Xiaomi 14 Civi review: Stylish all-rounder with minor hiccups

Xiaomi 14 Civi handset has debuted in India to fill the void between the Rs 40k and 50k price bracket. The highlights of the smartphone are its style and selfies! But can it carve out its own space in a market brimming with competition? Is it just pretty, or does it offer enough substance to stand out?

Xiaomi 14 Civi is definitely an attractive, bright, lightweight and slim (7.4 mm thick) handset, especially this Matcha Green colour variant. It comes with a combination of different textures like leather finish vertical strip and a matte finish with smooth gradient texture. It is not a fingerprint magnet and a good choice for buyers who are bored of Glossy, black and blue handsets in the market and want to go for something bright. For others, who like stuble colours,  there are options of glossy Cruise Blue or Classic Black variants.

Xiaomi 14 Civi features a 6.55-inch FHD+ AMOLED display that offers a 120Hz refresh rate. I do like the quad-curved display technology that makes it look premium and easy to hold. The vibrant colours, deep blacks, and sharp resolution make watching videos, browsing the web, or playing games smooth.

In terms of chipset, it is powered by the latest Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 processor, the current king of mobile processing power. It manages to handle multitasking, gaming, and scrolling through social media pretty well. It offers up to 12GB RAM and up to 512GB of internal storage. 

The MIUI 14 feels bloated with pre-installed apps like Mi Home, App Vault, PhonePe and so on. However, you can remove them manually, if you want. It supports 67W fast charging and houses a 4,700 mAh battery that can go from 0 to 100 per cent in less than 45 minutes. This sounds good but the competitors like OnePlus 12R that are priced much below this one offer much faster charging speed.

As for the camera, the smartphone comes with a 50MP triple rear camera setup and 32MP dual selfie cameras. In terms of selfies, it captures decent images, even in ultra-wide mode but do not forget to disable the beauty mode first. The rear camera managed to click well-detailed and sharp images, but the colour accuracy was not exactly accurate. However, it is not a deal breaker.

Click here to check the camera samples

The portrait images from the rear or front camera setup also come out quite well, with good subject separation. You will also get bright images in low-light settings but you can sometimes notice that it can loose out on sharpness in such scenarios. Overall, Xiaomi 14 Civi will be a treat for social media enthusiasts.

But should you buy this phone?

The Xiaomi 14 Civi is a stylish phone that offers top of the line chipset with good performance and camera capabilities. For someone who is looking for a good camera phone with eye-catching design can buy it. However, it feels a bit overpriced when compared to competitors like OnePlus 12R that offers faster charging or Samsung Galaxy F55 5G that offers same chipset at a cheaper price point.