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Xiaomi Mi Max 3 revealed: Who says a 5,500mAh battery takes long to charge?
- Xiaomi has unveiled the Mi Max 3, offering a Snapdragon 636 processor, up to 6GB of RAM, and up to 128GB of storage.
- The new device has a 5,500mAh battery that should hit 71 percent capacity after an hour of charging.
- The phablet has a starting price of ~$252 for the 4GB/64GB model.
After months of leaks, Xiaomi has finally revealed the Mi Max 3 at an event in China. The company has previously given us a drip feed of information, but there’s plenty more to know about the device.
For starters, the phablet has a Snapdragon 636 processor, which is a significant upgrade over the Mi Max 2’s Snapdragon 625 chipset. In fact, Qualcomm says the Snapdragon 636’s CPU cores have up to 40 percent better performance than the Snapdragon 630 (which launched after the Snapdragon 625).
Toss in 4GB to 6GB of RAM and 64GB to 128GB of expandable storage, and you’ve got a solid upgrade in core specs over last year’s device.
A huge, fast-charging battery
It wouldn’t be a Mi Max device without a large screen and big battery though, so we’re glad to see a 6.9-inch full HD+ (18:9) display and 5,500mAh battery here.
The latter is about 200mAh bigger than the 2017 phablet, but the Mi Max 3 is able to hit 71 percent capacity in just an hour of charging. This makes for a fantastic figure if confirmed in testing, given the sheer size of the phablet’s battery.
We expect the Mi Max 3 to slow down to a trickle as it approaches 100 percent capacity, as is the case with other fast-charging phones. But we hope it follows in the Mi Max 2’s footsteps and hits 100 percent in just under two hours. Nevertheless, the fact that an hour of charging can potentially give you two days of juice is rather impressive.
In the photography arena, Xiaomi has adopted a 12MP+5MP dual camera setup (1.4 micron pixels, f/1.9 aperture) for the rear. Much like other recent Xiaomi devices, the Mi Max 3 sports a portrait mode as well as AI-powered scene recognition. The latter feature will be available via a system update, though.
In the selfie department, the Mi Max 3 offers an 8MP f/2.0 camera (1.12 micron pixels), which is also used for basic face unlocking. There’s no 3D face unlock here then, but it might be a solid alternative to the rear fingerprint scanner, given the sheer size of the device.
Other noteworthy features include Bluetooth 5.0, an infrared blaster, USB Type-C, a 3.5mm headphone jack, and the ability to charge other devices.
The 4GB/64GB version of the Mi Max 3 is available for 1,699 yuan (~$252), while the 6GB/128GB variant will set you back 1,999 yuan (~$296). The device will be available in black, gold and blue.