Xiaomi’s Mi MIX is the company’s bezel-less concept phone priced below RM2,200

Following the launch of Xiaomi’s new flagship Mi Note 2, the company also unveiled a brand new concept smartphone called the Mi MIX. Why is it special? Well, it’s got a bezel-less screen and a 91.3% screen-to-body ratio.

As Xiaomi’s CEO Lei Jun talked about the future of smartphones, he sees future handsets as sheets of transparent glass and devices that are all screen and no body. However, he also says that currently, our technology is simply not advanced enough to produce a device like that yet. So, as a step in that direction, Lei Jun revealed the brand new Xiaomi Mi MIX — the company’s experimental concept phone.

This new handset gets its name from Xiaomi’s desire to explore. The ‘MI’ in MIX represents Xiaomi while the X represents the company’s will to explore and push the envelope.

The first thing you’d notice about Xiaomi’s Mi MIX is the fact that it has a nearly bezel-less screen. Save the slim chin, the rest of the handset’s front is occupied by a large 6.44-inch Full HD display that boasts a staggering 91.3% screen-to-body ratio. Because of this massive “edgeless” display, the Mi MIX’s screen breaks away from the traditional 16:9 aspect ratio to a 17:9 aspect ratio instead.

Since the screen takes up the entire smartphone’s top half, Xiaomi had to remove the earpiece and proximity sensor. In its place sits an ultrasonic distance sensor that detects when your ears are near and sends audio through a ceramic acoustic system that vibrates to produce audio.

The front camera has also been relocated to the handset’s bottom chin. Since the chin is so slim, Xiaomi had to redesign a camera module so you end up with a 5-megapixel selfie shooter that’s 50% smaller than your typical selfie camera. You can also rotate the phone entirely to have the camera on top when you want to take selfies so your palm isn’t blocking the lens. The primary camera is a 16-megapixel unit that sits just above the fingerprint scanner at the back of the device.

Besides the attention-grabbing bezel-less screen, the rest of the MIX also holds some surprises. First up, it packs a punch with a 2.35GHz Snapdragon 821 processor, 4GB RAM and 128GB of internal storage. Then you’ve got the all-ceramic body which has a hardness of 8H on Mohs scale. But this isn’t just any ceramic body, this particular smartphone has been designed by world-renown french designer Philippe Starck who’s famous for his incredible design work.

There’s even a more premium Mi MIX 18K with 18K gold accents, 6GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage. No matter which device you pick, you will also get a 4,400 mAh battery inside that has support for Quick Charge 3.0 via a USB Type-C port. This is also a dual-SIM device that supports 2 nano SIMs.

Xiaomi’s Mi MIX will be priced at RMB3,499 (around RM2,146) for the standard model with 4GB of RAM and 128GB of internal storage, while the 18K variant with 6GB of RAM and 256GB of internal storage will be priced at RMB3,999 (around RM2,455).

This smartphone is expected to be available in China on the 4th of November 2016 onwards.