XIAOMI 13 Review – Compact Sized Flagship

The Xiaomi 13 is one of the latest from Xiaomi’s latest 2023 lineup but by now most must have know that Xiaomi actually announce it very late last year in China. We did an unboxing so you can check it out as below.

Who is this for ?

This is a phone meant for someone who wanted a compact size device in your hand, with great amount of camera capability and a flagship processor built into it. This is also suitable for those demanding for smooth multimedia experience which you can take advantage over fast readiness for 5G with good WiFi hardware inside.

Design – Compact form factor that is easy in the pocket

The Xiaomi 13 comes in at about 189 grams and crammed into a 6.36 inch form factor with 71.5mm slim body, a size that is so easy on the pocket or your handbag which you almost dont even feel it as other phones getting larger, but if you wish to get one with a larger size, there is always a choice, which is the Xiaomi 13 Pro. Now back to this one, the Xiaomi 13 is built with Gorilla Glass 5 protection in front with aluminum body all around as a frame and of course, the back of the phone is also made with a durable glass material that comes in different colors, namely the white, black and flora green.

Overall the design does look blocky but the experience is, you get a very handy, steady holding phone when operating with it, which is still among the handiest compact flagship you can get in the market now.

Display and Audio – Small but still mighty on this part

Small does not mean a bad thing, and Xiaomi proves it with an inclusion of a 6.36 inch E6 AMOLED display that is capable of render up to 120 frames per second. This brings further to the point that it covers almost 90% screen to body ratio that inherits lesser bezels making all the space to navigate smoothly over your day to day usage. It incorporates the AdaptiveSync over the display which means that frames can go low on less intensive apps making it saving every energy it gets to give users a longer battery life. Apart from that using it under bright environment is no issue thanks to the peak brightness that can go as high as 1900nits. HDR10+ and Dolby Vision is present that complements the whole premium display standard which gave good color range and definition whether its a streaming you are enjoying over or just quickly viewing a few photos that you captured.

While the screen packs alot to it, the same can be said over the speakers, and yes it is a stereo speaker, one on the earpiece and another is a bottom firing one, both combined gave a quite loud audio that covers small room range, and its quite clear too when we tested with a few genre of music and vocals, dont expect to get heavy bass but it is a good one. HiRes Audio is and HiRes Audio Wireless are supported with Dolby Audio that includes equalizer options and enhancements to it. I am very sure that there is a setting for everyone so your mileage may vary depending on your listening settings that suits your ears.

Camera – Leica is there, with modes you can play around.

Rear Camera : 50 MP, f/1.8, 23mm (wide), 1/1.49″, 1.0µm, PDAF, OIS
10 MP, f/2.0, 75mm (telephoto), 1/3.75″, 1.0µm, PDAF, OIS, 3.2x optical zoom
12 MP, f/2.2, 15mm, 120˚ (ultrawide), 1/3.06″, 1.12µm

Front Camera : 32 MP, f/2.0, 22mm (wide), 0.7µm

Now there is quite alot you can do with the camera, let me just start with the rear camera experience, the megapixels is not the most crucial thing here, rather we look at quality it can get with the combination of the rear lenses. During day time, the shots came out as good as it can get, with clear visible objects and good dynamic range all around it, even zooming will still give you tons of details. Indoor shots with brightness is proven not an issue also, with even better clarity since the surrounding is well lit and colors sometimes, can look softer than others, however retaking shots or maybe future software update may solve or improve the performance for this part.

Evening and night shots however still hold up and to a certain point, moving objects can be captured too even taking the pictures in automatic mode and zoomed in, which is kinda shows that the combination of the rear camera is formidable as it claims to be, and well ideal even further if you are a fan of shooting scenes, this is one of the phone can you can seriously consider to use along it.

One mode that is fun to play is the the Supermoon mode, which allows you to shoot images of the moon, while this mode works for the Xiaomi 13, compared to its competition, more will need to be refined over the AI software and this can be further improved as well with software updates that can further identify better via AI and zooming in algorithm. Currently I would say it is good enough as most of the higher end flagship still missing this mode. Will this be a norm moving forward for the competitions? I would say yes, slowly but surely.

Now tons of camera mode, but we will highlight a few, the most signification ones are the Leica Authentic and Leica Vibrant. To put it in a simple terms possible, Authentic mode brings in the classic tone on the images capture while Vibrant applies deeper but brighter colors which is more vivid with some sharpening applied. This also works over video capture as well.

How about the front camera? Well it is business as usual, with wide angle support, HDR and portrait, a common mode you could get on smartphones today and no Leica modes on the selfie, as this is so far only for the rear sets of camera only. On a positive note it is very suitable whether it is from a simple selfie shots to VLogging, it is a fairly simple one can beautification features are included.

Lets talk abit on the video capture, well you can take up to 8K at 24FPS maximum if you want the high end cinematic feel to it. But suffice to say, 4K 60FPS is still one of the best for any mobile shooters today in order to to keep the storage in check while retains most of the details you can get. My experience on this? Stabilization is on par and meets expectation while just dont try to zoom in too much during recording, details will still retain but pixelation effects will be there somehow, so in other words, manually moving over towards a certain capture point with some zoom in together seems to be the best for the most part or scenario.

Performance, Benchmarks, Experience – The Snapdragon in your hands

This further does not need more introduction when it comes to flagship devices, that is equipped with the well known Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 Octa Core processor with all the bells and whistles you can think of. Xiaomi sets the new line up with a minimum of 12GB LPDDR5 RAM and 256GB of internal storage to start and for the most part, good enough for a flagship smartphone and it is up to the user going for a higher end storage, yet one will have to take note that there is no expandable storage option across all Xiaomi 13 models, including the Xiaomi 13 Pro.

Oh yes, this is no surprise that it comes with Android 13 and MIUI 14, with some of the improvements over loading times and faster app switching, in a nutshell it does look similar to MIUI 13, just the processes and outlook is much more streamlined compared to the previous iteration. To put it over the experience basis, especially if you are a seasonal Xiaomi/POCO user, nothing much is changed, but much smoother, and as my test daily driver, you can expect that it will last you about 12 hours straight no issues without turning on Power Saver. Not mentioning much on what I usually do, as it is pretty much how a moderate user uses over a premium phone, opening about 25 apps and juggle with it seems excellent on this portion. Now its gaming time, Genshin Impact holds well over 35 minutes before it starts throttling, but so, that is just a tiny bit and not much of a serious stutter over domain hunting and daily missions. If you play alot of eSports title, this phone is definitely for you too, games like CoD Mobile will just run fine with good framerate pacing, and thats not enough, Game Turbo mode will give you more by toggling the Performance mode.

Towards benchmark, not to far away from the current flagships tested and definitely outperforms any mid range class phones equipped with a mid tier SOC.

Technical Specifications

Conclusion and Verdict

The Xiaomi 13 is one phone that definitely tells a few very convincing choices to get, but it is a solid reason. As a start definitely the included Leica Co-Engineered camera is one inclusion that this is a formidable mobile shooter you can get, apart from it, a great flagship processor with enhancements via MIUI 14 which still allows a vast array of customization from your wallpaper to virtual RAM adjustments, its all there for you to play around it. But one part we could not forget its the nice form factor that you can carry with all day long with ease and Xiaomi truly did not disappoint on this one.

The Xiaomi 13 is now widely available at a price starting from RM3499 and you can CLICK HERE to check it out!