[updated] Xiaomi Mi 4i Now Officially Unveiled for less than Php10k

The Chinese electronics giant Xiaomi held an event yesterday in India to announce a new monster of a smartphone. The company usually unveil their new products in their home country in China but for the first time they did it in the very promising market for most tech companies which is in India. Xiaomi has now officially revealed the Mi 4i that is packs a punch and priced less than a little over Php9k when converted to the local currency.

There are a lot of things going on the Mi 4i that we don't usually see on other high end or mid-range counterparts from local and international players. First is the display, it sports a 5-inch screen with Full HD display with full lamination OGS glass and supplied by Sharp/JDI. It's not that big in terms of screen size coming in at only 5 inches but an average users are usually okay with that size and the resolution. Xiaomi enforced a polycarbonate unibody casing with Soft Touch finish preventing finger prints from staying on the surface.

The company also managed to make the Mi 4i as thin as 7.8mm but at the same time stuffed in a massive 3,120mAh battery pack. Xiaomi claimed they used a new high-density battery technology to make that small space filled with a big battery juice. Speaking of battery there is also a rapid change technology built in where it enables to the battery to be charged up to 40% in just one hour and up to 3 hours to fully charge the phone. 

 Xiaomi Mi 4i specs:

- 5" Full HD IPS display
- 1920 x 1080 resolution, 441ppi
- Full-Laminated Corning OGS Glass
- 1.7GHz Octa-core 64-bit Snapdragon 615 processor
- 2GB RAM
- 16GB internal storage
- Supports microSD card, Does not support microSD card
- 13MP rear camera with f2.0 and two-tone flash
- 5MP front camera with f/1.8 and 80-degree wide angle lens
- Android 5.0 Lollipop with MIUI 6
- WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS
- Direct WiFi, GLONASS
- USB OTG
- Dual SIM
- Dual Standby
- Dual LTE
- LTE
- 3,120mAh battery

Xiaomi will initially release the Mi 4i smartphone in India starting April 30 via Flipkart for Rs 12,999 or about Php9,080 in Philippine peso and will be followed by markets in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia the next month. Don't worry my fellow Pinoys, Xiaomi Philippines has already confirmed that the Mi 4i will also be released in the country they are just finalizing the date. We will know once that is official.

UPDATE: 4/28/2015

According to a post on Unbox where Hugo Barra, VP for Xiaomi Global participates in teardown session of the Mi 4i smartphone and at the same event he confirms that the smartphone storage is not expandable through microSD card. That means users are stuck with the default 16GB internal storage. And from the looks of it, a USB OTG is, unfortunately, also not supported.