Xiaomi like every Chinese Android OEM has modified the Android OS to make it look and feel like an IOS. However, things are slowly starting to change. MIUI 9 continuation on Xiaomi’s journey to differentiate itself from the competition and it also takes some big steps towards a move away from the IOS aesthetics!
MIUI 9, at least on my phone is on Android 7.1.2, and for the first time ever! Xiaomi gives us all the features in the latest and greatest version of Android and then adds a few touches of their own. It adds a completely new icon design, which are big improvements over the IOS esque icons of the previous version of MIUI. Not only that there are plenty of goodies in this feature-packed new update!
Split mode makes its first appearance on MIUI, it allows you to use multiple apps at the same time. And I will admit to not using it. But, it feels good to have it handy if I need.
The feature which I use the most could also be the most minor change in the update. It is the ability to double tap the recent/function key to switch between two apps! It improves my productivity significantly!
Then there are the improvements to the lock screen, where now swiping left brings you to a settings panel. Here you can turn on the flashlight or open remotes. Notifications also seem to appear better.
Add to that dope new screenshot editing tools! These tools allow you to add text, doodle, crop or even add arrows to point to sections on your screenshot. The ability to scroll and take a screenshot of things like a whole web page is just icing on the cake.
And if these visible changes were not enough, there are plenty of under the hood changes. These changes bring significant improvements to the day to day operations! I see significant improvements in App load times and battery life. Both are crucial to the longevity of your device.
Even with all the positive changes which MIUI 9 brings, it still has plenty of eyesores to fix. The biggest of the eyesore would be the notifications. Notifications are plain ugly in MIUI and have been for some time. The ability to directly reply to a text from notifications is something which I use like crazy on stock Android, but here I just choose to ignore the feature. Because, it requires you to do a two finger swipe on the notification to reveal an ugly reply button, which you then press to reply to a text. It both looks and feels horrible. I hope Xiaomi fixes this in its next iteration of MIUI or even better switches to the stock notification shade.
I still hate the home screen experience of MIUI. I just do not like to have all my junk out in the home screen for everyone to see. On a side note, I will also love to have to ability to hide Apps from the home screen. And while we are on that, Xiaomi if you are going to copy IOS, then copy its good features and allow the users to remove all the useless and barebones bloatware, which you preload on our phones. I mean why make your own mail App if you are going to preload Gmail? It is a waste of resources. The same is with the Music, Gallery and Notes! Why harass the end user and create confusion? Just stick with the Google ones. Or allow us to remove the Google ones! The preloaded App situation is a hot mess on Android!
Next up is Camera, if you are gonna go through the difficulty of making your own camera App, then make sure it is good! The camera experience on MIUI is barebones with little to no manual options at least on my phone! Competitors offer way more advanced manual options then Xiaomi.
Now to end this long praise turned rant, I would like to add MIUI is good! However, it has some major flaws which its makers seem to ignore. These flaws have been with the OS for some time now and demands to be fixed!
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