6 Nov 2025
The Xiaomi 17 Pro Max is an interesting flagship device featuring two OLED displays, a large 7500 mAh battery with fast charging, and a premium glass and metal design with IP68 certification. It boasts a powerful Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip, impressive speakers, and a quad 50-megapixel camera system, though the ultrawide camera performs poorly in low light.
The Xiaomi 17 Pro Max is an interesting flagship with dual screens, a 7500 mAh battery, and a fast charger. The reviewed device is the Chinese version, featuring a Chinese ROM that limits some Google or Western services, with potential minimal differences like packaging and battery capacity expected in the unreleased global version.
The phone's body is completely glass with a metal frame, conveying a premium feel. It features Dragon Glass protection on the front, a ceramic-reinforced composite, and a matte fiberglass back that resists smudges and fingerprints. The device holds an IP68 certificate, with Xiaomi promising resistance up to 6 meters for 30 minutes.
A new generation fingerprint sensor works effectively with protective glass. The device weighs about 220 grams, making it slightly heavy, and its 8 mm thickness without the camera bump is good for its battery and wireless charging coil. It supports a physical SIM card, with no mention of eSIM capabilities.
The device incorporates two OLED displays: a 6.9-inch front screen and a 2.9-inch back screen. Both are 12-bit, 120 Hz, and support HRT Plus and Dolby Vision, featuring flat designs with very small bezels. Their brightness is excellent, performing well under outdoor light.
The displays offer default and custom refresh rate modes; the default mode intelligently adjusts from 1 to 120 Hz based on activity, saving battery life by dropping to 1 Hz when idle or matching video frame rates. The 2.9-inch second display is currently useful for call notifications, timers, app background information (mostly Chinese apps, with Spotify as a non-Chinese example), and interactive animations, with its best use case being a camera preview for main camera selfies.
The Xiaomi 17 Pro Max utilizes the 5th generation Snapdragon 8 Elite chip with 3rd generation Orion cores, which claims 20 times better performance and 30 times more efficiency than its predecessor. The Adreno 840 GPU shows 23 times better performance, alongside improved ray tracing and artificial intelligence capabilities.
The base model of this phone comes with 12GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. The reviewed model features 16GB of RAM with 1TB of storage, representing the highest available system configuration.
In benchmarks, the device is fast and powerful, surpassing many previous Elite chips, although it slightly lags behind some phones with the same Gen 5 chip in GPU-based combined tests. CPU stability tests show about a 50% performance drop after 10 minutes, indicating 60% stability, which may result in slight frame drops during extended heavy gaming, though overall temperature is controlled by throttling, and current power is sufficient for all tasks.
The phone houses a giant 7500 mAh battery, delivering above-average and practically one of the best battery lives, easily lasting a full day of heavy use. The premium version includes a 100-watt charger, and it supports 50-watt wireless charging. It charges from 0% to 100% in approximately 39 minutes with the included charger or 48 minutes with a 100-watt PD charger; charging patterns show high initial wattage decreasing as the battery fills.
The speakers offer great volume and exceptional sound quality, providing a clean sound at high volumes. Their quality is comparable to iPhone speakers and is significantly superior to Android competitors, even surpassing the S25 Ultra in some aspects.
Software changes are minor, focusing on smoother animations and the integration of 'Super Island,' Xiaomi's equivalent of Dynamic Island, for displaying live information like timers, music, and calls. While Xiaomi-specific AI couldn't be tested, a Gemini method is available, and apps can be downloaded from the Get App store for Google Play Store access. Due to the Chinese ROM, language is limited to Chinese and English, lacking Google Discover, location history, Quick Share, and Google Assistant voice activation by default, though workarounds for some features exist.
The Xiaomi 17 Pro Max is equipped with a quad 50-megapixel camera system. This includes a main camera with a new, larger sensor and a slightly narrower aperture, a 5x periscope telephoto lens, and an ultrawide camera.
Daylight photos from the main camera are sharp, low noise, and exhibit very good dynamic range, despite occasional contrast issues or color casts. Close-up shots from the main camera (cropped to two megapixels) are also good under artificial light. The 5x periscope telephoto lens works well, though its output can be soft, with 10x zoom being acceptable. Ultrawide photos are considered normal, with a shorter focal length difference from the main camera compared to other phones.
The selfie camera now features autofocus but tends to soften skin and other details, aligning with Chinese aesthetic preferences. The second display offers a superior alternative for selfies by utilizing the main camera preview.
The ultrawide camera performs terribly at night and is deemed unusable. In contrast, the main camera excels in low light, producing photos with very low noise, excellent distinction of shadows and highlights, and good subject separation, including in portrait mode.
Overall, the camera system tends to soften photos, making them appear unnatural, including results from the periscope lens, and generally performing worse than equivalent flagship cameras. The selfie camera's 'doll-like' effect can be disabled.
Video recording is supported by the main camera, a feature found on some flagships like the S25 Ultra but not iPhone. Other cameras also record videos acceptably. Video stabilization is notably good, resulting in decent overall video recording quality for a flagship phone.
The camera package is considered strange, but the phone offers a unique premium experience, especially with the second screen's potential for interactive games and high-quality selfies using the main camera. It is a very attractive phone with a premium feel, outperforming the iPhone in many aspects except for the camera. Users prioritizing camera performance might prefer Samsung or iPhone flagships, but the Xiaomi 17 Pro Max's camera is adequate for many.
A design flaw causes dust and lint to accumulate around the camera rings due to a magnetic field created by the display and cameras. Xiaomi should address this in future iterations if it maintains this design.
The battery is where Xiaomi is beating the iPhone and Samsung with a charger, because it has a giant 7500 mAh, so it was natural to be satisfied with its battery life, which is above average and practically one of the best.
| Feature | Detail | Highlight/Benefit |
|---|---|---|
| Design & Build | Glass body, metal frame, matte fiberglass back, Dragon Glass front, IP68 certification (6m/30min). | Premium feel, enhanced durability, fingerprint/smudge resistance, superior water resistance. |
| Displays | Dual OLED (6.9" front, 2.9" back), 12-bit, 120Hz, HRT Plus, Dolby Vision, adaptive refresh rate. | Immersive visual experience, versatile secondary functions, intelligent battery saving. |
| Performance | Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5, Adreno 840 GPU, 16GB RAM/1TB storage (reviewed model). | Powerful processing, improved graphics and AI, high efficiency for all tasks, sufficient power despite minor stability drops. |
| Battery & Charging | 7500 mAh capacity, 100W wired charging, 50W wireless charging. | Exceptional battery life, rapid charging from 0-100% in ~39 minutes, superior to competitors. |
| Audio Quality | Stereo speakers. | High volume, clean sound quality, comparable to iPhone, superior to Android rivals. |
| Camera System (Strengths) | Quad 50MP cameras, larger main sensor, 5x periscope telephoto. | Excellent daylight photos (sharp, low noise, good dynamic range), very good night photos from main camera (low noise, good detail). |
| Camera System (Weaknesses) | Ultrawide camera, general image processing softness. | Terrible night performance for ultrawide, overall photos can appear unnaturally softened compared to other flagships. |
| Software (Chinese ROM) | Limited English/Chinese languages, no Google Discover/Quick Share/Assistant by default, 'Super Island' equivalent. | Smooth animations, improved cross-device file transfer, but requires workarounds for full Google services. |
