Xiaomi Redmi Y1 Selfie Smartphone Series Launched in India: Highlights

Xiaomi Redmi Y is the new selfie-focussed smartphone series the brand is launching in India, Manu Kumar Jain revealed at an event in New Delhi. The 'Y' in the new Xiaomi Redmi Y series stands for 'You', the selfie-taking buyer, the company said. At the event, the company launched two phones in the new series, namely Redmi Y1 and Redmi Y1 Lite. Alongside the phones, Xiaomi is releasing the MIUI 9 Global Stable custom Android skin for compatible phones in India starting mid-November. The software build has been optimised to deliver super-fast performance, such as quicker app launches.

Update: Xiaomi Redmi Y1, Redmi Y1 Lite Launched in India: Price, Specifications

Jain said while kickstarting the event that Xiaomi will make a total of four major announcements at the ongoing event. While Xiaomi Redmi Y series was the first to be announced, the company has since shifted its focus to MIUI 9 and is detailing its new features, including dynamic resource allocation and other system t.

The Redmi Y1 has a 5.5-inch HD screen, octa-core Snapdragon 435 chipset, 16-megapixel front camera with selfie light, and 13-megapixel rear camera with PDAF and dual LED flash. It has microSD card support up to 128GB, 4G VoLTE, and 3080mAh battery. The Redmi Y1 price in India for the variant with 3GB RAM and 32GB storage is Rs. 8,999, and Rs. 10,999 for the model with 4GB RAM and 64GB internal storage.

Redmi Y1 Lite has similar features, such as the display size and resolution, battery capacity, microSD card support, and rear camera setup. However, it only has a 5-megapixel front camera with no LED flash, and the quad-core Snapdragon 425 processor. It comes with 2GB RAM and 16GB storage and is priced at Rs. 6,999.

The latest version of Xiaomi's custom Android ROM was first unveiled back in July, and has since been made available in various betas. Xiaomi has confirmed that the release of MIUI 9 Global Stable update, meant for devices outside China, will be announced at Thursday's launch event.

MIUI 9 offers faster app load times (hence the #LightningFast teaser), new design elements, shortcuts on lock screen, split screen feature, smart functionality, and more. Another highlight is the new Image feature search that has the ability to distinguish your images by typing in keywords.

Xiaomi MIUI 9 update will be available for Redmi and Mi phones going back to 2012 models

Also new in MIUI 9 is the Smart Assistant feature will let you search for pretty much anything on your phone and swiping to right on the home screen will bring up the search along with app suggestions, news and other customisable widgets, similar to Apple's Spotlight feature for iOS.

Other new features include a Smart app launcher that suggests apps to launch based on the content on the screen. The latest OS also brings three new themes, No Boundary, Colour Fantasy, and, Cool Black as well as a new default theme. Additional new features include a new design on the lock screen, a new shortcut to activate the torch by swiping right on the lock screen. The split-screen feature that was launched with Android 7.0 Nougat can now be found on MIUI 9 as well.