Xiaomi 14T Pro: the flagship for everyone who does not need a flagship

Xiaomi has brought the new 14T Pro to market. It brings some important upgrades over its predecessor, so you get the feeling of holding a flagship in your hand even though it is not one in price.

Design and display

The 14T Pro now has a very modern look with flat edges and a matte back. It sits well in the hand, is resistant to fingerprints and looks high-quality. I find the Titan Gray that I have here the sleekest. Titanium is a fad among all manufacturers right now, like Buffalo shoes in the 90s, only much prettier. The camera module with the lenses now arranged in a square looks many times better than on the predecessor.

The 6.67-inch AMOLED display has extremely thin, symmetrical bezels and gets up to 4,000 nits bright. On top, as with the 13T Pro, comes a refresh rate of 144 Hz instead of 120 Hz. In daily use I see no serious difference from 120 Hz, everything runs super smoothly. For gamers it makes a difference if the game supports a high refresh rate.

Performance: daily life instead of benchmarks

Inside is the MediaTek Dimensity 9300 Plus. I do not care what benchmarks say: in daily use I experience smooth, stutter-free operation. A current Snapdragon is certainly faster, but it does not bother me if an app takes 0.01 seconds longer. I know nobody who has ever needed the full power of these processors, and you always pay for it. What interests me is whether the smartphone runs smoothly and how long it takes to process photo and video recordings. Everything else is pretty much all the same to me.

Battery, charging and what’s in the box

• Battery: 5,000 mAh, nicely big for a mid-range device. I get about a day and a half, longer with lots of Wi-Fi and without a camera endurance test.
• Charging: 120 watts wired, 50 watts wireless.
• Charger: There is none in the box anymore. Xiaomi justifies this like other manufacturers with environmental protection. While others sell their chargers separately at a high price, Xiaomi lets its go for 99 cents. I think that is a nice move.
• Extras: A screen protector is preinstalled, and a case is included for free.

AI

Xiaomi relies on AI in the relevant places without developing its own model with a lot of marketing. It uses Google’s Gemini, and the app and features are available. Circle to Search is announced. On my test device I could not activate it yet. An update probably comes with the market launch on 26.09.

Camera

For some years now, Xiaomi has worked closely with Leica. I think it is great that you get a camera like this in a mid-range smartphone:

• 50-megapixel main camera
• 50-megapixel telephoto camera
• 12-megapixel ultrawide camera

Besides the Leica lenses, as in the 14 Ultra there are the Leica tools in the software, such as switching between Leica Authentic and Leica Vibrant in photo mode or the presets with different focal lengths in portrait mode. I have already made a separate video with tips and tricks on the Xiaomi camera interface.

Compared to the 14 Ultra, there are compromises. The two most important: there is no macro mode, and the selfie camera has 32 megapixels. It is great for snapshots, and in good lighting conditions you also get good videos and photos, but it gets harder in less light. The portrait mode of the main camera does a really great job; selfie portraits are sometimes not cut out quite cleanly.

On the positive side: night shots turn out nicely high-contrast and, thanks to AI, extremely low-noise, more on the level of the 14 Ultra.

Updates

Xiaomi guarantees four Android versions and five years of security updates. That is not the seven-year level of Samsung and Google. But I do not necessarily see myself walking around with the same smartphone for seven years. Xiaomi used to not be exactly strong on security patches, but a lot has happened in recent months: they now come every month and regularly. On my 14 Ultra I already have the September patch at the end of September.

Price

The 14T Pro costs €799 RRP in the smallest variant with 12 GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage and has therefore not gotten more expensive than the predecessor.

Verdict

The 14T Pro is a mid-range device with a flagship feel: design, display, battery and camera convince me. A separate video with lots of sample shots is coming for the camera.