Chinese device maker Xiaomi is continuing its push to offer decent phones at reasonably low prices. A few months ago the company introduced the Xiaomi Phone 2S with high-end specs and a mid-range $320 price tag.
Now the company is following up with $130 phone called the Xiaomi Red Rice, and while it doesn’t exactly feature top-of-the-line hardware, it’s a surprisingly powerful device for the price.
The Red Rice features a 4.7 inch, 1280 x 720 pixel display, a 1.5 GHz MediaTek MT6589T quad-core processor, 1GB of RAM, 4GB of storage, and a microSD card slot.
There’s an 8MP camera on the back and a front-facing 1.3MP camera.
It runs Xiaomi’s custom version of Android 4.2 called MIUI. It’s a heavily customized version of Android with its own launcher and settings areas as well a few other custom apps including a file manager and media player.
Xiaomi’s new phone is designed for the Chinese market  and supports GSM and TD-SCDMA networks. It has dual SIM card slots.
The phone will be available in black, red, or gray, and Xiaomi will offer battery colors in a range of colors including blue, green, yellow, or pink.
The Xiaomi Red Rice is expected to ship in China August 12th. It’s not clear if you’ll be able to get your hands on one outside of China anytime soon.
Cool phone! We are working on a review about this monster 😉
You think I can buy one in Hong Kong, or only Mainland?
2x SIM rules IPS display and nice design…
Dang, that’s a pretty good phone for $130! I hope it comes to the States.
With aliexpress or other marketplace, you don’t need to hope (as long as you buy from a seller with a good reputation).
the problem of that is the warranty.
Actually problem is 3G compatibility. Normally mediatek phones are 3G compatible but it can be disabled if aimed at China market. When they release an international version in Hong Kong, it will be much more expensive than this.
Actually when the phone went on sale in HK the price was HK$999 = US$129 – the price quoted above. But they claim to have sold out of all 10,000 in 36 seconds… The only person I know who got one had to go over to China to get it..