In India, Xiaomi has just taken the wraps off the latest upgrade to its mobile operating system – MIUI 7. The ‘global version’ of the OS is touted to be more refined with 30% better response time in launching apps as as well 10% better battery life overall.
MIUI has improved over the last year and with MIUI 7, the new colourful interface will come with better performance, battery-saving optimisations and even more personalisation options.
Hugo Barra, vice president of Xiaomi Global said that MIUI 7 is a “fresh new take on our immensely popular operating system. well-loved by over 150 million users.” Barra also calls it coins it “Yours by Design.”
The beta version will be available starting 24 August, and can be downloaded from the global MIUI site.
Here’s an overview of the new features
System UIs: Themes get even tighter integration with MIUI 7. There are four ‘System UIs’ available when you power up your phone – pink, high-fashion Rose, playful pastel Pink Blush, soft blue Ocean Breeze and brown-gold sophisticated High Life.
Showtime: A playful feature that will debut in India first applies to calls. MIUI 7 lets you set an animated video of your contacts instead of just plain name, number or static profile image.
Auto DND: This feature ties in closely with you Mi Band. When you’re sleeping, Mi Band activates Do Not Disturb (DND) mode and silences your phone. When it detects you’re awake, it disables DND and you’re back in normal mode again.
XXL Text: Some of you may prefer large fonts, and extra large fonts on your phone. In MIUI 7, there’s XXL Text which is a complete rework of the UI to ensure the text is formatted to fit the screen optimally.
MIUI Data Saver: Using Opera Max compression technology, MIUI Data Saver (available worldwide in the coming months) will help you save data across all apps. Data like images and videos will be sent to Opera’s servers, compressed before sending back to your phones. This can give you up to 50% of data savings.
Baby Album: This feature uses face recognition technology to automatically identify babies and group photos together. So you can relive every stage of your children’s lives. Photos can also be set as a slideshow on the lock screen. This feature will be available in India first.
Daily Lockscreen: Variety is a spice of life. With MIUI 7, you can opt to have a new image everyday, automatically chosen from a selection of high quality photographs, including award-winning ones. Again, this feature will roll-out in India first before it becomes available in global markets later.
It’s been a colourful journey for MIUI, from the humble beginnings of just 100 users to the 150 million worldwide to date. Actively incorporating feedback from users since the beginning, Xiaomi has rolled out 250 weekly updates so far, and counting.
