Xiaomi 14 review

Upgraded 120Hz LTPO OLED display

The Xiaomi 14 retains the same 6.36-inch diagonal but bumps the resolution to 1200 x 2670px, adds 12-bit color depth support, and is now LTPO, which means more granular refresh rate control for better power savings. Additionally, the panel supports DC dimming to eliminate the flickering for people with sensitive eyes. It's a dedicated switch in the Display menu.

Other premium features such as HDR10+ and Dolby Vision are still on the list, as well as Widevine L1 security level for high-quality video streaming in services like Netflix.

Despite the advertised boost in peak brightness (from 1,900 nits to 3,000 nits), the maximum brightness in auto mode didn't go above 1,175 nits in our testing, just about the same as last year. That's not necessarily bad, though, as the Xiaomi 14's screen boosts enough for comfortable outdoor use and is still rather competitive.

The handset can go up to 497 nits in manual mode and as low as 2.3 nits.

Refresh rate

The new Xiaomi 14 comes with an LTPO OLED panel, which means a more granular refresh rate and better power efficiency in certain tasks. For instance, the software dials down to 10Hz when you are not interacting with the display. It does so very quickly and ramps up to 120Hz when you touch it.

The available modes are three - Default (read Auto), 60Hz and 120Hz. However, while the 60Hz mode keeps the screen's refresh rate static at 60Hz, the 120Hz mode acts exactly like the Default mode.

In any case, we recommend using the Default mode as the software is pretty smart at detecting the content on the screen. It seems to favor 120Hz in all apps we tried, except YouTube, for example, where it will choose the appropriate refresh rate depending on the type of video. It can do 24Hz, 30Hz and 60Hz to match 24fps, 30fps and 60fps videos, respectively.

Battery life

Our new Active Use Score is an estimate of how long the battery will last if you use the device with a mix of all four test activities. You can adjust the calculation based on your usage pattern using the sliders below. You can read about our current battery life testing procedure here. For a comprehensive list of all tested devices so far, head this way.

The Xiaomi 14 now draws power from a slightly larger 4,610 mAh battery, which isn't enough to make a meaningful difference in the overall endurance score. However, the new HyperOS and the supposedly more efficient Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 bundled with an LTPO OLED panel have an impact on battery endurance.

Despite its small size (compact flagships rarely have great battery life), the Xiaomi 14 shows excellent endurance in two categories in particular - web browsing and video playback.

The call test is understandably lower than your average big-screen flagship as battery capacity plays a significant role in screen-off tests. The gaming test result is a bit underwhelming, but the other two screen-on scenarios make up for that.

With an Active Use Score of almost 14 hours, the Xiaomi 14 is among the best in its class.

Charging speed

In the charging race, the Xiaomi 14 with its 90W proprietary charging standard, is clearly the winner with a huge lead over its compact competitors and sits second only to last year's Xiaomi 13 Pro, which has a 120W charger to begin with.

From 0 to 100%, the handset charges in just 35 minutes, while a 15-minute charge may potentially be enough for a full day of use, depending on your use case, of course.

The device also supports 50W fast charging using a proprietary wireless stand wired with the bundled 90W charger.

Reverse wireless charging at 10W is also available.

Speakers - loudness and quality

The Xiaomi 14 packs a hybrid stereo speakers setup - one bottom-facing speaker and one that doubles as an earpiece. The typical issue with this solution is that the main speaker located at the bottom is always considerably louder. However, this isn't the case here. Both speakers are quite loud and almost perfectly balanced.

Xiaomi 14 loudspeakers

Quality-wise, the speakers are great. There is some barely noticeable ringing and distortion at the highest volume level, but the bass is always well-pronounced without muting the vocals, which sound great.

Xiaomi's compact flagship is also adequately loud, earning a "Very Good" loudness score with -25.3 LUFS. This is just as loud as the Galaxy S24 and slightly louder than the iPhone 15.

When it comes to tuning, the Xiaomi 14 sounds a bit more bass-heavy than its competitors, with the Galaxy S24 having more pronounced vocals and the iPhone 15 having the best of both worlds, providing the most balanced sound overall.

Use the Playback controls to listen to the phone sample recordings (best use headphones). We measure the average loudness of the speakers in LUFS. A lower absolute value means a louder sound. A look at the frequency response chart will tell you how far off the ideal "0db" flat line is the reproduction of the bass, treble, and mid frequencies. You can add more phones to compare how they differ. The scores and ratings are not comparable with our older loudspeaker test. Learn more about how we test here.