Xiaomi announces the Mi Mix Fold, its first folding phone

Xiaomi has resurrected its Mi Mix series with the Mi Mix Fold, the company’s first commercial folding phone. Unlike previous outlandish Mix devices and concepts from the company, the Mi Mix Fold is a pretty conventional folding phone that uses a big-screen-on-the-inside / small-screen-on-the-outside design similar to Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold series and Huawei’s new Mate X2.

The inner screen is an 8.01-inch 4:3 OLED panel with 2480 x 1860 resolution, a standard display brightness of 600 nits (900 peak), and support for Dolby Vision HDR. Xiaomi says the display is able to withstand being folded 200,000 times. The outer screen is 6.52-inches with a 90Hz refresh rate. Xiaomi is making big claims about the Mi Mix Fold’s audio capabilities, with four Harman Kardon-tuned speakers and what the company describes as 3D panoramic sound.

Image: Xiaomi

The processor is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 paired with 12GB or 16GB of RAM and 256GB or 512GB of storage. Battery capacity is 5,020mAh, and Xiaomi says the 67W fast-charging system should get you a full charge in 37 minutes.

As previously teased last week, the new Mix is also the first phone to use liquid lens technology in its camera. Xiaomi says that it allows for a telephoto lens with a close focusing distance of 3cm and optical zoom of 3x, or 30x hybrid zoom. The rest of the camera system is comprised of a Samsung HMX 108-megapixel main sensor and a 13-megapixel ultrawide, which sounds like the same solid setup that’s on the Mi 11.

Image: Xiaomi

Xiaomi first showed off a folding phone prototype more than two years ago, before Samsung shipped its first Galaxy Fold. That device had a double-folding design where a tablet-sized screen could be bent back on the left and right edges for a more phone-like experience.

Later that year, Xiaomi announced the Mi Mix Alpha, which had a wraparound screen that covered almost the whole phone, but it never made it to market. More recently Xiaomi unveiled its latest concept phone, featuring a “quad-curved waterfall display” that curved on all four sides.

The Mi Mix Fold, on the other hand, is very much going on sale — people in China are able to preorder it as of today, and it’ll ship on April 16th. Prices start at 9,999 yuan (around $1,521) for a model with 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, going all the way up to 12,999 yuan (around $1,978) for a 16GB / 512GB ceramic special edition. There’s no word yet on a release outside of China.