The moment we’ve all been waiting for is here, Xiaomi 13 Ultra is finally out and ready for sale. It’s loaded with major innovations, making it a lot different than the “Ultra” phone launching every year. Pricing information can be found at the end of the article. Let’s start with the most remarkable part of the phone, the camera.
Camera
Xiaomi 13 Ultra is equipped with a quad camera setup that enables you to use four cameras with good range of different focal lengths. The device offers a wide range of versatility, the focal length ranging from 12mm to 240mm (2x digital zoom applied over 120mm periscope telephoto). Xiaomi 13 Ultra is not actually a phone, but a zoom lens capable of taking wide-angle photos. Of course, we are aware that it is a phone camera, but a wide-angle camera with a focal length equivalent to 12mm is pretty crazy. You can take 122° field of view with ultrawide angle camera, it has auto focus and macro photography capability that can shoot photos at up to 5 cm distance.
The other thing that’s crazy is the main camera. Xiaomi 13 Ultra features a primary camera with a 1-inch Sony IMX 989 sensor, which is a popular choice among several Chinese phone manufacturers, We have seen this camera sensor on Xiaomi 12S Ultra, 13 Pro, vivo X90 Pro+, and OPPO Find X6 Pro. However, what sets the Xiaomi 13 Ultra apart is its variable aperture capability. As camera sensors become larger, the depth of field also increases, leading to potential blurriness when shooting close-up subjects. Changing the aperture can address this issue, but there aren’t many phones on the market that offers this feature.
Samsung was the first to introduce a variable aperture with Galaxy S9, but it’s not available in newer Samsung phones. Xiaomi 13 Ultra’s main camera aperture can be adjusted from f/1.9 to f/4.0, ensuring clear images even when shooting objects up close. The main camera also features Dual Pixel PDAF for fast focusing.
All the auxiliary cameras on Xiaomi 13 Ultra equip the same sensor, Sony IMX 858. The size of this sensor is 1/2.51″ and we can say that this sensor size is quite sufficient for telephoto cameras, not only the sensor size but also quality of the lens matters as well. Xiaomi 13 Ultra features a 8P aspheric high-transmittance lens. Xiaomi shared a photography comparison between iPhone 14 Pro Max and Xiaomi 13 Ultra in the launch event.
The telephoto camera boasts a zoom capability of 3.2x, while the periscope telephoto camera has 5x zoom. All of the cameras are equipped with OIS, except for the ultra-wide angle camera.Xiaomi 13 Ultra can shoot 8K video at 24 FPS and 4K 60 FPS video recording is available as well. For those who want to freeze the time, it allows you to shoot slow motion video at 3840 FPS video.
Just like previous Xiaomi phones, you can also shoot 10-bit video and videos with Dolby Vision support. Xiaomi 13 Ultra is capable of taking RAW photos with 14 bit color. The front camera of Xiaomi 13 Ultra is still disappointing, as it can only shoot 1080p video at 30 FPS. Front facing camera has 32 MP resolution and f/2.0 aperture.
Display & Design
The back cover of Xiaomi 13 Ultra features both leather and glass materials, much like its predecessor Xiaomi 12S Ultra. It also comes with an aluminum frame and has a thickness of 9.6mm due to its large cameras and 5000 mAh battery.
Xiaomi 13 Ultra will be available in black and green colors. Xiaomi 13 Ultra comes in white color as well but it’s available only in China. Note that Xiaomi 13 Ultra is IP68 certified making it water and dust resistant.
Xiaomi 13 Ultra marks a refreshment in Xiaomi phones, as Xiaomi has offered Samsung displays for a long time, Xiaomi 13 Ultra comes with Huaxing‘s C7 display, produced by a Chinese manufacturer. This display has a refresh rate of 120 Hz and comes with QHD resolution (1440 x 3200). It is 6.73 inches in size.
The brightness of Xiaomi 13 Ultra’s display is currently the highest ever seen thanks to its Huaxing C7 panel with 2600 nits brightness. The display brightness of Samsung’s latest flagship phone, Galaxy S23 Ultra, is 1750 nits. OPPO Find X6 Pro was previously the leader with a brightness of 2500 nits, but now Xiaomi 13 Ultra has taken the lead once again.
Performance & Battery
Xiaomi 13 Ultra is powered by the fastest processor from Qualcomm, Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, and it is equipped with LPDDR5X RAM and a UFS 4.0 storage unit. Xiaomi 13 Ultra now includes a USB 3.2 port instead of the previous USB 2.0 port, which had a very low speed limit of 40 MB/s. The details regarding the RAM and storage configurations are given at the end of article.
A brand new feature of Xiaomi 13 Ultra is the Hibernation Mode, once you have 1% charge left, you can make calls for 12 minutes and have 1 hour standby time with 1% charge with the help of Surge G1 and P2 chips.
Storage & RAM configurations – Xiaomi 13 Ultra Pricing
The pricing of Xiaomi 13 Ultra might differ based on the region, and the following list shows prcicing of Xiaomi 13 Ultra in China. If you reside outside China, you may face higher prices. Although it packs lots of features we can easily say Xiaomi 13 Ultra is reasonably priced, here is the pricing of Xiaomi 13 Ultra in China.
- 12GB + 256GB – 5999 CNY – 872 USD
- 16GB + 512 GB – 6499 CNY – 945 USD
- 16GB + 1 TB – 7299 CNY – 1061USD
During the launch event, Photography Kit was revealed by Xiaomi, it can be purchased separately and will be available at a price of 999 CNY (145 USD). The kit can be attached to the smartphone and enables it to function like a DSLR camera. Although it will make the phone bulkier it’s an excellent option for those who love photography since the kit even has a dedicated shutter button.
What do you think about Xiaomi 13 Ultra? Please comment down below!