Leveraging on another category for its smartphone department, Xiaomi has officially unveiled its first gaming phone made in collaboration with Chinese company Black Shark Technology, thus its model name “Black Shark.”
Housing a processor apt for its main function, the Xiaomi Black Shark comes with a Snapdragon 845 mobile platform. Some tech and media websites have reported the Snapdragon 845 to be 27% faster than the Kirin 970 chipset of the AI-powered Huawei Mate 10, which partially explains how powerful the said processor is.
The Snapdragon 845 is further complemented with an 8GB RAM + 128GB onboard storage apt for heavy mobile games with rich graphic content. Aside from this, the Black Shark runs on Android 8.1 Oreo, and a 4,000mAh battery.
Adapting one important feature of gaming PCs and laptops, the Black Shark is equipped with an integrated liquid cooling system which is obviously made to prevent overheating. Interestingly, this device has what’s called a Shark key, which when enabled, puts the smartphone into high performance, immersive gaming mode. Another key feature of the Black Shark is its one-sided gamepad which has a separate stamina of 340mAh for an additional gaming time of 30 hours.
In terms of display, the Xiaomi Black Shark has a 5.99-inch FHD+ (2160 x 1080) IPS screen with 2.5D curved glass and Gorilla Glass 5 protection.
No official word yet from Xiaomi regarding the local availability of the Black Shark, but it is now up for pre-order in China with a price of CNY 2,999 for the 6GB RAM + 64GB ROM version, and CNY 3,999 for the 8GB + 128GB ROM variant.
Xiaomi Black Shark specs:
OS: Android 8.0 Oreo
Display: 5.99-inch FHD+ (2160 x 1080) IPs screen with 2.5D curved glass and Gorilla Glass 5
Processor: Snapdragon 845, Octa-core, 2.8GHz
Memory: 6GB/8GB
Storage: 64GB/128GB
Battery: 4,000mAh with Quick Charge technology
Rear Camera: 12-megapixel, f/1.75 aperture + 20-megapixel, f/1.75 aperture dual camera setup
Front Camera: 20-megapixel, f/2.2 aperture
Dimensions: 161.6 x 75.4 x 9.25 mm
Weight: 190g