TechRadar Verdict
The Xiaomi Mi Body Composition Scale 2 can let you know everything from your weight and muscle mass to your visceral fat level and metabolic age, and yet it's incredibly simple to set up and use. Unless you download Xiaomi’s Mi Fit app you’d never know how comprehensive it is, with only your current weight visible on the scale itself. Connected via Bluetooth to a phone, the Mi Body Composition Scale 2 gives accurate and consistent data and best of all, doesn’t beep, flash or display unwanted information.
Pros
- +
Sturdy and steady
- +
Minimalist design
- +
Simple to use
- +
Can use without an app
- +
Low price
Cons
- -
Uses 4x AAA batteries
- -
Basic display
- -
Doesn’t measure heart rate
- -
No Wi-Fi
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Two-minute review
The best smart scales shouldn’t be complicated. However smart it seems on paper, the Mi Body Composition Scale 2 from Chinese brand Xiaomi is all about minimalism. It doesn’t look much and, to the lay user, nor does it do much. In fact, unless you’ve downloaded Xiaomi’s Mi Fit app, you could be forgiven for thinking that the Mi Body Composition Scale 2 is just a digital scale of the kind that has been around for decades.
However, there’s a lot going on under its tempered glass hood. Not to be confused with the simpler Xiaomi Mi Smart Scale 2, the Mi Body Composition Scale 2 uses bioelectrical Impedance Analysis (BIA) to present you with data on your weight, muscle mass, BMI, bone mass, body fat, visceral fat, basal metabolism, water and an overall ‘body score’.
The Mi Fit app deals with all that, presenting easy to read scores and charts, but you don’t have to get involved in any of that. The beauty of the Mi Body Composition Scale 2 is that you can just step on it, see your current weight, and get on with your day. All that’s missing is a heart-rate sensor, but then you’ve probably got a heart rate monitor, fitness tracker or a smartwatch for that.
Price and release date
Originally launched by Xiaomi in 2020, the Xiaomi Mi Body Composition Scale 2 is a follow-up to the original Mi Body Composition Scale from 2018. It’s available from the Mi website for £24.99 (about $35 / AU$50), and at a lower price from third-party retailers.
Be sure to look for the Xiaomi Mi Body Composition Scale 2 (model number 2XMTZC05HM) and not the Xiaomi Mi Smart Scale 2, which is a slightly different product.
Design
- Minimalist design
- Weighs 1.7kg
- Uses 4x AAA batteries
The Mi Body Composition Scale 2 is all about minimalism. Covered in reinforced glass, its 300 x 300 x 25mm chassis has rounded corners and is shiny, but doesn’t attract fingerprints. Its sensible, simple design continues with a large – but not massive – LED display up the top that displays your weight, and only your weight, in white characters. When it’s not doing that, it’s completely invisible. In the centre of the product is a ‘Mi’ logo, and at each corner are steel sensors.
The scale communicates with a smartphone via Bluetooth 5.0 and is powered by four AAA batteries, which are included in the box alongside an instruction manual in Chinese characters. We would have preferred a built-in battery, though Xiaomi suggests they’ll power the Mi Body Composition Scale 2 for about 12 months.
Performance
- Well weighted and steady
- High-precision pressure sensors
- Measures your balance, but not heart rate
The Mi Body Composition Scale 2 is all about its high-precision pressure sensors. Step on to them and your weight is shown within a second, and if you try to weigh yourself a few minutes later you’ll get exactly the same weight.
Crucially, the Mi Body Composition Scale 2 doesn’t move when you put one foot on it, unlike some much smarter scales that overlook the basics. However, you do need to remove your socks to get anything other than your weight; the scale needs skin contact to get body composition data.
You can also get a score of your balance by standing on the scale on one leg for a few seconds.
What it does lack is Wi-Fi, but that's less of an issue than it might sound. A lot of bathrooms suffer from a weak wireless signal (after all, no one ever puts a router router by the toilet), so the Mi Body Composition Scale 2 using Bluetooth to communicate with a smartphone makes a lot of sense.
Companion app
- Simple, clear figures and charts
- Calculates body age and ideal weight
- Syncs with Apple Health, Google Fit and Samsung Health
Though you can just use the Mi Smart Scale 2 as a digital scale that displays your weight, there’s a lot more going on under the hood that is only revealed if you use it to funnel data into the Mi Fit app. Each time you weigh yourself, it takes a host of measurements and sends it all to the Mi Fit app via Bluetooth, which then uploads it all to the cloud. It then syncs with Apple Health, Google Fit and Samsung Health.
Although the Mi Fit app also includes things like walks, runs, calories used etc, you can just use it to track your weight. There’s plenty of bioelectrical impedance analysis here, including body fat, muscle, protein, water, bone mass, visceral fat and a score for your basal metabolic rate (the number of calories required to keep your body functioning at rest).
It also offers your body age and your ideal weight (based on your height, age and BMI, “so you don’t have to lose weight recklessly and become excessively thin for the sake of aesthetics” according to Xiaomi. To get that kind of analysis you must tell the app your gender, date of birth and height.
First reviewed September 2021
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