It is confirmed that Xiaomi will be releasing the Mi 5 after the Chinese New Year holidays in China, but it seems like the Mi 5 isn’t Xiaomi’s first device of 2016. The smartphone to claim that title would be the Xiaomi Redmi 3, which is a 5-inch device made of metal.
What’s interesting is that Xiaomi has decided to take a different approach to the successor of the Redmi 2. Looking at the promotional poster released by Xiaomi on Weibo, the Redmi 3 seems to not only have a full metal body design, but a plaid design on the back as well. This could increase the grip of the smartphone, but we’ll have to get our hands on the device to know for sure.
The company hasn’t revealed any official specifications of the device, but comparing it to the TENAA listing we reported earlier, the Redmi 3 is confirmed to have a 5-inch 720p display. Other than that, the device is said to run on an octa-core 1.5GHz processor coupled with 2GB of RAM. It will supposedly have 16GB of internal storage with support for expansion via a microSD card, as well as a 5MP camera on the front and a 13MP camera on the back.
Xiaomi has set a date, the 12th of January, as the official day to launch the Redmi 3. If Xiaomi is implementing the same pricing strategy, then the device could have a very competitive retail price.
(Source: MIUI)
