Xiaomi 12 launch live: catch up on Xiaomi's new phones, watches and earbuds

Welcome to our Xiaomi 12 live blog. We’ve got a few hours to go until it kicks off, but we can use this time to look through all our expectations.

Here's the usual schedule for one of these things:

We'll share some expectations and analysis for a few hours.

Just before the event starts, the brand will likely kick of some pre-show sizzle reel footage that might tease what's coming - or it could just be a load of adverts for existing products.

The show will likely go on for 60 to 90 minutes, unless Xiaomi wows us with loads of tech. That's unlikely though - even Apple's event last week lasted less than an hour, and there was loads there.

Once the event finishes, we'll share any extra analysis, especially on extra tech they show off that surprises us. If we get any reviews, we'll also share them here.

Let’s look first at the Xiaomi 12, the ‘vanilla’ phone in the series.

This has a 6.3-inch FHD+ 120Hz screen, three rear cameras with a 50MP main, 13MP ultra-wide and 5MP telemacro snapper, a 4,500mAh battery, 67W wired and 50W wireless charging, and a Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset.

So it sounds like a feature-packed flagship phone, though one that’s surprisingly small given Xiaomi’s usually-giant mobiles. That’s if the international version is the same as the global variant, a fact we’ll have to see about.

We like the design, especially of the pastel-looking colors. It looks relatively understated compared to some other Xiaomi mobiles we’ve seen.

The Xiaomi 12 is an interesting one, because it's a lot more compact than previous main-series Xiaomi phones we've seen.

If we had to make a guess, we'd say Xiaomi is trying to rival the Galaxy S22 series here. The vanilla phone in Samsung's S line is always quite compact at around 6.1-inches, while the Plus model is bigger (and the Ultra model has top specs).

The smaller, spec-heavy option is great for people who want a top-end phone but don't have huge mitts.

That is, of course, if the Xiaomi 12 does launch in the West - there's an outside chance Xiaomi could opt to release an odd combination of phones, like the 12X and 12 Pro, but not the vanilla one.

Before you recoil, thinking that's weird and unlikely, there is a history of Chinese brands releasing Pro phones but not standard ones. That's happening with the OnePlus 10 Pro, for example.

It'd be a weird choice though, so we hope it's not the case.

Next up the Xiaomi 12X.

This is very similar to the standard Xiaomi 12, and we expect that’s why this isn’t called the 12 Lite - that implies it’s a more budget alternative than it actually is.

In most ways the specs are the same, and the two variants are that the edges of the screen aren’t curved, and the chipset is only the Snapdragon 870 (which is powerful, but not as powerful as the 8 Gen 1).

In China it’s a little bit cheaper than the Xiaomi 12, but not by a dramatic margin - it’s more like a mid-range alternative than a genuinely cheap version. Also, we don’t really see X variants launch globally, so we’re not sure if this one will or not.

This isn’t fully a ‘Lite’ version of the Xiaomi 12, because its specs have too much in common with the main phone to be a real budget alternative.

But for people who don’t like curved-edge screens, or don’t need the top-top-top processing power (which, honestly, is most people) this will be a better phone.

Oh - we might see a Xiaomi 12 Lite too. It's not likely, but not impossible.

Finally, the Xiaomi 12 Pro.

This is a big flashy flagship phone, and it looks like the true successor to the Xiaomi Mi 11. It has three 50MP rear cameras, a 6.7-inch 2K 120Hz screen, a 4,600mAh battery with 120W wired and 50W wireless powering, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset and a 32MP front camera.

So it sounds like a super-spec extravaganza, which likely won’t be cheap - in fact, it sounds as much like a successor to the Xiaomi Mi 11 Ultra in the camera department.

We hope this launches, as that camera combination sounds incredible, but if it does it definitely won’t be cheap.

We’re most excited to test out the Xiaomi 12 Pro - we enjoyed the cameras of the Mi 11 Ultra and these sound even better. Plus, it doesn’t have that phone’s silly camera bump.

Most interesting could be the price - if this launches for a sub-$1,000 / £1,000 price, it could be an incredible rival to similar handsets from OnePlus, Oppo and Samsung.

That smartwatch we mentioned is the Xiaomi Watch S1 Active, the company itself has confirmed, though details are light on the ground.

We’ve seen some teasers which show… straps. Oh, and another which shows two crowns. Yeah, that’s not exactly a huge reveal.

Expect the launch event to bring loads more details. Or any details, for that matter. We’re expecting another sports-focused affordable smartwatch but that’s based on Xiaomi’s track record for wearables.

Xiaomi's live stream has started, but it's just a teaser video for the event which we saw earlier, that you can see below:

But we’re not exactly sure what to take from it. At time code 0:13 you can see three circles, each with a piece of information - from left to right we see two viewfinder frames out of alignment (which probably points to image stabilization), a moon and an eye (Night Mode, no doubt) and two small circles next to a large one (this is what the Xiaomi 12 camera layout looks like).

Two mintes until it starts - time for the quickest coffee in the world.

And I'm back - made the coffee in less than 90 seconds.

And we're off.

...and we're straight into the usual guff where the brand giving a presentation talks about itself for a while.

Now they're going through some of 2021's devices:

Most of these never went on sale globally.

They've 'officially' named the phone - though the stream title 'Xiaomi 12 Series Global Launch' kinda gave it away.

They have said that there are only two phones though - we reckon it's the 12X that's been dropped.

We're looking at the Xiaomi 12 design first - there's a purple (pictured), black and blue version - the latter looks like the Mi 11.

They're justifying some of the design decisions of the phone like the main camera ring, wavy speaker grilles and curvy design, but most of it feels like marketing guff.

We've been watching a video that was filmed on a Xiaomi 12 model, which is a showcase for a camera focusing thing called ProFocus which recognizes subjects and tracks them when you're shooting a video.

Apparently ProFocus also works on photo, so you can blast away at that shutter button and rely on a subject staying in focus even when they're moving.

It sounds like an interesting feature for certain uses, like people who photograph sports events.

Here are the cameras on the Xiaomi 12 - the company is going through camera samples on the phone, with lots of portrait and night shots.

We're already onto the display - this is a quick event. Apparently it has Xiaomi's most colorful in a display yet - does that mean better than the Pro? 68 billion colors apparently.

It's a 6.28-inch screen with a punch-hole cut-out.

Xiaomi has confirmed that the new phone has the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1.

This is a top-end Android processing which is very powerful, and we've tested it on a few phones so far.

It does heat up really easily under pressure, though.

Apparently the Xiaomi 12 can let you connect to multiple cell networks at once (and it's a 5G phone). That should be really useful for people who live in 5G areas, as they can be very hit-and-miss.

We're hearing some power spec: 67W wired and 50W wireless, sounds good. There's a 4,500mAh battery.

Apparently there's also a smart charging feature here that analyzes your sleep habits and alarms, to charge slowly overnight so you don't spend ages overcharging. That sounds pretty useful for ensuring the phone lasts for longer.

The Xiaomi 12 is a wrap, and we're just seeing a sizzle reel for it. Now to find out if the other handset is the Pro or X.

Oh, they've given the Xiaomi 12 price at $749. The phone likely won't go on sale in the US, so that price is likely just a reference figure.

And we've moved onto the Xiaomi 12 Pro.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro looks rather similar to the standard model, honestly. It's bigger though.

We've seen a video shot on the Xiaomi 12 Pro, and it looked good in some scenes, but a little green-screeny in others. Still, for a smartphone film it looked great.

We also had the director break down why he used the different rear cameras for different shots.

Here are the Xiaomi 12 Pro's rear cameras. That's 150MP total, 138MP more than the new iPhone SE.

And here's the display specs - the handset sounds great, like a true Xiaomi Mi 11 successor. There's also a 1500 nits max brightness and 120Hz refresh rate.

Ooh - the Xiaomi 12 Pro has four surround speakers. That's novel. Music should sound great.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro is the company's first top-end phone with 120W charging - that's 18 minutes to power it completely full, apparenlty. 

The company said that's the time it takes to meditate but you can probably do other things in that time instead.

They didn't actually say the battery capacity though, unless we missed it.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro price is $999 - again, the phone likely won't actually sell in the US, but it's an easy reference cost.

Xiaomi has pledged to three years of Android updates and four years of security updates to these new phones.

Oh, and they're talking about the Xiaomi 12X - it'll cost $649. Wow, they said about a single sentence about the phone - we guess it's not as important a device to Xiaomi.

Next: Xiaomi Buds 3T Pro.

These are some true wireless earbuds that you can see pictured above. They've got up to 40db active noise canceling with a few different modes depending on where you are. There are transparency modes too so you can hear people when you're listening to music.

There's also something called Dimensional Audio Quality here, which sounds like a faux-surround-sound feature.

Oh, those are some expensive buds: $199.

Now we're looking at two Xiaomi smartwatches: the Watch S1 and Watch S1 Active. It seems that Xiaomi is breaking up its watches like how Samsung used to, with a standard 'classical' looking, and a sports-focused, version.

The Xiaomi Watch S1 Active has a 1.43-inch AMOLED screen. It comes in white, blue and black, and you can mix and match which body and strap go with which.

There are 117 fitness modes apparently, though we presume they're not all that in-depth.

There are 19 'professional' modes, which apparently does give you lots of metrics for certain sports. Tennis was named as one of them.

The Active comes with these as well as Bluetooth calling, NFC, Alexa compatibility, 

Oh, and the Active has a 12-day battery life and built-in GPS. 

It'll cost $199, so it's not as cheap as other wearables from the brand.

The standard Xiaomi Watch S1 has a more traditional-looking watch design.

It has the same screen as the Active but with a more ruggedly-built case, with a leather and a fluororubber strap (both come in the box).

Feature-wise it sounds exactly the same as the Active, except it also has wireless charging. It's only the design that's slightly tweaked.

It's very expensive at $269.

And that's a wrap on the Xiaomi 12 event. But if you can wait just a few more minutes, we've got something else to share.

And here it is, our early Xiaomi 12 review.

We found it a cute little phone, and its smaller form factor compared to its predecessors and siblings makes it easy to use and hold in the hand.

Saying that, it's a bit of a spec drop from those handsets in a few ways, particularly the display and cameras. Also, it's not as cheap as we'd have liked for it to be incredibly competitive.

Expect a full review in the coming weeks.

And here's our Xiaomi 12 Pro review - this is a full review, after extensive testing.

We loved the phone's design, screen and charging speed - in fact, we gave it 4.5 stars out of 5 for its score. However we weren't too keen on its limited camera zoom, and found its software bloatware and lack of an IP rating less than stellar either.

Still, that's a really high review that sits firmly in our 'recommended' pile.

So what did we see at the event?

• Xiaomi 12
• Xiaomi 12 Pro
• Xiaomi 12X
• Xiaomi Buds 3T Pro
• Xiaomi Watch S1
• Xiaomi Watch S1 Active

Let's go through them one at a time (over an hour or so, so I can have lunch)...

First, the Xiaomi 12.

• 6.28-inch OLED FHD+ 120Hz screen
• 50MP main + 5MP telemacro + 13MP ultrawide + 32MP selfie
• 4,500mAh, 67W wired + 50W wireless charging
• Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset, 8GB or 12GB RAM
• Android 12 with MIUI 13 laid over the top

Next up the fancier Xiaomi 12 Pro.

• 6.73-inch AMOLED WQHD+ 120Hz screen
• 50MP main + 50MP telephoto + 50MP ultrawide + 32MP selfie
• 4,600mAh, 12W wired + 50W wireless charging
• Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 chipset, 8GB or 12GB RAM
• Android 12 with MIUI 13 laid over the top

The third phone is the Xiaomi 12X.

• 6.28-inch OLED FHD+ 120Hz screen
• 50MP main + 5MP telemacro + 13MP ultrawide + 32MP selfie
• 4,500mAh, 67W wired + 50W wireless charging
• Snapdragon 870, 8GB or 12GB RAM
• Android 12 with MIUI 13 laid over the top

Here are the prices for the three phones we've just looked at - we'll include conversions, but exact prices in these regions might be different.

Xiaomi 12X: $649 (about £500, AU$900)

Xiaomi 12: $749 (about £570, AU$1,030)

Xiaomi 12 Pro: $999 (about £760, AU$1,360)

Now onto the Xiaomi Buds 3T Pro:

• Multiple noise canceling and transparency modes
• Surround sound audio
• 24 hour battery life for case, 6 hour per bud
• 70 minute charging time with USB-C
• Wireless charging

Now we move onto the Xiaomi Watch S1

• 1.43-inch AMOLED screen
• Leather and fluororubber straps
• 117 fitness modes, 19 of them are in-depth ones
• Health tools like sleep and heart rate tracking
• 12-day battery life with wireless charging

Finally the Xiaomi Watch S1 Active. Notice the italicized parts - those are the differences between the Active and normal watches.

• 1.43-inch AMOLED screen
• Fluororubber straps, no leather
• 117 fitness modes, 19 of them are in-depth ones
• Health tools like sleep and heart rate tracking
• 12-day battery life without wireless charging

And the prices an all of those?

• Xiaomi Buds 3T Pro: $199 (about £150, AU$280)
• Xiaomi Watch S1: $269 (about £210, AU$370)
• XiaomI Watch S1 Active: $199 (about £150, AU$280)

We're intrigued by the new Xiaomi smartwatches.

The company made a name for itself in the mobile area with competitively-priced mid-rangers, before advancing into the premium sector, and it seems to have done the same for watches - these are some of its priciest wearables ever.

The feature-set seems similar to on Xiaomi's cheap smartwatches, so we'll have to test these watches out to see if they're worth their high prices.