AI. You can use AI Portraits to turn your images into portraits or completely new composition.

Finally, there's a much more advanced AI algorithm, called Xiaomi HyperMind, that is supposed to learn from your everyday habits and automate them. Say you're using your phone to turn on your smart bulb at a certain time and in a certain color. After some time HyperMind will in theory do this for you without any input.

Xiaomi 14 Battery

The Xiaomi 14 comes equipped with a 4,610mAh battery, which might seem small, compared to big flagships such as the Honor Magic 6 Pro (5,600mAh silicon-carbon cell) but don't forget that the Galaxy S24 rocks an even smaller 4,000mAh battery. So, let's see how this little flagship performs in our battery benchmarks.

PhoneArena Battery Test Results:

Looking at the results, there are some pretty interesting conclusions to be had. First, the LTPO screen management on the Xiaomi 14 is pretty good, and this certainly helped with the browsing result of over 16 hours. Which, while not breaking any records, is pretty impressive for a phone of this size and specs. To be fair to the Galaxy S24, the Samsung phone managed to replicate the result with its smaller 4,000 mAh battery, so that's another thing to keep in mind.

The video streaming score is unexpectedly low (we might have to run this one again), but the gaming test returned more than 10 hours of uninterrupted joy and fun, which again is a pretty good result. The Xiaomi 14 was able to beat not only its competitors in this test, but also its bigger sibling, the Xiaomi 14 Ultra.

PhoneArena Charging Test Results:

On the charging front, we have 90W fast wired charging support and 50W wireless. Xiaomi cites 31 minutes for a full 0 to 100% cycle and we were able to kind of verify that. In our charging test, the Xiaomi 14 went from 0 to 100% using the bundled 90W charger in 39 minutes. You get 50% in just 15 minutes, and half an hour on the cable will get you 90%, so it's amazingly fast!

Xiaomi 14 Models

Xiaomi has a tradition of launching the vanilla and Pro versions of its series and then later offering an Ultra model to showcase some super-cool features. This year the company turned things upside down, reserving the Pro model for China, and launching the Ultra model globally, so it's a trade-off of sorts. We're getting a better camera system globally, but no fancy titanium.

There's still a chance for the Xiaomi 14 Pro to make it outside of China in some shape or form, but it's pretty slim. The vanilla Xiaomi 14 is now pretty potent in and of itself, so if you want something more Pro-grade, you should check out the Ultra. Bear in mind that the latter also comes with an ultra price tag.

Xiaomi 14 Competitors

Obviously, Xiaomi is gunning for the recently launched Galaxy S24 series, given the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 processor and all the AI tricks onboard.

Another indirect competitor series is, of course, the iPhone 15, with the usual caveats applying here as well. Xiaomi phones are hard to get in the States (near to impossible), and being Android devices, they mostly compete with other fellow Android phones. That being said, we can definitely see people choosing a Xiaomi 14 instead of an iPhone 15, so there's also that.

Xiaomi 14 Summary and Final Verdict

The Xiaomi 14 is one hell of a phone! It's compact, fast, its screen is bright and accurate, the battery life is super solid, and the fast charging will put a smile on your face. The camera system is also pretty decent, not at the level of the bigger brother, the Xiaomi 14 Ultra, but still on par with direct competitors such as the Galaxy S24 and the iPhone 15 (adding a dedicated zoom lens to the equation too).

So, what are the drawbacks? First, the price. The phone isn't cheap at 999 euros. Pricewise it's actually closer to the iPhone 15 Pro, and the Galaxy S24 Plus than to their respected vanilla versions. The other thing is the availability of the phone. Even though its officially a global model, getting one in the US will be a difficult endeavor. 

 

But if you're sick and tired of the same old Samsung and Apple duopoly, and want to try something rather different, the Xiaomi 14 is a great choice. An expensive choice, for sure, but great nonetheless.