Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite hands-on

Xiaomi has been very consistent in releasing smartphones that deliver the best value for the price. Hence, let us preface this Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite hands-on review by saying that, this is easily one of the best smartphones that you can get for the price.

We were able to prove that claim even just in the brief time that we were able to spend with it.

Right off the bat, you can already appreciate the design of the Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite. It has a shiny back panel that’s being protected by a 2.5D glass. This makes the device equally stylish and relatively durable.

Also, the Aurora Blue color variant has this trendy gradient design that’s identical to other popular midrange devices today like the Huawei Nova 3i and the Vivo V11.

On the front, we have the large 6.26-inch FHD+ screen with a 19:9 aspect ratio. Of course, the device comes with a notch on top, something that we must learn to love until Xiaomi adopts what Lenovo did on the Z5 Pro.

But on the upside, the notch is actually relatively smaller than what the competition has. Making it a little less distracting.

As for the processor, the Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite feels like a solid performer. This thing comes with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 chipset, with either a 4GB/64GB or 6GB/128GB configuration. That’s a really impressive combo for a device at this price.

During our short time with it, we were able to play with its interface, launch some basic apps, and run some games — and for a first impression, we were really pleased.

As for the interface itself, the Mi 8 Lite runs on Android 8.1 Oreo with Xiaomi’s MIUI interface on top. Just like in our previous Xiaomi smartphone review, we liked what the company did on their own take on Android. It’s clean, straightforward, and feels seamless to play with.

Moreover, the dual 12-megapixel + 5-megapixel rear cameras provided good performance in our initial testing, which we will try to play with more in our full review. This thing has large 1.4μm pixels, a wide aperture of f/1.9, and a dual-pixel sensor for a fast auto-focus system. There’s also a 24-megapixel selfie camera on the front.

Well, that’s it for now. We will play more with this device and provide you with a full review once it becomes available. But if you’re already sold, you can already pre-order yourself a Mi 8 Lite for Php13,990 (4GB/64GB) and Php16,990 (6GB/128GB).