Xiaomi 12 Pro First Impressions: A Slim and Stylish Premium Smartphone

Xiaomi's flagship smartphones have so far been about big numbers and bragging rights. Last year's Mi 11 Ultra (Review) was a perfect example of this. With the new Xiaomi 12 Pro, the company seems to have taken a more subtle approach to a flagship phone. The design of the 12 Pro appears more mature and refined, and there are no headline-grabbing numbers for the cameras or even battery capacity. Xiaomi claims to have worked on delivering better consistency instead. So does this slim and stylish premium smartphone from Xiaomi check all the boxes for a 2022 flagship? Let's take a closer look.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro is available in two variants. There's a base variant with 8GB of RAM priced at Rs. 62,999 and a second 12GB RAM variant priced at Rs. 66,999 in India. Both have 256GB of internal storage and there's no microSD card slot for expansion.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro's body has a slim metal frame sandwiched between two sheets of glass. The display uses Corning's Gorilla Glass Victus, and the back panel is made of Gorilla Glass 5. Both glass panels have curved sides, making it easy to grip this device. At 205g, the 12 Pro surprisingly does not feel too heavy.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro has a 6.72-inch WQHD+ AMOLED display with a 120Hz peak refresh rate

The 6.72-inch WQHD+ E5 AMOLED display has mild curves on the left and right. It has a 120Hz peak refresh rate that can drop down to 1Hz, thanks to the LTPO 2.0 technology. The display is also HDR10+ and Dolby Vision certified, which should make this phone well suited to streaming HDR video. There's also a quad-speaker setup that has been tuned by Harman Kardon.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro runs MIUI 13, based on Android 12. In my limited time with the phone so far, it seems to have most of the Android 12 features in place, but I did notice some preinstalled third-party apps.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro uses Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 SoC, which has been used in nearly every recently launched flagship. There's also a 4,600mAh battery which Xiaomi claims can be fully charged in just 18 minutes when using the included 120W charger in Boost mode. The 12 Pro also supports 50W wireless charging and 10W reverse wireless charging.

The Xiaomi 12 Pro has three rear-facing cameras

The camera setup on the Xiaomi 12 Pro is unique because all three of its rear cameras have 50-megapixel sensors. The primary camera features optical image stabilisation (OIS), the ultra-wide-angle camera has a 115-degree field of view, and the telephoto camera enables 2X optical zoom. A 32-megapixel front-facing camera is in charge of selfies.

As a premium smartphone priced starting at Rs. 62,999 in India, the Xiaomi 12 Pro sure looks the part of a proper flagship. It seems premium and classy, but it's missing one important feature, which is an official IP rating for dust and water resistance. It's a little odd considering some of Xiaomi's budget phones do have IP ratings. This alone could be a deal-breaker for some buyers. I'm also interested to see how Xiaomi's Android 12 implementation compares to Samsung and OnePlus' flagships. If you are interested in this premium smartphone from Xiaomi, stay tuned for my full review, which will be out soon on Gadgets 360.