Xiaomi mi a2 review in Spanish (complete analysis)

Xiaomi Mi A2 technical characteristics

Unboxing

The Xiaomi Mi A2 is committed to the usual presentation of the Chinese brand. The smartphone comes in a fairly small cardboard box with a predominant white color. The box is made of very hard cardboard, which guarantees great protection until it reaches the hands of the end user. The box informs us of the most important characteristics and specifications, in addition to showing a high-resolution image of the terminal.

Once we open the box we find everything perfectly arranged so that it does not move during transport, something key to avoid any type of damage. In total we find the following bundle:

Xiaomi Mi A2. Protective Case. Power Adapter. USB Charging Cable. SIM Tray Extractor. Quick Manual.

Design

We can see that the bezels are very thin, something that is key to include such a large screen in a compact terminal.

Xiaomi Mi A2 does not include physical buttons for the operating system, something that allows you to take advantage of the front surface in a much more efficient way to place a large screen without the device being too large. This means that we will have to use the virtual buttons of Android.

At the top of the front is a 20-megapixel camera, which ensures high quality in seflies and video conferences. This camera does not have a flash. At the bottom we find the USB Type-C connector, which we will use to charge the 3010 mAh battery of this terminal.

This battery has Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 technology, which will allow us to always have it ready to leave the house, in our tests we will check how long it takes to charge this battery.

On the right side we find the buttons for the volume and the on / off of the terminal, all of them are metallic and have an excellent touch.

As for the left side, we find the tray for the cards. To remove it, we must use the included tool, it is the typical skewer that all mobiles usually carry with this type of tray. This time two Mano SIM slots are offered, without any possibility of expanding the storage.

The removal of the 3.5mm jack is striking, something that will force us to use headphones with bluetooth operation or a USB Type-C connector. This also means that we have to depend on an external DAC to listen to music, since the signal that comes out of the USB connector is digital, and must be converted to analog.

screen

Xiaomi Mi A2 is a smartphone made with a high quality aluminum body, we have the blue version that is really beautiful. Xiaomi has worked hard to maintain measurements of 15.80 x 7.50 x 0.73 cm and a weight of only 168 grams.

The terminal includes a large 5.99-inch screen, which is based on IPS technology and follows the fashion of opting for an 18: 9 format, which translates into a resolution of 2, 160 x 1080 pixels with a 77% surface area. Useful. The use of IPS technology guarantees high image quality, with very vivid colors and perfect viewing angles.

If you wear polarized sunglasses, you will not be able to see the smartphone vertically. You will have to use it horizontally.

It is also important to note that it is a 2.5D ptanlla protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 5. If you go outside, the operating system calibrates the automatic brightness very well. As always, do we recommend buying a tempered glass to avoid any disappointment?

Sound

The sound perfectly meets being a mid-range smartphone. It is heard loud, clear and crisp. It is positioned in the lower area of the keyboard (next to the USB Type-C plug) and when we play any video, series or music it sounds great. Without a doubt, sound is one of its strong points.

As we do not have a 3.5mm miniJack connection, we have to use the adapter that it incorporates or, alternatively, acquire bluetooth headphones to listen to music and charge at the same time. We did not like this section and we believe that the disappearance of the Jack connection in the mid-range is an error.

performance

Inside is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 660 processor, it is a very powerful model with great energy efficiency thanks to the manufacturing process at 28 nm FinFET. This processor is made up of eight Kryo 260 cores, which are divided into two blocks of four each that operate at frequencies of 1.8 GHz and 2.2 GHz. The graphic part is provided by the Adreno 512 GPU, a unit which guarantees great performance in all Google Play games.

This processor is accompanied by 4 or 6GB of RAM and 32, 64 or 128GB of internal storage. We have the version with 4 GB of RAM and 32 GB of internal memory, some characteristics that are enough to take full advantage of it, although we recommend that you go for a 64 GB or 128 GB unit since the internal memory is not expandable through micro SD. 4 GB of RAM is more than enough to guarantee a good multi-task and day to day.

Although the benchmarks are of little use to assess whether a smartphone is worth it or not. With AnTuTu we have managed to reach 114, 246 points. But the reality is that both the operating system, applications and heavy use of gaming are superfluous. Largely due to the good set of processor and RAM.

The fingerprint reader works great and we have hardly had any errors. For a week we will have had two errors and that we use the phone a lot. Facial recognition is good but also not for rocket fire. In nighttime situations it happens frankly but during the day it is more than enough, it is one more option to unlock your smartphone.

OS

This Xiaomi Mi A2 is managed by the Android 8.1 Oreo operating system, which means that it is up to date. Being an Android One model it comes without MIUI, and it has guaranteed updates direct from Google and for a period of two years, which means that you will receive up to Android 10, and three years in security patches. We have a mobile for a while!

It brings us the super clean operating system and only brings us three applications pre-installed: Xiaomi Store, my Drop and Mi Community. That if you do not feel like having them, you can eliminate it without any problem.

The experience has reminded us of the one offered by any Pixel smartphone on the market (saving the differences) or the old Nexus 4 or 5 at the time. And we believe that it is the new Nexus 4 that fascinated us so much in its time. Good pretty and cheap.

Camera

The back offers us a double camera along with the fingerprint sensor to manage the terminal with greater security and comfort. Xiaomi Mi A2 comes with a dual rear camera consisting of a 12-megapixel primary sensor (Sony IMX486 Exmor RS) and a 20-megapixel secondary sensor (Sony IMX376 Exmor RS) both with a f / 1.75 focal length.

It is an excellent combination, which will make us not miss our compact camera most of the time. The presence of two sensors will allow us to take photos with a very good portrait effect, something that is fashionable. The camera is accompanied by a dual-tone LED flash, something that will allow for more natural colors in photos.

How do these cameras perform? It is a real blast that a mid-range smartphone performs so well during the day and night. I come from a Samsung Galaxy S8 and I have not missed it very much. During the day we were able to take photos.

While at night with some light it has been great. Perhaps in the recording it is not the best of its range but it is not out of place. We believe that it is one of the terminals to take into account and at the moment our favorite in the mid-range with the Honor 10.

It also has a front to take selfies or video conferences with a sharpness of 20 Mpx and a 2.0 focal length. Yes, it is not the best we have tried but it works very, very well. The photographic section is the biggest improvement we have seen compared to the Xiaomi Mi A1. Yes… installing the GCAM application improves it, but not as much as this Xiaomi Mi A2 natively.

Battery

Although its 3, 010 mAh allows us to have the day perfectly, even giving it intensive use, it has left us with a bittersweet taste. It is the black mole of this device, since having the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 in the market we took those 11 hours of screen, we have spent only 5 hours and very little screen.

We know that there is no perfect smartphone and even less in this price range. But if Xiaomi had bet on 4000 mAh right now we would be talking about the most important flagship of this year. What do you think?

Connectivity

As for connectivity, the Xiaomi Mi A2 includes GPS, AGPS, GLONASS, BDS, bluetooth 5.0 and WiFi ac, as we see it is very well served although, as expected, it comes without NFC.

Regarding coverage, it is compatible with all the most important bands, including the 800 MHz band for 4G in Spain.

2G: GSM 1800MHz, GSM 1900MHz, GSM 850MHz, GSM 900MHz 3G: WCDMA B1 2100MHz, WCDMA B2 1900MHz, WCDMA B5 850MHz, WCDMA B8 900 MHz 4G LTE: FDD B1 2100MHz, FDD B2 1900MHz, FDD B20 800MHz, FDD B3 1800 1700MHz, FDD B5 850MHz, FDD B7 2600MHz, FDD B8 900MHz, TDD B38 2600MHz, TDD B40 2300MHz

We have hardly had any loss of coverage, except on one occasion and we think it was because of Lowi, but overall everything has been very smooth and uncut. If you are from Lowi you have to configure the APN manually.

Final words and conclusion about Xiaomi Mi A2

Xiaomi has listened to the community and brings us a long-awaited renewal. With the battling Snapdragon 660 processor, 4 GB of RAM, 32 or 64 GB of internal memory, a much improved camera, with the essence of Android One and a chassis of very beautiful colors (this blue makes us fall in love) are its most notable features.

We found several improvements for future reviews… The battery lasts the day but we can not ask for miracles (5 hours of screen), that it does not have NFC, minijack 3.5 output or not having the possibility of expanding the internal memory through microSD can throw us to back . But the mobile does not lag, it positions the GPS very well, it takes scandal photos day and night and it has very good coverage in 3G / 4G.

We recommend you read the best mid-range smartphones

Is the Xiaomi Mi A2 really worth it? If you have a tight budget and do not want to spend more than 300 euros, you do not have many rivals currently (and less with Android One). We would only value the acquisition of the Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 or the Honor 10, the first has MIUI and the second currently costs 399 euros with an intrusive layer such as EMUI.

Another thing that we think can be improved is the LED message indicator that is white. We ask ourselves: Why is it not RGB or does it allow multiple colors? Another possible improvement for the future Mi A3.

Currently we find it in Spanish stores for a price of 249 euros for the 4 GB version of RAM and 32 GB of internal memory (the one analyzed) or 279 euros for the 4 GB version of RAM and 64 GB of internal memory. We think it is a very good price, but in Chinese stores we run into some groundbreaking prices .

ADVANTAGE	DISADVANTAGES
+ DESIGN AND COLORS AVAILABLE	- BATTERY AUTONOMY IS RIGHT FOR THE DAY
+ ENOUGH POWER FOR ANY USER	- NO NFC
+ ANDROID ONE	- NO MINIJACK 3.5
+ VERY GOOD CAMERA	- NO POSSIBILITY TO EXPAND WITH MICROSD
+ VERY GOOD FOOTPRINT READER AND FACIAL RECOGNITION AVAILABLE