Xiaomi’s Mi A1 with Android One coming to Malaysia in September

Launched a few days ago to great fanfare in India, Xiaomi’s latest phone the Mi A1  is also their inaugural entry to the Android One programme. For the uninitiated, that means the phone runs a stock version of Android, in this case Nougat 7.1 out of the box with upgrades for at least two years down the line which ought to encompass Android Oreo and Android P.

Externally, the M1A1 comes in three different colours, black, rose gold and gold with a polished, elegant looking external all-metal chassis that incorporates subtle antenna bands on the top and bottom. The phone comes with a front facing 5.5-inch Full HD LCD display and sports a power efficient Snapdragon 625 2.0GHz octacore processor under the hood paired with 4GB RAM and 64GB of expandable storage to the tune of a microSD card that supports up to 128GB cards.

The rear comes with a dual camera setup, with both sporting 12-MP sensors with one camera coming with a wide angle lens and the other with a 12-MP 2x optical zoom lens with both working together to snap the now obligatory shots with sweet looking bokeh. The front has a more common 5-MP selfie camera. Other mod-cons include the obligatory fingerprint sensor plonked on the rear and an IR blaster with one of the few concessions added to the stock Android experience in the form of their Mi Remote app. Keeping it all powered is a 3,080mAh battery via a USB Type C port. The M1 A1 is slated to arrive in Malaysia sometime in late September in both online and traditional brick-and-mortar stores though no price has been announced as yet.