samsung vs xiaomi  

 

So we're just over a month into 2021 and yet already a couple of massive

heffier style flagship smartphones have launched globally and i've got them

right here in my sweaty little mitts i'm talking about the galaxy s21 from

samsung and xiaomi's me 11. now that galaxy s21 marks a change in strategy for samsung

with stripped-down specs accompanying a reduced asking price at least compared with previous galaxy s series handsets but this we blighter still costs from 769 quid so it in exactly wallet friendly meanwhile xiaomi's me 11 flagship boasts super premium specs and features and yet it still manages to keep the price down to reasonably sane levels making it very stiff competition for that samsung s21 so the grand question is which one is

more deserving of a space in your bag pants well let's do a full side-by-side

comparison of the galaxy s21 and the xiaomi mi 11 for the camera tech.

              The performance the battery all that good stuff to see which one might be best for you i've done a full review of both of these smartphones as well right here on textbook and for all the latest greatest tech please do poke subscribe and ding that notifications bell

cheers all righty then so stick the xiaomi mi 11 next to the samsung galaxy s21 and

the differences are fairly freaking obvious to begin with the physicality is obviously quite

quite different so if you are looking for a compact smartphone do i even need to see it the galaxy s21 is going to be your obvious choice it's just 6.2 inches compared with the 6.81 inch behemoth.

                That is the xiaomi mi 11. the galaxy s21 is considerably lighter than the mi 11 as well just 172 grams versus 196 grams i mean let's face it the mi 11 is about as easy to grapple with one-handed as an i-rate badger covered in lard and while both these smartphones have a one-handed mode it's definitely much easier to implement.

                Here on the galaxy s21 compared with the me 11. if you flip them around we'll see that around the back end you've got a frosted finish on both the me11 and the galaxy s21 that sort of glossy shiny finish seems to be falling out of fashion these smartphones do use different materials for the back end however you've got an old glass finish here on the xiaomi mi 11 although they're a bit big in the specs about which kind of glass it actually is here on the samsung galaxy s21 it's their glastic material which is basically a hybrid of

glass and plastic.

               But regardless in both cases the mi 11 and the galaxy s21 are both resistant to

scratches and scuffs and also greasy prints so you can fondle them as much as you want and they'll only need the occasional bit of buffing up as few color choices well samsung's

flagship is available in white or black and you've also got a pink or this brand new phantom violet color as well if you want something a bit more vibrant whereas the mi 11 comes in either midnight gray or this horizon blue variety i actually quite like the horizon blue as you can see there's got a gradient style finish very subtle indeed but xiaomi is also promising that more colors will be coming soon as well to the global market so fingers crossed some more vibrant options soon.

              Now both the galaxy s21 and the xiaomi me 11 sport but a gorilla glass victus

covering that screen which is great news because not only is it highly scratch resistant

but also it's drop proof as well certainly a lot more drop proof than previous versions of gorilla glass so in their lab conditions they can survive drops up to around two meters

which is pretty impressive stuff so hopefully no cracks nor shattering anytime soon and you also get a pre-installed screen protector on both of these as well for added reassurance just in case that victus wasn't enough for you unfortunately the mi 11 doesn't support the full ip68 water and dust resistance.

                That the galaxy s21 does so if you want a smartphone you can take into a nice

hot bubbly bath for a chill netflix session or something like that then the s21 is your

huckleberry now both of these smartphones are graced with a nice bit of android 11 fresh out of the box that's the latest version of google's os however while on the surface they appear quite similar they offer a similar sort of layout you've got an app store on both all that sort of good stuff you will find that they are quite different once you dive into them a bit more because on the galaxy s21 you've got samsung's on one ui and then it's version three and in the case of the xiaomi mi 11 you've got xiaomi's own miui 12 launcher now for the most part they do offer.

                Slightly different versions of the same features for instance and always

on display you've got plenty of customization options as well you can completely configure

uh the desktops to look and feel exactly how you want you can also of course obviously add on your own launcher if you're not happy one of the differences between one ui and miui 12 is that samsung seems to have gone out of its way to duplicate services that you've already got on android so you've got samsung's own browser samsung's on app store samsung pay as well as google pay of course you've got good old bigsby the bixby assistant on top of the google assistant it just goes on and on thankfully xiaomi doesn't go to those extreme levels like samsung but here on miui 12 you will find an awful lot of crap wear pre-installed on this may 11. you go

                 Lots of rubbish little games that come pre-installed settle you've got like a tetris rip-off thing you've got the opera browser so a bit of duplication there you've got like

some tick-tock and all this crap on there thankfully the good news is the vast majority of it can be uninstalled so facebook off you time for the dust to settle on you dust settle now in recent years a massive spotlight has rightly been trained on privacy issues with smartphones xiaomi is definitely trying to do.

                Its part when it comes to privacy and protecting your personal data so for instance when you're sharing photos from the me 11 you can now say if you want the likes of location data all that metadata stuff to be ripped out from your photo before you share it that

said for the more security and privacy conscious of you out there i definitely recommend samsung's galaxy s21 out of this pair because of samsung's

                Excellent knox security suite which basically offers top level encryption for all of your privates all of that good stuff now on the subject of security both of these smartphones have an in-display fingerprint sensor it's an optical sensor here on the me 11 and it's an ultrasonic scanner here on the galaxy s21 ultrasonic is supposed to be more accurate because it actually takes a 3d image of your fingerprint gotta say they've had absolutely zero issues with either of these smartphones that fingerprint sensor is fast it's reliable as you can see there

                You just straight into your desktops uh i've rarely had any of them crap out of me unless my hands are like really dry or really wet and just in case your hands are soggy or

whatever you can't use that fingerprint sensor we've got face recognition on both of these as well so just tap that power button and as you can see on both the galaxy s21 and the mi 11 instantly recognized and straight into those desktops nice again fast and reliable both of these smartphones are dual sim as well and you've got a choice for either 128 gig

or 256 gigs of storage with either as well but no micro sd memory card support to expand

so let's move on to the display tech and on the samsung galaxy s 21 you got that

compact 6.2 inch dynamic amoled 2x display on the xiaomi mi 11 it is a whopper of a

6.81 inch but it's amoled tech once again now one of the big controversies is while the mi 11 has quad hd plus resolution visual samsung has dropped that res from quad hd plus to

full hd plus for the s21 and yeah we've got smaller dimensions here so the difference in resolution is less obvious than you might expect.

                You will definitely notice finer detail on that xiaomi mi 11 when you get in

close but of course the quality of your visuals go far beyond just the resolution the good

news is that both of them are hdr certified so the likes of netflix you can play hdr content

i definitely enjoyed the crazy sharp contrast while watching video on both of these blows although i've got to say i prefer the color reproduction on the galaxy s21 both of these

smartphones do have color settings you can play around with to either make it more natural and more vibrant looking certainly on the vibrant settings.

                The s21 those visuals really really popped they were absolutely stunning a noise as far as the pig brightness goes because if you bump up thebrightness levels on both of these smartphones these screens won't just lazy your eyes to bits they'll probably burn a hole

right through your skull so definitely no worries if you're trying to get good visibility on a

bright sunshiny day and on the flip side the brightness goes all the way down when you need it to as well and you've also got the usual eye comfort modes and all that shenanigans so you can get a nice comfortable viewing at night as i briefly mentioned with both the

me11 and the galaxy s21 you can dive into the display settings you've got the likes of the light and dark mode you can play around with and plenty of other screen customization so yeah you can produce really poppy vivid in your face colors or more natural looking colors you can also play around with the color temperatures on both of these blurs and the other big whip is that you've got a 120 hertz mode on both of these smartphones as well of course

the me11 can run at 120 hertz on that top quad hd plus resolution as well which is something that samsung's flagship phones struggled with in the past let's move on to audio and it's a stereo speaker setup on both the mi 11 and the galaxy s21 so let's test them out starting with the me11 photos and videos and from one of the latest greatest tech please

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                 Now one of the best camera phones around right now is definitely google so here on the me 11 there's a clear imbalance between the top speaker and the bottom speaker that

top speaker is really tinny and quite quiet in comparison with that one minus v if you just muffle that you can quite clearly notice the difference between the two but at least on top volume as long as you don't muffle that bottom speaker you get a nice crisp reasonably clear output and now let's try the same but with the galaxy s21now one of the best camera phones around right now is definitely google's pixel 4 rear which costs 350 quid and yes fair enough so the galaxy s 21s or your via those speakers definitely a lot quieter than the mi 11 i guess because it's more compact smartphone it can't produce quite as much power but it is a bit more balanced that audio as well the top speaker isn't a complete cop out like it is on the mi 11.

                Unfortunately though neither of this pair has a headphone jack come on samsung

come on xiaomi why why do you not put headphone jacks on your flagship smartphones goddammit why are you not like jack still the good news is i've had no trouble using bluetooth with either of these smartphones you've actually got full high-res audio and ldac support here on the me11 as well so absolutely stunning audio coming out of that now

when it comes to the performance it's a very different state of affairs on the galaxy s21 and the xiaomi mi 11 as well here on the galaxy s21

                You've got samsung's very own exodus 2100 chipset it's a 5 nanometer chipset

at least you do here in the uk in other regions i believe you get the snapdragon 88 which is actually what you find bundled here in the me 11 another 5 nanometer platform as you can see quite different scores when you run a bit of geekbench on both of these blows as well i run these tests this morning uh as you can see the multi-core score is significantly better

here on the m11 with that snapdragon 8088 and the single core score also beats the single core here on the exynos as you can see there it gigs around on both of these as well i don't believe that either of them has a choice of uh something different in any region i gotta say that the everyday experience in both them is absolutely fine you know you tap an app

and it just loads straight up no hassle no worries i haven't seen any you know judders or anything on either of these blowers when it comes to gaming i've already noticed that the

xiaomi mi 11 with that snapdragon 88 is better than the galaxy s21 with its exynos chipset

uh the likes of gentian impact are really really demanding resource intensive gear just runs that little bit smoother on the mi 11 you'll see a few little jutters certainly on that higher detail setting on the s21 a couple of little jotters here and then on the m11 it's not perfect by any means but it's certainly a lot less noticeable the good news for gamers is that both these smartphones come with their own built-in gaming mode that likes a game turbo here on the mi 11 you just drag out this little menu at any point and that just allows you to help block

notifications you can record your screen all that good stuff you've got a similar thing here on the samsung galaxy s2 on the game booster feature but it's slightly more awkward you've got to drag out the notifications bar to actually access it and then it pops up on screen

like so this gives you likes the priority mode which again blocks all notifications you've got a few other little tools that you can mess around with as well monitoring your temperature and your resources opening other apps uh in little mini displays yada yada in the case of the m11 you don't have an entirely flat display unfortunately uh but touchwood so far it hasn't impacted on my gameplay i've still found everything's perfectly playable it's actually got a 480 hertz touch sampling rate here on the meat 11 as well so every swipe and pork is instantly replicated on screen here on samsung's galaxy s21 it's a 240 hertz touch sampling rate so it certainly seems a lot more inferior on paper but i've got to tell you i didn't really notice any proper difference maybe a professional esports gamer or something would be able to

                To notice the difference between this one and that one uh personally i thought

was absolutely fine and good news for that network gaming with both these blogs as well because they've both got integrated 5g on those platforms it's not even a separate modem it's actually built into those chipsets you've also got full wi-fi 6 support as well that's for the batteries well it's a 4000 milliamp cell stuffed inside the s21 is a bigger 4600 milliamp however in the mi 11. it's kind of understandable because it is a bit of a unit and i have found so far in my everyday testing that the meal 11's battery life is definitely better than the s21s the s21s to be honest sometimes i struggle to make it through a full day on a charge again this is the exodus model not the snapdragon 88 version whereas i found that as long as i don't go absolutely nuts for that gentian impact a fully charged me11 will see me through the full day no worries although it won't last very long into a second day unless you're

super super conservative and when they are both dreams when it comes to charging them back up again while xiaomi

                Smartphone is once again the winner you've got 55 watt wide charging and

frankly bonkers 50 watt wireless charging on this bad boy as well so it is significantly faster

than the s21 just an hour either plugged in or on a wireless charging pad will give you a full charge no worries whereas not only is the samsung galaxy s21 slower than the mate 11 but also you'll have to provide your own charger because there's not even one stuffed in the box

now both of these handsets also boast a triple lens rear camera slapped around back with quite a funky camera design the samsung galaxy s21

                Relies on a 12 megapixel primary lens which apparently uses sony's imx 555 sensor the same as the older s20 with built-in optical image stabilization in the case of the mi 11 it's a 108 megapixel primary sensor using samsung's own hmx tech again with built-in ois now there's not a huge amount of difference in everyday snaps here s21tends to produce more natural looking colors in bright conditions while the mi 11 can slightly over saturate an image instead on the flip side though the mi 11 captures a little more detail which is

especially noticeable when blowing up your photos with close-ups the s21 does a better job

than the m11 on that auto mode but the mi 11 does have a secret weapon in its super macro mode using the special telemacro lens more on that in a bit the me11 and the galaxy s21 both do a sterling job with portrait shots you get clean edge capture and a wonderful bokeh style blur yum with night shots though the me 11 is the clear winner here the galaxy s21 often struggles to focus

                In really low light and produces dark fuzzy shots on that auto mode while the mi 11 focus is accurate and the results are definitely impressively bright albeit rather grainy

switch to the dedicated night mode and samsung definitely narrows the gap significantly but you still get the occasional out of focus shot and the mi 11 once again wins for

overall brightness and tone accuracy now both of these smartphones also boast an ultra wide angle lens a 12 megapixel on the s21 and a 13 megapixel on the me 11. and here the mi 11 actually produces more natural looking images but both do an absolutely fine job as for those third and final lenses well here on the samsung galaxy s21 is a 64 megapixel telephoto lens although it doesn't offer much at all in the way of optical zoom what it's doing is basically cropping into your shots relying on that high megapixel count and here on the xiaomi mi 11 it's a 5 megapixel tele macro lens it can be used for those extreme close-ups as well as zoom shots and there's no doubt at all

                That the galaxy s21 is better at the zoom shots both of them can go up to 30

times zoom max but when you hit that 10 times level the mi 11 is already struggling while the s21 shots are still looking okay boost beyond that though and you'll get grainy results with either smartphone now both of these smartphones can shoot home movies and a rather impressive 8k resolution if that's your bag otherwise a slightly more sedate 4k resolution at

either 30 or 60 frames per second i gotta say though for added flexibility i do really like the galaxy s21 and it's single take mode which takes a whole heap of photos and videos at the same time

                When you hit that shutter button or rather it takes one long video and then

creates a whole bunch of photos and videos from that footage and you got plenty of bonus mods with both these handsets as well you've got a full-on pro modes for your photos here on the xiaomi mi 11 you've actually got pro mode for your photos as well as your videos here on the s21 and if you dive into the more section well as you can see you've got

absolutely tons of stuff on both of these blows so you can do the usual slow mo time lapse all that good stuff then around front the galaxy s 21 has a 10 megapixel selfie cam that's trumped by the miele ovens 20 megapixel effort but both capture perfectly detailed snaps of

your mug complete with a portrait mode for blurry shenanigans that is once again completely spoojorific so there you have it there is my full in-depth comparison between the xiaomi mi 11 and the samsung galaxy s21 my voice is now gone i'm absolutely knack and i'm gonna go collapse on a heap face first somewhere but be great at your own thoughts uh before i go down below in the comments please do uh let me know which one is your own personal favorite and why please do poke subscribe and ding that notifications bell if you

haven't already and have yourselves a fantastic rest of the week cheers everyone love you