Xiaomi 17T Pro review: a fantastic phone, but is it a sensible choice?

Our experiences with the Xiaomi 17T Pro

In May, DroidApp travelled to Vienna to attend Xiaomi’s press conference. The new Xiaomi 17T series took centre stage in the Austrian city. This was striking, given that the Xiaomi 15T series had only been announced in Munich at the end of last year. Nevertheless, Xiaomi felt it was already time for a successor.

According to Xiaomi, the release schedule has been adjusted so that the European launch coincides with that in China. It is not uncommon for devices to be released first in China, only to appear in Europe months later. With the 17T series, that is no longer the case. The series consists of the Xiaomi 17T and the Xiaomi 17T Pro. We’ve been testing the latter extensively over the past few weeks. You can read what we think of it in this review.

Unboxing

Inside the phone’s white packaging, we find the SIM ejector pin, some paperwork and a USB-C data cable. Naturally, you’ll want to start playing around with your phone as soon as it arrives, so a (plastic) screen protector is already attached to the screen and a silicone case is included.

Design and interface

In our Xiaomi 15T Pro review from last autumn, we were already very enthusiastic about that smartphone. Now the question is, can its successor pull off the same feat? In terms of design, at least, it’s already scoring points with us. If you’ve had enough of white or black smartphones, Xiaomi offers a number of other colours to choose from. For example, one with a purple-to-black gradient, or a blue one. And it’s the latter that we have here in the editorial office for this review. Personally, we think this deep blue colour is really cool, and it looks great. The Pro is quite a large device, which makes operating it with one hand a bit trickier.

The left and top edges of the Xiaomi 17T Pro are left uncluttered. On the right-hand side, you’ll find the power button and the volume key. At the bottom, there’s space for the USB-C port, as well as the speakers and the SIM slot. The camera module houses three lenses in a slightly raised camera island. The Xiaomi 17T Pro looks like a genuine premium phone and is also IP68-certified, making it dust- and water-resistant.

Xiaomi has equipped the 17T Pro with a 6.83-inch 144Hz display. This AMOLED panel offers a resolution of 2772 x 1280 pixels. On sunny days, the screen is perfectly legible. In the early morning and late evening, the screen can be dimmed sufficiently to ensure comfortable viewing. You can also opt for a special mode that adds an orange tint to the screen, making it gentler on the eyes. The in-display fingerprint scanner responds quickly and accurately.

Interface

If you’re already used to a Xiaomi phone, the interface won’t be a world of difference. If you’re switching from another brand, it will take a bit of getting used to. The device runs Android 16 with Xiaomi’s own HyperOS skin. This skin has been continuously improved over recent years and works well in everyday use. HyperOS offers various customisation options that you can have great fun with. These include an Always-On Display, illuminated screen edges for notifications and, of course, various options for the lock screen.

You can swipe down from the top-left corner to access notifications, whilst swiping down from the top-right corner takes you to the quick settings. Unfortunately, Xiaomi doesn’t let you revert to the old layout, where these two features were combined. On the side of the bar, you can opt for the sidebar with quick access to various apps. You can also open an app as a floating window over another app.

Communication and multimedia

Although a lot of communication these days is ‘app-based’, making phone calls is still very important to many users. Xiaomi has equipped the 17T Pro with two physical SIM card slots. The smartphone also supports eSIM. If you opt for this, you won’t be able to insert a second physical SIM card.

Call quality is good and we didn’t encounter any issues whilst making calls. In addition to Wi-Fi, you can of course use 5G, Bluetooth and similar technologies. Here too, we didn’t notice any glitches, so it performs exactly as you’d expect. The Xiaomi 17T Pro supports up to Wi-Fi 7. It also features Bluetooth 6.0. You can browse the internet using Xiaomi’s own browser, which comes pre-installed on the device. But of course, you can also use Chrome or any other web browser for this.

Camera

Where Xiaomi aims to stand out from its competitors is the camera. And Xiaomi has really gone all out on this. You get three lenses, arranged as follows: a 50-megapixel main camera, a 12-megapixel wide-angle lens and a 50-megapixel periscope telephoto lens. The latter lens allows you to zoom in 5x. There’s also a 32-megapixel selfie camera.

For the camera, Xiaomi has once again teamed up with Leica. Among other things, this gives you the option to choose different styles. You can opt for ‘Leica Authentic’ for more authentic colours in your photos, or ‘Leica Vibrant’ for greater saturation. What’s more, with Leica Live Moment, you’ll never miss a moment again, as the seconds leading up to the photo are also captured. We’re familiar with this feature from more expensive handsets and, for example, the iPhone.

But what about the photo quality? You can view the photos you’ve taken straight away in Xiaomi’s comprehensive gallery app. The photos are very vibrant and saturated. The photo quality on the Xiaomi 17T Pro is really top-notch, just as we’ve come to expect from the manufacturer. The photos have rich colours, are sharp and generally have good detail. Zooming in works well too, although it’s sometimes important to hold the phone even more steady than you normally would, as we occasionally notice a slight blur. As well as 5x zoom, you can also use 10x zoom. In the latter case, the phone utilises both digital and optical zoom, combined with AI.

In low light, the photo quality is also excellent. It’s best to avoid zooming in under these conditions, however. The quality deteriorates in such conditions. The wide-angle lens takes reasonable photos, although the edges aren’t sharp (as is often the case with this type of lens). But overall, Xiaomi once again offers a rock-solid camera with the 17T Pro. You can view the photos we took with the smartphone in the digital photo album.

17T vs 17T Pro

What’s striking is that the camera on the Xiaomi 17T Pro is virtually identical to that of the Xiaomi 17T. We took a few photos with both devices and compared the camera quality. What about the differences between the two models?

In the photo taken by the ditch, we can see quite significant differences. For instance, we can see the red estate car on the other side of the water. The red colour is less pronounced on the 17T, whilst on the 17T Pro it is a bright red. The colours are more saturated on the Pro model and the overall image looks sharper. The 17T Pro is often just that little bit sharper, which we can also see in the photo of the heron. But this is particularly noticeable if you have something to compare it with, as the standard 17T certainly doesn’t take bad photos. Furthermore, we find the sky in the second photo (of the cycle path) looks just a little nicer on the 17T.

Video camera

The Xiaomi 17T Pro’s video camera lets you capture excellent videos, as you can see below. You can choose to film in 8K, or at a lower resolution. Footage is sharp and, depending on the recording modes selected, you can use the different lenses whilst filming. We shot the video below in Vienna, filmed in 1080p at 60fps.

Performance and battery life

The Xiaomi 17T Pro is equipped with the powerful MediaTek Dimensity 9500 processor. Whilst MediaTek had a negative reputation years ago, the Taiwanese company now enjoys a good reputation. The Xiaomi performs tasks at lightning speed, and we haven’t noticed any glitches or so-called lag over the past few weeks. It also doesn’t overheat. The Xiaomi 17T Pro always comes with 12GB of RAM. You can choose between 256GB, 512GB or 1TB of storage.

Battery

Thanks to the 7000mAh battery, you’ll have little to worry about in terms of battery life in practice. The smartphone is equipped with a massive battery, with a capacity of 7000 mAh. You can charge this battery at 100W via a cable or at 50W wirelessly.

In practice, the Xiaomi’s battery life is more than adequate. A screen-on time of between 6 and 8 hours is certainly achievable with more intensive use. A full day of intensive use is no problem at all, and if you use the device less frequently, it will last even longer.

Update policy

The Xiaomi 17T Pro can expect the necessary updates in the near future. In total, the device will receive five Android upgrades and six years of security updates. That’s decent for this price; although Samsung and Google provide seven years of updates for their devices in this price range.

Verdict

With the Xiaomi 15T Pro, we saw that you really don’t necessarily have to go for the most expensive flagship to get a good camera and good battery life. The Xiaomi 17T Pro easily pulls off the same feat, and has the added bonus of being available in attractive colours. The screen is good and you’ll receive updates for long enough.

However, at the time of writing, the Xiaomi 17T is 150 euros cheaper. And that phone also offers the 5x zoom camera, the same update policy and good battery life. If you’re looking for a smartphone with an excellent camera, long battery life and a premium look and feel, the Xiaomi 17T Pro is an excellent choice. However, the cheaper Xiaomi 17T is so well-rounded that the extra cost of the Pro won’t be worth it for everyone.

Whichever one you choose, the Xiaomi 17T Pro is 200 euros cheaper at Mobiel and Belsimpel until the end of this month. You’ll also find offers at Coolblue, Bol.com and MediaMarkt.

If you’re thinking of going for the Xiaomi 17T, you can also get a 200-euro discount on it. That model is available at Mobiel and Belsimpel with this great discount. You can also find it at Coolblue, MediaMarkt and Bol.com.