Damage:
R7999
Technical Specs of the Mi5
- Android
- It features a 5.15-inch 1080p display,
- Snapdragon 820 chipset,
- 16-megapixel rear camera,
- 4-megapixel selfie camera,
- dual-SIM card slots,
- 4G LTE,
- IR Blaster,
- USB Type-C port
As the world’s 5th largest smartphone manufacturer, Xiaomi accounts for 5% of the global smartphone market share. Not bad for a company that was only founded 6 years ago. The Mi 5 is a phone that not everyone knows about, but they should. I got to test out the phone for a few weeks and this is what I thought:
Let’s check the Mi 5 out
The Mi 5 looks great and has a bigger screen than the iPhone 6S. It is light and has all the features you have come to expect from a smartphone. Plus the battery life is amazing.
Let’s have some fun with the Mi 5 camera – what’s my age again?
The Mi 5 has a 16MP rear camera and a 4MP front aka selfie camera. There are some pretty cool built in filters, with interesting names like vivid, yesteryear and Japanese.
When in doubt, add a filterAnother cool feature is the guess your age and gender feature. And no I’m not biased. Thinking I look 7 years younger than I am…
Age 23, female: I love this feature. I just smiled and it said I was 7 years younger than I am.
Duckface: I pulled my best duckface and despite my attempt to look younger, I was still 23.
31 year old female: I thought if I added some wrinkles I’d look older. Apparently I looked my age.
Age 33 and male: it told my SO that he looked 3 years younger than he actually was.
Look, no beard: Take another 2 years off. Without a beard he looks 31 years old.
See Also: Can this website guess your age? Microsoft’s how old.net
Post it art with the Mi 5
Someone was making stop motion videos at work and I thought I’d test out post it stop motion. I had great ambitions to produce a starry night or some such master piece, but it turns out post it art is not that easy. Here’s my version of Space Invaders using the Mi 5.
[Tweet “Space invaders post it art using the Mi 5”]
What I like:
- This phone is fast. The Snapdragon 820’s efficiency lets you play games and have as many apps open without worrying about speed.
- The camera comes with a beauty function and some fun filters. The guess your age and gender function is good for a laugh and I really like it because apparently I look 7 years younger than I am.
- Amazing battery life. While some phones send you into a panic if you don’t pack your charger or a power bank, this battery lasted 2 days.
What I don’t like:
- Even though it has space for two sim cards, your nano sim is no good here.
- It is slippery and the shiny surface slides quite easily, but this is nothing a cover can’t fix.
Gone are the days of a polarizing iPhone vs Samsung world. Cheaper smartphone models are entering the market all the time, and if you are willing to try out a new phone when your upgrade comes around, the Xiaomi Mi 5 is a good alternative for almost half the price.
It will set you back R7999.
Disclaimer: Review unit, Jade tested it and then it went back.
