The MWC 2026 event in Barcelona has started. No time was wasted; the company immediately introduced the Xiaomi 17 and Xiaomi 17 Ultra to the global market. Both were out in China before MWC, so their specs aren’t really a surprise. They did, however, reduce the battery capacity on these international variants. You’ll find the details below.
Xiaomi 17 Ultra
The camera setup on the Ultra is a technological marvel in our books. They crammed in a 50MP 1” type sensor on the back, which is a Light Fusion 1050L outsole with LOFIC HDR. This is placed right next to the ultrawide 50MP (115°) lens. The selfie camera is also 50MP.
But these other lenses pale next to the giant 200MP (1/1.4”) periscope telephoto camera on the Xiaomi 17 Ultra. This sensor has a smooth variable zoom from 75 mm to 100 mm. Well, all the cameras here are unforgivably massive, so the plateau sticks out more than usual.
The rest of the chassis goes down from 9.4mm to 8.3mm thin on the Xiaomi 17 Ultra. This newcomer’s screen won’t be as sharp as 15 Ultra. They demoted it to 1.5K (2608 × 1200p) resolution, though it does allow for more battery saving. It’s still a 6.9” M10 OLED with LTPO 1-120Hz refresh rate and Dolby Vision/HD10+ rating.
The local peak brightness has leveled up to 3500 nits this time. Drop resistance is a little better due to the Xiaomi Ceramic Shield Glass 3.0. The hot topic was actually the battery on this global 17 Ultra variant. The original had a 6800mAh cell, but they’ve reduced it to 6000mAh globally.
It still draws 90W from the wall, and the wireless coil hits 50W input. Of course, Xiaomi 17 Ultra also has a camera kit, and there’s an extra 2000mAh capacity onboard. The phone covers all the flagship basics: dual speakers, Bluetooth 6, WiFi 7, and even an ultrasonic fingerprint ID is present here.
Let’s not forget that this handset is run by the world’s fastest Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip made for Android. Xiaomi 17 Ultra’s price tag will put a serious dent in one’s wallet, though. It’s 16GB/512GB trim sits at €1499 (~PKR 494,000).
Xiaomi 17
The basic version doesn’t have a 200MP camera, but it does have the same Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chip at 4.6GHz. This is a flagship device, and has the new Hyper OS 3 Android 16 firmware built in. The chip allows for UFS 4.1 storage speeds. One thing that’s different about the global version is the battery.
The original Chinese Xiaomi 17 has a 7000mAh cell onboard. But the global version dropped it to Si/C 6330 mAh. That didn’t affect the charging speeds, which is good news. There’s a 100W fast charging backup here with a 50W wireless coil.
A rear 50MP camera trio is found on the basic Xiaomi 17. There’s a main 50MP lens, next to a 50MP ultrawide. The telephoto lens is a 60mm 2.6X zoomer at 50MP resolution. Then comes the selfie shooter, which is also 50MP. All sensors record 4K@60 or 8K@30 FPS.
The screen here is a compact 6.3” AMOLED at 120Hz. This has an LTPO refresh rate. The resolution is 1.5K, and Xiaomi has its own Shield Glass guarding it. This newcomer only scored an IP68 rating, which is a bit weaker than Ultra’s IP68/IP69 rating.
It has all the flagship essentials. Xiaomi 17 is built around dual speakers and WiFi 7, with ultrasonic fingerprint ID and a display-out 3.2 USB port. And yes, this newcomer also has the Infrared remote. The global price of Xiaomi 17 (12/256GB) base trim is €999 (~PKR 329,000).
