Xiaomi Mi 10 5G review

MIUI 11 on top of Android 10

While technically MIUI 12 has recently become official and is now a thing, the Mi 10 doesn't ship with it out-of-the-box. The next version of Xiaomi's popular Android flavor was just announced, and is yet to make an appearance on any phone. It might still be a while before that happens. Mi 10 device owners can probably expect to be among the first to get the update, as well. Also, the changes MIUI 12 introduces aren't all that drastic anyway. Probably since MIUI is already in a very, very polished state, as it stands.

Flat and simple design is definitely a prevalent theme around the entire UI. But, that simplicity is still the result of many design iterations and subtle tweaks and decisions. The amount of polish really shines through in little things, such as curves, subtle animation frames, including snap-back, velocity and drag effects. This level of polish is kept pretty consistently throughout the UI, which is probably why little imperfections, such as the lack of consideration for spacing around the selfie camera punch hole tend to stand-out to us a bit more.

Lock screen • Quick access pane • Home screen • Second home screen • Folder view

Security-wise, the Mi 10 gets a choice between face and fingerprint unlock, as biometrics. Like we already mentioned, the fingerprint reader is current-gen and works great, Both snappy and reliable. Same goes for the facial recognition. We also appreciate the extra attention to detail Xiaomi put into the visual aspects of unlocking. There are plenty of fingerprint reader animations to choose from. Better still, there are a couple of fingerprint-reader-based shortcuts you can setup for some extra convenience.

Security • Fingerprint setup • Fingerprint options • Fingerprint shortcuts • Animations • Face recognition

The Mi 10 Pro supports Always-on display, and you can schedule it or leave it on/off all the time. MIUI 11 has a ton of themes you can choose from and make it yours. You can customize may of those. The AOD also supports breathing light - the curved edges of the display will flash with colors upon new notifications.

AOD and notification edge led effects

In a somewhat related extra, MIUI 11 supports nature alarm and notifications, which sound different depending on the time of the day. Nature sounds have been tailored for alarms and notifications and are far less stressful through the day.

Nature-inspired notifications

We only bring this up here since the same Sound and vibration menu also houses an interesting Sound effects sub menu, which, among other things, allows you to place a visualization of any audio currently playing on the phone on the AOD. You get a few designs to choose from. Pretty nifty, even if quite wasteful in terms of battery.

Sound effects

As far as general layout goes, you get plenty of nice little extras, like a quick shortcuts pane to the left of the lock screen, where you can arrange your Mi Device IR and IoT gadgets and appliances for control and also toggle the flashlight.

Notifications pane • Quick toggles • Recent apps • Split screen • Quick return to split screen

All of the Android basics are definitely there and well covered. With one notable exception, that is - an app drawer. While historically, MIUI hasn't really had an app drawer, one was recently added. Since out Mi 10 review unit is running the official MIUI 11.0.9 GLOBAL ROM, we should definitely have the option to enable it. Yet, we don't just like with our Mi 10 Pro. Odd, for sure.

Before we get to some of the other extras MIUI has to offer, we should say a few words about Dark Mode and the current state it is in. The feature is there and seems to be implemented thoughtfully, even including a scheduler, and for the most part, it does its job great. Darkening most parts of the UI in order to save on battery and make things easier on the eyes. By the way, the Mi 10 also offers a DC backlight control option for the latter, which we appreciate.

Dark mode

However, Dark mode is far from perfect even when approaching it with the right set of expectations. Including the fact that some third-party apps might not play nice with it, and that's in no way MIUI's fault. The thing is that we even found the occasional Xiaomi app and menu that doesn't adhere to Dark Mode settings.

Dark mode mishaps

That being said, one of the major improvements on the way with MIUI 12 is Dark Mode 2.0, which promises to make everything better and even a bit smarter, incorporating things like dynamic font-weight scaling and adaptive dimming of elements. Plus, we can't really blame Xiaomi too much since Google themselves still can't get their entire app suite to play nice with AOSP dark mode. Every time we tried to do a quick Google search on the Mi 10, we got blasted with the glaring white background of the main Google app. Plus, the feed that is positioned as the furthest most left pane in MIUI inexplicably bugged at some point and now no longer scales correctly. But, we digress.

You get extensive theme support with MIUI. Basically, everything is subject to change. Rather ironically, though, the Theme app itself is one of the admittedly few Xiaomi apps that don't respect Dark Mode.

MIUI Themes

MIUI also offers a Security app. It can scan your phone for malware, manage your blacklist, manage or restrict your data usage, configure battery behavior, and free up some RAM. It can also manage the permissions of your installed apps and allows you to define the battery behavior of selected apps and applies restrictions only to the apps you choose.

Security app

MIUI also offers proprietary Gallery, Music, and Video player. In some regions, the music and video apps include paid streaming options. MIUI 11 has a new document viewing app, which supports all popular formats and makes for a seamless experience. There is also a new Notes app that now supports Tasks.

Gallery • Music • Files • Mi remote

Again, we can see the off app, not really playing nice with Dark mode. Not a major complaint, though. Finally, it is worth noting that our Global MIUI ROM featured no ads anywhere in the UI. This might not be true for certain Chinese branches, though. We aren't exactly sure how things stand on that front at the moment.

Performance and benchmarks

As we already mentioned on multiple occasions, the chipset is one of the many common bits, shared between the Mi 10 Pro and the vanilla version. It is the current flagship option of choice - the Snapdragon 865, complete with the X55 modem and Sub6 5G connectivity. To be more particular, still, you get 1, 3, 7, 28, 77, 78 bands in the Global version and 1, 3, 41, 78, 79 SA/NSA bands in Chinese Mi 10 units.

The Snapdragon 865 holds little surprises and naturally promises top current-gen performance. Since the vanilla Mi 10 shares both the body and the chipset in question with the Pro, we have already tested, we also have little reason to worry about the actual performance of the chip. With the 865 you get a total of eight cores: 1x2.84 GHz Kryo 585 Gold (Cortex-A77 derivative) & 3x2.42 GHz Kryo 585 Gold (Cortex-A77 derivative) & 4x1.8 GHz Kryo 585 Silver (Cortex-A55 derivative). An Adreno 650 is also part of the package and about as good as it gets for GPU performance right now.

Just like the Mi 10 Pro, you can get the vanilla Mi 10 with either 8GB or 12GB of fast LPDDR5 RAM. Storage options include 128GB and 256GB (we have an 8GB/256GB unit for testing). There is no 512GB tier on the vanilla Mi 10, while the Pro does get one, with limited availability. The storage is also very snappy, officially marketed as UFS 3.0. Though, estimated by AnTuTu's speed tests to come closer to UFS 3.1.

GeekBench 5.1 (multi-core)

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max
  3503
• OnePlus 8
  3399
• OnePlus 8 Pro
  3374
• Oppo Find X2 Pro
  3349
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  3347
• Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro 5G
  3331
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  3322
• Huawei P40 Pro
  3197
• Realme X50 Pro
  3175
• Sony Xperia 1
  2753
• Redmi K20 Pro/Mi 9T Pro
  2732
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G
  2728
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  1733
• Xiaomi Mi 9T
  1703

Kicking things off with CPU-only performance and GeekBench, we can see the Mi 10 scoring perfectly within expectations for its Snapdragon 865. As we said, this is about as fast as things currently get in the Android realm, with only minor variances between different manufacturers and devices. You can probably squeeze a few more points out of the chip with a more aggressive scheduler or other tweaks, but nothing really substantial and outside the realm of statistical error.

GeekBench 5.1 (single-core)

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max
  1332
• OnePlus 8
  919
• Realme X50 Pro
  911
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G
  910
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  910
• Oppo Find X2 Pro
  906
• Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro 5G
  905
• OnePlus 8 Pro
  902
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  895
• Huawei P40 Pro
  780
• Sony Xperia 1
  747
• Redmi K20 Pro/Mi 9T Pro
  744
• Xiaomi Mi 9T
  542
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  542

We can clearly see Apple still has a neck up above the Android crowd in single-threaded tests. Though, this is a synthetic load we are talking about and hardly enables any parallel between Android and iOS real-world performance. Unless you are really into calculating Pi over and over again.

We would have very-much liked to have a device with the increasingly-popular Snapdragon 765G on the charts as well. It has been doing nothing short of bringing 5G to the masses at a more affordable price point and, on paper, not a lot of sacrifices to raw performance. We'll have some numbers on that chip soon enough, though.

AnTuTu 8

Higher is better

• Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro 5G
  595246
• Oppo Find X2 Pro (120Hz, 1440p)
  593717
• Realme X50 Pro
  592447
• Oppo Find X2 Pro (60Hz, 1440p)
  585764
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  578056
• OnePlus 8 Pro (120Hz, 1440p)
  573276
• OnePlus 8
  564708
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G (60Hz)
  560437
• Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max
  536883
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G (60Hz, 1440p)
  528631
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  528459
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G (120Hz, 1080p)
  514485
• Huawei P40 Pro
  496356
• Redmi K20 Pro/Mi 9T Pro
  437823
• Sony Xperia 1
  418206
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  263396
• Xiaomi Mi 9T
  257146
• Xiaomi Mi Note 10
  256717

Moving on to AnTuTu and its more complex and multi-tier testing and scoring methodology, we get our first taste of how certain aspects of the Mi 10's display affect performance. On the one hand, we have the FullHD+ resolution, which offers a definite bonus in on-screen GPU performance at native resolution.

On the other hand - the 90 Hz refresh rate. If all the pieces in the chain from on OS level, all the way to the app level fall-in nicely and correctly and the GPU has enough horsepower to push past the 60fps mark, in 90Hz mode, the Mi 10 can, indeed, get more than 60fps on the display. Those conditional bits are particularly important, though and can vary wildly manufacturer to manufacturer, game to game and app to app.

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro 5G
  75
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G (120Hz, 1080p)
  74
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  73
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G (60Hz)
  60
• Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max
  60
• Realme X50 Pro
  60
• OnePlus 8
  60
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  59
• Redmi K20 Pro/Mi 9T Pro
  57
• Xiaomi Mi 9
  56
• Sony Xperia 1
  55
• Huawei P40 Pro
  52
• Oppo Find X2 Pro (120Hz, 1440p)
  43
• Oppo Find X2 Pro (60Hz, 1440p)
  43
• OnePlus 8 Pro (120Hz, 1440p)
  43
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G (60Hz, 1440p)
  42
• Xiaomi Mi Note 10
  27
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  27
• Xiaomi Mi 9T
  24

Just to illustrate this point further, here is a Manhattan 3.1 GFXBench on-screen run on the Mi 10, as well as a few other devices we have tested. The Adreno 650 is powerful enough to break past the 60fps mark in the particular test. Something that can only be achieved on-screen with 90Hz mode enabled and working properly. Which, to Xiaomi's credit, is the case on MIUI 11. Offscreen tests, conversely, don't see a difference, regardless of screen refresh rate settings, since their rendering is not bound by the speed of the display.

GFX 3.1 Manhattan (1080p offscreen)

Higher is better

• Apple iPhone 11 Pro Max
  120
• OnePlus 8
  88
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  87
• Oppo Find X2 Pro (120Hz, 1440p)
  87
• Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro 5G
  86
• Realme X50 Pro
  86
• Oppo Find X2 Pro (60Hz, 1440p)
  86
• OnePlus 8 Pro (120Hz, 1440p)
  86
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G (60Hz)
  85
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G (120Hz, 1080p)
  85
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G (60Hz, 1440p)
  85
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  84
• Huawei P40 Pro
  75
• Redmi K20 Pro/Mi 9T Pro
  71
• Sony Xperia 1
  71
• Xiaomi Mi 9
  70
• Xiaomi Mi Note 10
  30
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  30
• Xiaomi Mi 9T
  27

As for GPU test runs that can Actually make the Adreno 650 sweat, we have the Aztek test, in both its Open GL ES 3.1 implementation, as well a running on Vulkan.

Aztek OpenGL ES 3.1 High (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G
  32
• Realme X50 Pro
  31
• OnePlus 8
  31
• Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro 5G
  29
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  29
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  29
• Xiaomi Mi 9
  24
• Oppo Find X2 Pro
  18
• OnePlus 8 Pro
  17
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  10

Aztek Vulkan High (onscreen)

Higher is better

• Realme X50 Pro
  30
• OnePlus 8
  30
• Xiaomi Mi 10 Pro 5G
  29
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  29
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  29
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G
  26
• Xiaomi Mi 9
  23
• Oppo Find X2 Pro
  17
• OnePlus 8 Pro
  17
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  9.3

The latter API is theoretically much better optimized overall. But, not necessarily going to produce tangibly-better real-world fps figures in the wild. Which is exactly the case here. Building upon our previous explanation, we didn't really include any varied display refresh runs for any of the devices in these two on-screen tests, since not even the Adreno 650 manages to even come close to the 60fps mark. That's a good thing too, since as soon as the industry comes up with silicon that does, on-screen GPU tests will have to adapt and become harder to keep up.

3DMark SSE OpenGL ES 3.1 1440p

Higher is better

• OnePlus 8
  7290
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  7280
• Realme X50 Pro
  7221
• Oppo Find X2 Pro
  7159
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  7132
• OnePlus 8 Pro
  7127
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G
  6713
• Huawei P40 Pro
  6062
• Redmi K20 Pro/Mi 9T Pro
  5733
• Xiaomi Mi 9
  5450
• Sony Xperia 1
  5123
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  2464
• Xiaomi Mi 9T
  2182

Finally, here are some 3DMark runs for the Mi 10. Again, without including runs at different display refresh rates, since the Sling Shot Extreme runs are off-screen by nature. Again, making refresh rate irrelevant.

3DMark SSE Vulkan 1440p

Higher is better

• OnePlus 8
  6720
• LG V60 ThinQ 5G (cooled)
  6628
• Oppo Find X2 Pro
  6586
• Xiaomi Mi 10 5G
  6490
• Realme X50 Pro
  6472
• OnePlus 8 Pro
  6425
• Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G
  6308
• Huawei P40 Pro
  5637
• Redmi K20 Pro/Mi 9T Pro
  5000
• Sony Xperia 1
  4505
• Xiaomi Mi 9
  4068
• Samsung Galaxy A71
  2253
• Xiaomi Mi 9T
  2035

In case you were wondering why the increased focus on display refresh and frame rates, it is definitely not by accident. This new wave of high refresh rate mobile panels has necessitated a deeper exploration and understanding of their behavior. Since the feature itself can have drastic effects on the quality of the visual experience, but also, potentially bring about a major battery endurance penalty in the process. The latter mainly happens from misusing high refresh rate. Either by the user or, unfortunately, by certain manufacturers. As things currently stand, MIUI is actually on of the cleverer Android flavors, when it comes to automatic refresh rate switching and battery conservation. The OS actually automatically detects certain apps, like the default video player, YouTube and Netflix, as inherently meant to deliver video content at 60fps or less and switches the display refresh rate down, accordingly, if needed.

As for a summary of the performance you can expect from the Xiaomi Mi 10, the conclusions are simple and straightforward: It is a true 2020 beast, up there with the best flagships currently on the market. It, unsurprisingly, keeps up with its Pro sibling, as well. And while it also shares some of the same slightly elevated surface temperature issues, those never really affected actual performance. Slap a case on for more in-hand comfort and simply think of it as surface cooling, necessary to sustain great performance from the capable Snapdragon 865.