Xiaomi 15 Review
Pros
- Lots of power and smooth performance
- Great battery life
- Comprehensive camera offering
- Nice compact design
Cons
- Seems expensive
- Lots of bloatware
- Camera zoom AI has weaknesses
- Gets warm under load
Key Features
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Review Price: £899
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Snapdragon 8 Elite power There’s loads of power for great performance, giving you a flagship experience.
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Comprehensive Leica camera The triple camera system covers all bases, with plenty of features in the camera app.
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Compact convenience The Xiaomi 15 is a little more compact than many flagships, so for those wanting power without a massive screen, it’s a great choice.
Introduction
Xiaomi’s flagship phones for 2025 fall into the Xiaomi 15 Series, led by the Xiaomi 15 Ultra. This phone, the Xiaomi 15, is pitched as the “regular” phone.
As such, this £899 device squares up against the iPhone 16 (£799) or the Samsung Galaxy S25 (£799), offering a flagship experience in a compact device.
It closely follows the Xiaomi 14 and, like its competitors, there isn’t a huge difference to its forebear, tweaked rather than radically reworked.
What Xiaomi isn’t doing is looking to undercut its rivals. Instead, this device looks to offer more while charging a little more too. That makes for a phone that’s fully packed but perhaps more expensive than you might expect.
Design
- High-strength aluminium frame
- IP68 protection
- Four colours
The design of the Xiaomi 15 hasn’t changed hugely from the Xiaomi 14. It’s characterised by the large square camera module on the rear of the phone with centralised Leica branding – lest you forget – while the phone itself has a flat display, flattened edges and a glass front and back.
The aluminium frame has a matte finish to it, which I prefer to the glossy finish of the Xiaomi 14, as it attracts fewer fingerprints. Although the overall design is flat, the edge of the frame curves nicely into the rear of the phone, so you don’t have the sharp edges that you’d get on iPhone or the Galaxy.
It’s a minor point, but it makes the phone feel a little softer in the hand, because you don’t have sharp edges digging into you.
The Xiaomi 15 comes in four colours, black, white, green and liquid silver. The green I had for review was a very pastel green, more of a hint of mint – and it’s surprisingly close to Samsung’s Mint colour for the S25. The frosted rear of the phone looks great, however, and it’s hard not to see it as anything other than a quality design.
At 8.08mm it would be unfair to call it fat, but it’s a little thicker than the Galaxy S25 and if I’m being honest, I think the Galaxy S25 looks slightly higher quality. At 191g, it’s not too heavy, so it’s an easy phone to slip into your pocket and live with day-to-day.
Protection comes in the form of an IP68 rating, so there’s flagship-grade protection from dust and water ingress, while Xiaomi says that the frame is 33% stronger than previously. It uses Xiaomi Shield Glass for protection, while there’s a case in the box you can slip it into for better protection.
There’s a factory-fitted screen protector which you’ll barely notice and I didn’t find it to pick up dents quite as readily as the Poco X7 Pro that I recently reviewed, suggesting it might be a little stronger. Such screen protectors can save you from scratches, but if you don’t like it, it’s easy to remove.
Screen
- 6.36in AMOLED display
- 3200 nits peak brightness
- Stereo speakers with Dolby Atmos
There’s a 6.36-inch AMOLED display on the Xiaomi 15, with a 2670 x 1200 pixel resolution resulting in a nice, sharp, 461ppi. It’s a flat display, with a single punch hole at the top for the front camera, and thin 1.38mm bezels around the edges. These bezels are universal around the entire display, so it again looks like great quality.
The display has a 1-120Hz refresh rate, with the option to set this to auto, or fix it to a particular refresh rate based on your preference. This is supported by a 300Hz touch sampling rate to make sure that presses are quickly recognised.
Xiaomi offers a range of different colour settings for the display, with the standard “original colour Pro” looking nice and natural, but I bumped it up to the “vivid” setting to bring a little more vibrancy to the colours. That can make things look a little richer (which you may or may not like) and I found that all my content looked great.
There’s a bump over the Xiaomi 14 to 3200 nits, with Xiaomi very much keeping up with the pursuit of higher peak brightnesses. While there’s the benefit of better outdoor visibility through these high brightnesses, it’s really deployed when viewing HDR content, like from that camera.
This gives better impact, meaning those highlights can be even more impactful and create higher contrast in movies and photos. The phone also supports Dolby Vision, HDR10, and HDR10+, which improves performance for streamed movies, HDR photos, and Dolby Vision video that you capture.
I watched some Zero Day from Netflix on the Xiaomi 15 and was impressed by how well it handled dark scenes with flashing highlights. Surviving Black Hawk Down looked great, with the vibrant colours of the present-day interviews really popping through and creating a great contrast to the lower-quality video footage from 1993.
At 6.36 inches, this is clearly a smaller phone and playing Call of Duty Mobile, I found it just a little too small. That’s obviously going to depend on how much space you want for gaming and what you’re playing, but I’d say it’s not a natural choice as a gaming phone because of that smaller display.
There are stereo speakers on the Xiaomi 15 offering Dolby Atmos, which is a little wider and more immersive than the default sound. Interestingly, there’s a toggle for “immersive sound”, which you can turn off when Dolby Atmos is selected, which feels a little like undoing the good that it’s doing. That’s something that seems to plague HyperOS, the skin that Xiaomi uses: there seem to be more options than make sense.
Cameras
- 50MP main, 50MP 2.6x telephoto, 50MP ultra-wide, 32MP front camera
- Leica lenses and Leica filters
- AI editing tools
Xiaomi has pushed the Leica partnership with its phones for a number of generations and that continues with the Xiaomi 15, which is pitched as having “pinnacle photography”. At first glance, the arrangement of these cameras is similar to the Xiaomi 14, but as the company looks to strengthen its position in smartphone photography, it has tweaked the offering slightly to give you a more versatile experience.
That sees the large sensor of the main camera – a 1/1.31in Light Fusion 900 image sensor – which is a rebranded OmniVision OVX900, as found in the Xiaomi 14. This is a great camera, benefitting from a big sensor, meaning it’s got something of a light capture advantage over some rival phones.
The results are generally very good, producing some lovely, detailed, images in good light, and good results in lower light too. The shots look a little saturated to my eyes; photos of the setting sun over New York City look pleasing, but are warmer than they actually were.
Low light photos again seem a little on the warm side too and I noticed that there’s a slight halo effect in bright conditions when something is framed against the sky. This suggests that the post-processing is perhaps a little keen to produce an aesthetically pleasing shot.
That’s what happens if you use the AI enhancement for far zoom too. The zoom is good and out to about 5x zoom you’ll get nice results, but this phone has stepped down from the 3x zoom on the Xiaomi 14 to a 2.6x native zoom on the Xiaomi 15.
I tested the zoom at 30x against the Pixel 9 Pro XL and found the Pixel to generally produce better results, partly because the colour balance was better, but mostly because it produces sharper images. See the photos of the satellite dish as an example, both shot at 30x zoom.
To get around this, Xiaomi offers an AI feature to assist with ultra-zoom photos. This can make an image look noticeably sharper, but it’s at risk of losing real detail. For example, in these photos of the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, the Pixel has preserved details that Xiaomi’s AI has processed away.
This is a double-edged sword: use the AI and you’ll get a shot that looks better – sharper, greater contrast, richer colours, even if it’s inaccurate. Don’t use the AI and you’ll have a softer image that can’t stand up against the best out there.
The front camera is good, but note that if you’re not a fan of beautification, you’ll have to switch this off for each photo mode. The portrait mode is great, giving good edge detection to blur that background, with the option to adjust the bokeh effect either at the time you take the photo, or later in the Gallery.
Xiaomi’s camera offering is comprehensive. There’s a lot of capability in the app, lots of options, including pro mode, Leica filters and a whole lot more. If you love to tinker with the camera, then there’s fun to be had, but if you want the best point-and-shoot experience, you might get better results from a simpler camera elsewhere.
Performance
- Snapdragon 8 Elite
- 12GB RAM, 128/512GB storage
- Can get warm under load
As a 2025 flagship phone, it’s no surprise to find the Snapdragon 8 Elite sitting in the heart of this phone, with 12GB RAM. There are options for 128 or 512GB storage and there are two SIM slots too. If you want eSIM, you’ll have to turn one of those SIM slots off.
As we’ve seen from other 2025 devices like the OnePlus 13 or the Honor Magic 7 Pro, there’s no shortage of power. Everything feels smooth and effortless, games play smoothly and are fast to launch – while I’ve also found this phone to offer a great connection both for data and when making calls.
There’s a compromise that comes with having a more compact handset, because it’s more difficult to cool down. I spent a lot of time using the phone’s hotspot and found that the phone got surprisingly warm. That can also happen when playing intensive games: it’s packed with Xiaomi’s IceLoop cooling system, but it still gets a little warm.
Using the Xiaomi 15 daily gives you the benefit of flagship performance in a phone that’s a little smaller, with so many flagship devices around the 6.7-inch mark.
Software & AI
- Xiaomi HyperOS 2
- Android 15
- Lots of bloatware
Xiaomi has been refining its software offering over the past years, cleaning things up in HyperOS and continuing that with HyperOS 2. For those who are uninitiated, HyperOS is a complete skin on Android that seems to draw some inspiration from iOS in how it presents itself visually and behaves. If you’re looking for a raw Android experience, you won’t find it here.
The biggest thing you’ll notice is that there’s a lot of bloatware, so even on day one, you’ll find the phone has apps on it you might not want. That includes a second app store, AliExpress, Booking.com, Mi Store, Themes, WPS Office, and so on. Some of these you can simply uninstall.
You can also undo some of the changes that Xiaomi makes to the user interface to make it a little more like Android, but the skewed software is part of the experience here.
Xiaomi is promising four years of OS updates and six years of security updates, which is in the middle of the pack. It doesn’t match the seven-year commitment you get from Google and Samsung, but perhaps you need to ask yourself how long you’ll have this phone for. That doesn’t avoid the fact that in four years it will be starting to approach redundancy.
There’s a sprinkling of AI through the experience too, with familiar translation, help writing and Google’s omnipotent Circle-to-Search. But to give Xiaomi its dues, it doesn’t seem to be shouting about AI quite as loud as some other brands, so if you’re not jazzed about AI, you won’t find it constantly prompting you to use AI features. Google’s Gemini is here of course, bringing with it all the AI features that Google offers too.
The most interesting AI features remain the photo editing options in my opinion, letting you expand a scene with AI filling the gaps, enhance the quality (this only works with photos that are bad), erase elements, remove reflections (which is especially useful) and changing the sky. None of this is unique as you’ll find it elsewhere, and you’ll have to use those features within Xiaomi’s Gallery app.
Battery life
- 5240mAh battery
- 90W HyperCharge
- 50W wireless charging
There’s been an increase in battery capacity for the Xiaomi 15, from 4610mAh on the Xiaomi 14 to 5240mAh on the Xiaomi 15. This is supported by 90W HyperCharge wired charging and 50W HyperCharge wireless charging. The former is especially useful as it works with most high-power chargers you’ll have around the home, as there isn’t one in the box in the UK or EU.
You’d need the right charger to get those faster wireless charging rates, but again, this is where brands like Xiaomi have an advantage over the likes of Apple and Samsung. That means you can recharge the phone in a flash, but you might not have to, because the battery life is excellent. I found that I got 41% charge from empty in 15 minutes on a 90W charger, which is a stunning performance.
Over the week I’ve been using the phone, I’ve finished the days easily with 50% left in the battery and then a quick blast sees it back to full again. Even running that hotspot and using the camera intensely for long periods of time saw the Xiaomi 15 exhibit good stamina.
Should you buy it?
Buy if you want a compact powerhouse
This is a powerful phone with great battery life and a comprehensive camera system that challenges some flagship models.
Don’t buy if you want a cleaner software experience
There’s no avoiding the extensive software changes in HyperOS, including bloatware and the reduced update promise – if you want a simpler device, Xiaomi isn’t for you.
Final Thoughts
On one hand the Xiaomi 15 is an iterative device. It looks like the Xiaomi 14 and offers much the same compact flagship phone experience. The day-to-day performance of this phone is great, there’s loads of power (even if it gets a little hot), the battery and charging is excellent and the display is great.
There’s a lot of camera to explore in the Xiaomi 15 with three good lenses, but it’s not best in class across all these lenses and I’d take the Pixel 9 Pro for better telephoto performance.
But the Xiaomi 15 is also curiously expensive: it’s a little more than an iPhone 16, a little more than a Samsung Galaxy S25 and more expensive than the Pixel 9. That might be a hard sell for some people.
Trusted Score
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- Used as a main phone for over a week
- Thorough camera testing in a variety of conditions
- Tested and benchmarked using respected industry tests and real-world data
FAQs
The Xiaomi 15 will receive 4 years of Android OS updates and 6 years of security updates. This doesn’t quite match the promise of 7 years from Google and Samsung, but it’s a good middle of the range offer.
The Xiaomi 15 has an IP68 rating meaning it’s water resistant and dust resistant.
The Xiaomi 15 supports 100W charging, but there’s no charger in the box in many regions.
Test Data
| Xiaomi 15 Review | |
|---|---|
| Geekbench 6 single core | 3032 |
| Geekbench 6 multi core | 9059 |
| 1 hour video playback (Netflix, HDR) | 6 % |
| 30 minute gaming (light) | 4 % |
| Time from 0-100% charge | 72 min |
| Time from 0-50% charge | 21 Min |
| 30-min recharge (no charger included) | 67 % |
| 15-min recharge (no charger included) | 41 % |
| GFXBench – Aztec Ruins | 1 fps |
Full Specs
| Xiaomi 15 Review | |
|---|---|
| UK RRP | £898 |
| Manufacturer | Xiaomi |
| Screen Size | 6.36 inches |
| Storage Capacity | 256GB, 512GB |
| Rear Camera | 50MP + 50MP + 50MP |
| Front Camera | 32MP |
| Video Recording | No |
| IP rating | IP68 |
| Battery | 5240 mAh |
| Wireless charging | No |
| Fast Charging | No |
| Size (Dimensions) | 71.2 x 8.1 x 152.3 MM |
| Weight | 191 G |
| Operating System | HyperOS 2 (Android 15) |
| Release Date | 2025 |
| First Reviewed Date | 02/03/2025 |
| Resolution | 1200 x 2670 |
| HDR | No |
| Refresh Rate | 120 Hz |
| Ports | USB-C |
| Chipset | Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite |
| RAM | 12GB |
| Colours | Black, White, Green, Liquid Silver |
| Stated Power | 90 W |
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