Xiaomi is starting to look like a car manufacturer with how many sub-brands it has: Redmi, Poco, Mito, CC, Black Shark, the list goes on. Only one phone was ever released under the Poco name, the wildly-successful Poco F1, which was developed by Xiaomi. Poco is now being spun off as Xiaomi's new sub-brand, with a (somewhat) independent team.
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Like most Chinese manufacturers, Xiaomi's Android phones come with heavy UI customizations and many pre-installed apps featuring advertisements no one asked for — in fact, this release model is part of the reason why Xiaomi is routinely able to undercut its competition in price. However, the company might be too thirsty about collecting personal data to show individualized ads, as its Quick apps application has been blocked by Google Play Protect because of potential tracking issues.
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Chinese Android phone makers have it rough when it comes to bringing on software updates to their customers. There's a totally different expectation as to how long these devices get supported there and the issue gets compounded when taking into account the proprietary UIs and services for each OEM's spin on the OS. In Xiaomi's case, it has taken up the challenge of bringing at least 13 devices up to Android Q over the next year.
Read More![[Update: Widevine L1, 4K60 in stable] Pocophone F1 to soon get 960fps slow-motion and 4K60 recording, Widevine L1 support, and more](https://www.androidpolice.com/wp-content/themes/ap2/ap_resize/ap_resize.php?src=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.androidpolice.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2018%2F11%2Fpoco-f1-hand-3_wm.png&w=728)
$1,000 flagship phones are an unfortunate reality in today's market, but there are plenty of options out there with most of the performance at a fraction of the price. One of the newest entrants to this game has been Xiaomi's Pocophone F1, which offers flagship-level specs at just $300. In case the low, low price wasn't incentive enough to pick one up, the Poco team will be adding a bunch of features and fixes in the coming weeks.
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Xiaomi's Pocophone is the new OnePlus One — a powerful package with a low price tag, and something you shouldn't buy in the US market. While many users decide to flash a custom ROM on this device due to Xiaomi's custom MIUI interface, there is some good software bundled with it that you can even use on other manufacturers' phones. I'm talking about the POCO Launcher, which now includes a dark mode and some other goodies in its latest update.
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The Xiaomi-made Pocophone F1 has been one of the hottest releases of 2018, as long as you live in a region where the phone exists. However, it came with Android Oreo. As you know, Pie is the new hotness, and now the Pocophone is getting its update. No OTA on your end yet? No problem—there's a download option.
Read MoreXiaomi is celebrating a strange milestone today. According to a tweet by the company's global VP, Xiaomi has 700,000 users, which presumably means the company has seen about as many sales. It's an odd milestone to be celebrating — 700K in "over three months" doesn't exactly roll off the tongue — but it's a good indicator of the company's success in its Pocophone experiment, especially when compared to OnePlus.
Read MoreIn the smartphone world, Xiaomi is the epitome of value for money. Now ranked fourth worldwide, it sells nearly one of every ten smartphones. But when companies start operating at such a large scale, the start-up mentality takes a backseat to more important considerations, and innovation can be stifled.
Oppo circumvented it with the "independent" OnePlus, Huawei spun off Honor for Western markets, and Xiaomi is taking an approach somewhere in the middle. Its Poco sub-brand is still under its umbrella and benefits from its resources, but has the advantage of an easily pronounceable name, some creative freedom, and room to fail without hurting Xiaomi's reputation.
Read MoreWe don't often discuss Xiaomi's software layer here on Android Police, but it isn't for lack of desire to. Most of our team lives in the US where Xiaomi doesn't officially operate and, even if we were to import units there, they wouldn't be compatible with most carriers' LTE bands. I'm based in Lebanon, and the first limitation applies here as well, but imported devices do work (we have LTE band 3), so I've been trying to get my hands on some of the companies' phones to test them out.
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Xiaomi's Pocophone F1 has become a popular point of comparison in the Android flagship space, but no less popular is the Poco Launcher, with nearly half a million installs via the early access program on the Play Store, plus an extra third of a million via APK Mirror. Well, it looks like the Poco Launcher has seen enough testing over the last couple of months for Xiaomi to consider it stable, as today's update has lost its previous "beta" label.
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