Xiaomi 14 Ultra hands-on

As promised, the Xiaomi 14 Ultra made an appearance at the MWC 2024 show floor, marking its official entrance on the global stage. We had the opportunity to spend some time with the Xiaomi 14 Ultra at the event and have some initial impressions to share.

First, let's talk about dimensions. The Xiaomi 14 Ultra is a hefty device; no two ways about it. It has a large 6.73-inch display and an ample 5,000 mAh battery. There's also a big vapor chamber (3x larger) on the inside to cool the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset. Add the impressive camera setup to the mix, and it all adds up to a 161.4 x 75.3 x 9.2 mm body size that weighs a fraction under 230 g.

The Xiaomi 14 Ultra comes in three different colors in its standard version. Two of these have faux leather on the back in either black or white and tip the scale at 224.4 grams. The third blue color has what Xiaomi calls Dragon Crystal on the back, and it's heavier at 229.5g. Finally, there's a Titanium Special Edition that's 229.6g, but that one is not leaving China.

Xiaomi 14 Ultra

We got to handle a black unit at the event and can confirm that it feels quite heavy. Dense and quite reassuringly rigid, too. It's not necessarily that bulky or hard to handle, though, since Xiaomi did a great job with the device's body. The corners of the middle frame are nice and rounded, and so is the backside. It fits very snugly in the hand.

The faux leather material is also very high-quality. It won't fool anybody it's actual leather, but that doesn't take away from its premium feel. The texture pattern is fine and non-intrusive. Xiaomi also says that the material should be more tear-resistant in this generation.

Moving to the display, which appears unchanged from the previous generation on paper. It is still a 6.73-inch 1440x3200px LTPO AMOLED panel with 120 Hz max refresh rate, Dolby Vision and HDR10+ support. The panel is a bit brighter at 3,000 nits (compared to 2,600 nits). The protective surface of the display is new this year. Xiaomi is using something called Shield Glass. It claims to offer ten times higher drop resistance and is also clearer.

Xiaomi calls it an All Around Liquid display, and we can definitely see why. Not only is the display slightly curved at both the sides and the top and bottom, but the very edges are also finely curved. We personally like the look, and the ergonomics work well in our opinion.

Xiaomi 14 Ultra

The most instantly recognizable part of the Xiaomi 14 Ultra is undoubtedly its large circular camera island. Gone is the abruptly raised frame around the old camera island - the 14 Ultra's lens-like module on the back gently slopes above its surrounding back panel. Even so, it is large and protrudes quite a bit from the phone's backside.

Unfortunately, we have no photo samples to show you at the moment. We should reiterate some of the impressive specs, though. Xiaomi kept the quad 50MP 0.5x + 1x + 3.2x + 5x formula intact and mostly kept the hardware. The main camera is still a 1-inch type sensor, but it's the latest Sony LYT-900 imager with a better design and faster readout. It has a variable aperture that is now wider at the bright end, switching between f/1.63 and f/4.0. That should let in 136% more light than the Xiaomi 13 Ultra. We saw a quick demo of the variable aperture and can say that is supports multiple fine steps that switch quite smoothly (even though Xiaomi calls it stepless).

Xiaomi 14 Ultra

There's a duo of telephoto cameras: a 3.2x 75mm f/1.8 regular one and 5x 120mm f/2.5 periscope, sharing the same 1/2.5-inch Sony IMX858 sensor with the 12mm f/1.8 ultrawide. The 120mm periscope got a bump from an f/3.0 lens to a brighter f/2.5 one. What's more impressive is the minimum focusing distance of both zooms - the 75mm can shoot as close as 10cm, while the 120mm focuses from 30cm.

The Xiaomi 14 Ultra runs Android 14 with Xiaomi HyperOS on top. The new OS skin is very similar to MIUI, with a few small visual and even fewer functional changes sprinkled in here and there. We will definitely get into the weeds of it in our full review.

The Xiaomi 14 Ultra is available in Blue, Black, and White and costs €1,499 for its solitary 16 GB/512 GB version.

Unfortunately, we didn't get to see the new upgraded Photography Kit accessory for the Xiaomi 14 Ultra, sold for €199. We do know that the camera grip has its own 1,500mAh battery and Bluetooth-enabled camera controls, but we'll try and include it in our full review once the Xiaomi 14 Ultra makes its way to our office.