Global Xiaomi 17 unit first look, coming soon to the Philippines

Confirmed, the Xiaomi 17 and 17 Ultra will be available in the Philippines as well.

This is the new Xiaomi 17

Global Xiaomi 17 official unit first look

Ahead of the global launch on February 28, we were able to check out one of its models—the vanilla version of the Xiaomi 17.

Designed to provide true flagship-level performance with high-quality Leica cameras in a compact size, this handset aims to wow even demanding users without the ultra price tag.

Ice Blue Xiaomi 17

Coming from the Xiaomi 15 last year, the new Xiaomi 17 features a similar yet slightly different design available in Black, Ice Blue, and Alpine Pink colors.

The camera interface

The unit I got to check is in Ice Blue with a fingerprint smudge resistant frosted finish. The back panel is made with glass with a slightly square camera hump. The camera sensors are protruded unlike the Xiaomi 15 with a flat look. The Leica logo and Vario Summilux branding are found in the middle of the island.

Slim for its expected large battery

The frame is aluminum measuring 8.06mm thick. The handset in total is just 191 grams.

The phone has nice curves on the frame making it generally comfortable to hold and not that slippery even without the case.

The overall design is flagship worthy and looks generally expensive.

Slimmer than ever bezels for a more immersive look

In front, the OLED display is still 6.3-inch big. Compact, yet not that small. The bezels are even slimmer at 1.18mm on all sides vs the 1.38mm. This is thanks to its use of an upgraded LIPO display technology.

Refined design, bezels are slimmer than ever

All of the ports, buttons, and antenna are placed on familiar locations. You'll see the SIM slot, primary speaker, Type-C port, and microphone hole below. At right, the user will see the power key and the volume rocker.

Leica cameras

We tried its zoom cameras, particularly the 60mm floating telephoto sensor and are quite nice. It can do high-quality lossless hybrid zooms up to 5x that looks like it was taken with a primary camera.

120mm zoom (5x hybrid)

1x vs 5x zoom

120mm macro, 60mm zoom

The rest of the specs aren't detailed yet (I already know, but I'm still under embargo), but this device will feature the top-of-the-line 3nm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 processor. The global Xiaomi 17 will have some differences from its Chinese counterpart. It ships with HyperOS 3 based on Android 16.

So far, I am intrigued. This might be a really good phone depeding on its pricing and our team is excited to further try the phone in the coming days.

What do you guys think?