The Xiaomi Mi Band line of activity trackers have a well-earned reputation for offering a lot of bang for the buck, especially when compared with pricier options like Fitbit products. But the new Xiaomi Mi Band 7 Pro is unusual in that it looks more like a smartwatch than a fitness tracker.
With a 1.64 inch, 280 x 456 pixel AMOLED display packing 326 pixels per inch, the Mi Band 7 Pro is substantially wider than the 1.62 inch, 192 x 490 pixel Mi Band 7 that launched earlier this year. It also has a few extra features.
Those includes an ambient light sensor for automatic screen brightness adjustments plus a built-in received for GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, and other satellite navigation systems.
The wider display allows more information to fit on the screen at once, so Xiaomi has also tweaked the software for its activity tracker, and introduced 180 new watch faces. It supports 117 different exercise modes and, of course, can track steps and sleep quality, a well as your heart rate and blood-oxygen level.
Xiaomi says the Mi Band 7 Pro is waterproof up to 5ATM, which should allow you to wear it while swimming or showering. It has NFC support for mobile payments, among other things. And Xiaomi equips the device with a 235 mAh battery that should offer up to 12 days of battery life with typical use, or up to 6 days with heavy use (taking advantage of all the features like real-time, all-day heart rate tracking).
While the Mi Band 7 Pro doesn’t have all the functionality of a full-fledged smartwatch (like support for third-party apps that run on the device itself), it does support displaying notifications from your phone as well as activity tracking information. And the large screen design not only lets you view more information at a glance, but it also helps the device look more like a watch/fashion accessory than a gadget that you’re obviously only wearing to track your steps or monitor your workout.
The Mi Band 7 Pro is up for pre-order in China for CNY 379 (about $56), but it has a retail price of CNY 400 ($60). It will likely cost a bit more if and when it goes on sale internationally.
I think I’ll just call it a smartwatch anyway. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen watches at a store that billed themselves as smartwatches even though there wasn’t much or any software you could install on them.