Xiaomi 13T review - Sbenny’s Blog

Introduction and specifications

This year’s Xiaomi Numeric T series is getting a massive update, bringing it closer to the company’s true flagship lineup. The new Xiaomi 13T and 13T Pro are still considered upper mid-range, or premium midrange, as you prefer to call them. But feature-wise, the duo is now much closer to true flagships. And that’s a good thing.

Xiaomi 13Т review

The Xiaomi 13T and 13T Pro are now launching with a price tag of around €50 more than their predecessors, but that extra money is worth it. Since this is a review of the Xiaomi 13T, we will focus on the Vanilla version, which is slightly different from the Pro version. The company also said that the 13T can be considered the budget version of the 13T Pro. This is probably the reason for where the Vanilla model is sold with only 256 GB of internal memory. A 512GB version would cost the same as a 13T Pro.

The 13T makes do with an inferior, but still quite promising chipset: the new Dimensity 8200 Ultra from MediaTek. It looks like a significant upgrade over last year’s Dimensity 8100 Ultra, at least on paper. The 13T is also satisfied with slower 67W charging. The rest is absolutely identical.

The specifications of the Xiaomi 13T in brief:

Body: 162.2×75.7×8.5mm, 193g; Glass front (Gorilla Glass 5), glass back or silicone polymer back, plastic frame; IP68 dust/water resistant (up to 1.5m for 30 minutes).
Screen: 6.67″ AMOLED, 68B colors, 144 Hz, Dolby Vision, HDR10+, 1200 nits (HBM), 2600 nits (peak), 1220x2712px resolution, 20.01:9 aspect ratio, 446ppi.
Chipsets: Mediatek Dimensity 8200 Ultra (4 nm): Octa-core (1×3.1 GHz Cortex-A78 and 3×3.0 GHz Cortex-A78 and 4×2.0 GHz Cortex-A55); Mali-G610 MC6.
Memory: 256GB 8GB RAM, 256GB 12GB RAM; UFS3.1.
Operating system/software: Android 13, MIUI 14.
Rear camera: Wide (main): 50 MP, f/1.9, 24mm, 1/1.28″, 1.22μm, PDAF, OIS; Telephoto: 50 MP, f/1.9, 50mm, 1/2.88″, 0.61μm, PDAF, 2x optical zoom; Ultra wide angle: 12 MP, f/2.2, 15mm, 1/3.06″, 1.12μm.
Front camera: 20 MP, f/2.2, (wide), 0.8 µm.
Video Capture: Rear camera: 4K@30fps (HDR10+), 1080p@30/60/120fps, gyro-EIS; Front camera: 1080p@30fps, HDR10+.
Drums: 5000mAh; 67W wired, PD3.0, QC4, 100% in 42 minutes (advertised).
Connectivity: 5G; eSIM; Dual SIM; Wi-Fi 6; BT5.4; NFC; Infrared port.
Various: Fingerprint reader (under display, optical); stereo speakers.

Compared to the last two generations, however, the 13T offers a significant upgrade in the display department (it should be considerably brighter now and support a 144Hz refresh rate instead of 120Hz), a more capable and versatile camera setup (finally, the obsolete 8MP ultrawide camera is gone), IP68 certification against water and dust, more premium construction with Gorilla Glass 5 and optional vegan leather back cover, and a more powerful chip. Interestingly, the 12T had 120W fast charging. What’s up with that? Perhaps Xiaomi wanted more of a noticeable difference between the 13T and the 13T Pro.

Arguably, the most notable change in the 13T series is the camera setup. Just like the flagship 13 family, the 13T features Leica-branded lenses along with the usual Leica optimizations for color and processing.

Xiaomi 13Т review

Although with a lower resolution, the 50MP main camera now uses a larger sensor and is aided by another 50MP unit tasked with taking 2x zoom photos. You could argue that 2x zoom is achievable using a simple crop from today’s large sensors, but it’s nice to have at least some sort of dedicated zoom camera rather than not having one at all. Has been a long time. Additionally, the 8MP ultrawide camera has been replaced with a more adequate 12MP ultrawide one. It’s an update we’ve been waiting for for a couple of years now.

Last but not least, Xiaomi now promises not three but four major OS updates and five years of security patches, just like its flagship lines. Xiaomi has put together a pair of very competitive mid-range devices, so the rather minimal price increase of €50 compared to the last generation can easily be overlooked. But as always, the devil is in the details. Let’s dive in.