Xiaomi has finally unveiled its greatest smartphone to date, the Xiaomi 15 Ultra. It improves on areas that are already great, especially on the cameras, battery, and of course, the chipset.
Like its predecessors, the Xiaomi 15 Ultra has a killer set of cameras tuned by the renowned camera company Leica. In fact, the design and the rear panel’s texture is similar to a classic Leica camera with a combination of aerospace-grade glass fiber and faux leather.
As for the hardware itself, the main shooter uses a large 1-inch 50-megapixel LYT-900 sensor with a 23mm focal length. Albeit, the aperture is now fixed at f/1.63, unlike last year’s variable f/1.6-f/4.0.
Another highlight here is the ultra-sharp 200-megapixel 1/1.4-inch HP9 sensor from Samsung that sits behind a 100mm telephoto lens with an f/2.6 aperture and can acquire 136% more light.
We have two more 50-megapixel shooters back here. There’s one that uses a 1/2.51-inch IMX858 sensor with a 75mm f/1.8 telephoto lens that’s great for portraits, and a standard 1/2.51-inch Samsung JN5 with an ultra-wide lens.
A pixel-dense 32-megapixel shooter is on the front for selfies.
Speaking of the front, what we have here is a fancy 6.73-inch QHD+ AMOLED panel with a 1-120Hz variable refresh rate and a whopping 3200 nits of peak brightness. It is protected with Xiaomi Shield Glass 2.0 plus, the frame uses CNC aluminum Xiaomi claims has 16x improved drop resistance.
Powering the Xiaomi 15 Ultra is the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite, one of the best mobile chips on the market today. It comes with 12GB/16GB of LPDDR5X RAM and up to 1TB of fast UFS 4.1 storage.
Xiaomi’s flagship has a 10% silicon carbide battery, one of the firsts to have it, allowing it to have a bigger 6,000mAh battery from 5,410mAh. It is paired with 90W wired and 80W wireless charging.
Finally, it ships with the latest Android 15-based HyperOS. Xiaomi pledged to provide 4 Android upgrades and 6 years of security patches. Not the best, but still impressive.
The Xiaomi 15 Ultra is now available in China. The 12GB/256GB model retails for CNY6,499 (~Php51,700), the 16GB/512GB comes in at CNY6,999 (~Php55,700), while the 16GB/1TB has a price of CNY7,799 (~Php62,000). It will be launched to the global market very soon.
You can also get it with the photography kit available in white/gold and black/red for CNY999 (~Php7,900).
Xiaomi 15 Ultra Specs
- Android 15, HyperOS 2 (4 Android upgrades, 6 years security patches)
- Dual SIM, Dual standby
- 6.73-inch QHD+ LTPO AMOLED display, 3200 x 1440 pixel resolution, ~522ppi
- 1-120Hz adaptive refresh rate
- Dolby Vision, HDR10+, HDR Vivid
- 3200-nit peak brightness
- Xiaomi Shield Glass 2.0
- 4.32GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite octa-core processor
- 12GB/16GB RAM
- Adreno 830 GPU
- 256GB/512GB/1TB UFS 4.1 internal storage, non-expandable
- 32-megapixel front camera
- 50-megapixel (1-inch LYT-900, 23mm, f/1.6, dual-pixel PDAF, OIS) + 200-megapixel (1/1.4″, HP9, 100mm 4.3x periscope, PDAF, OIS) + 50-megapixel (1/2.51″ IMX858, 70mm 3x zoom, PDAF, OIS) + 50-megapixel (1/2.51″ JN5, ultra-wide, PDAF) rear cameras, LED flash
- Leica camera system
- Under-display fingerprint scanner, Face unlock
- Stereo speakers, Hi-Res, Hi-Res Wireless audio
- IP68 dust and water resistant
- Aerospace-grade glass fiber
- HSPA+, 4G LTE, 5G
- WiFi 7, tri-band
- Bluetooth 6.0
- dual-band GPS, GALILEO, QZSS, GLONASS, NavIC, BDS
- NFC
- IR blaster
- USB-C
- Dimensions: 161.3 x 75.3 x 9.4mm
- Weight: 226g/229g
- Colors: Silver Chrome, White, Black, Green
- 6,000mAh non-removable battery, 90W wired, 80W wireless, 10W reverse wireless charging