Xiaomi’s first-ever smartwatch, the Mi Watch Revolve has been launched in India alongwith the Mi Smart Band 5, Mi Smart Speakers, and a few more products in its Smarter Living event. It is surprising to know that Xiaomi, the well-known smartphone maker in India is expanding its portfolio to smartwatches as well alongside its smart home products which include the Mi Smart Speaker.
The wearables category is now growing big aside from the smartphones itself. Xiaomi-backed wearable AmazeFit GTR smartwatch was another budget-oriented smartwatch we saw last year and now Xiaomi has finally introduced its Mi branded smartwatch – the Mi Watch Revolve which further adds to its Mi devices ecosystem.
If we talk about the major highlights of the Mi Watch Revolve, it’s sleek and light in weight, offers metallic design, AMOLED display, Firstbeat Motion analytics and runs 14 days long without a sweat. Here’s all you need to know about this smartwatch in our Mi Watch Revolve review.
Mi Watch Revolve Specifications
- Model: XMWT06
- Display: 1.39-inch color AMOLED display (Single Touch + Slide), 360 x 360 pixels resolution, Corning Gorilla Glass 3
- Software: Xiaomi’s custom OS, Xiaomi Wear app (Android), and Xiaomi Wear Lite (iOS)
- Protection: Up to 5ATM water-resistant
- Sensors: PPG Heart Rate Sensor, Three-Axis Acceleration Sensor, Gyroscope, Geomagnetic Sensor, Baraceptor, Ambient Light Sensor
- Features: Firstbeat Motion Algorithm, 10 Professional Sports Modes, 110+ Watch Faces, steps counter, distance traveled, calories burned, sleep monitoring, heart rate monitoring
- Wrist Strap: 22 mm quick release strap
- Operating Temperature: Between -10 degrees Celcius and 45 degrees Celcius
- Connectivity: Bluetooth 5.0 BLE, GPS, GLONASS
- Battery & Charging: 420 mAh Li-Po, 14 days runtime (20 hours with GPS On), 2 Pogo pin charger, takes less than 2 hours 30 minutes to charge
- OS Compatibility: Android & iOS
- Box Contents: Mi Watch Revolve with Strap (22 mm), USB Charging Dock, User Manual
- Colors: Midnight Black, Chrome Silver
- Dimensions: 46.2 mm x 53.3 mm x 11.4 mm
- Weight: 40 grams (excluding strap)
- Price: Rs 9,999 (early offer), Rs 10,999
Design, Display, & Build
About its design, the Mi Watch Revolve offers a sleek and premium 46 mm round stainless steel frame with a matte finish surface. It has a round face with two buttons on the side, one for the Apps and one for the Sports mode that can be customized.
The smartwatch is incredibly light in weight (40 grams) and looks really impressive at the first glance. The front side comes with a 1.39-inch colored AMOLED display with a slight curved on the surface and is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 3.
As it’s an AMOLED display, it also offers Smart Always-on-Display as a display trait. Other traits include a water-proof design with up to 5ATM water resistance so you can easily take it underwater or dive into the pool without any hazzle.
The back reveals the charging pins and a PPG heart rate sensor at the center. The 22 mm strap can be easily removed using a quick-release latch behind. It offers a charging dock that can be plugged in a USB charger or any USB port.
You will find a Bluetooth 5.0 LE and GPS, GLONASS for navigation. No Wi-Fi and loudspeakers are available on the watch. The Mi Watch Revolve comes with the Firstbeat Motion feature along with 10 professional sports modes and 110+ watch faces.
For the variants, there’s no 42 mm variant available, you only get a 46 mm dial which could be a tad larger for some people, those who have smaller wrists and who have a habit of using smaller dials could simply choose a smaller variant, but sadly Xiaomi doesn’t have one as of now.
The Mi Watch Revolve comes in elegant color variants – Midnight Black which uses the leather finish strap, Neptune Blue, Cosmic Dust Maroon, Space Black, and Astral Olive. The Mi Watch Revolve is priced at Rs 9,999 and it’s for early buyers, the offer will last till Diwali. The actual price for the Mi Watch Revolve will be Rs 10,999 after the offer expires.
Software, Features & App Interface
On the software side, the Mi Watch Revolve uses a custom made OS by Xiaomi, and not Google’s WearOS. The smartwatch connects with the smartphone via the Xiaomi Wear app, it pairs using the Bluetooth 5.0 BLE. It doesn’t use the WearOS app obviously since it is based on a custom wearable OS.
A typical smartwatch will let you do everything on the smartwatch itself, such as making calls, showing app notifications, listen to the music, using the voice assistant apart from just the fitness activities. This is possible with the devices powered by Google’s WearOS, take the OPPO Watch for an instance.
And as you know, it doesn’t offer a WearOS interface, it still has a bunch of things to offer, you can view the notifications, receive calls, control the music, find the phone, check the weather, use it as a flashlight, lets you measure the altitude using an altimeter on the Mi Watch Revolve aside from all the health and fitness perks.
As you can see the user interface offers the standard analog watch dial with chronograph style design on its default watch face. It shows you the steps, calories burned, and heart rate right on the homescreen. Other details include the current date, the weather temperature, and the battery percentage.
The Apps button opens the app drawer for the apps installed on the watch and doubles as the Home button. The Sports button, which is also a power button, activates the 10 professional sports modes including outdoor and indoor activities along with built-in GPS.
As you can see the user interface offers the standard analog watch dial with chronograph style design on its default watch face. The Mi Watch Revolve offers a variety of watch faces more than 110 to fit your styles. Changing the watch faces can be done right from the smartwatch by pressing and holding the watch face as well as from the Xiaomi Wear app.
For the health and fitness perks, it uses the Firstbeat Motion algorithm which is the professional analytics for sports activities. Firstbeat is one of the world’s leading providers of physiological data for sports and wellness. You also get continuous heart rate monitoring and it is required to provide essential health statistics from the wearable.
There are a total of 10 professional sports modes that include outdoor running, cycling, trail running, trekking, treadmill, indoor cycling, walking, freestyle workout, pool swimming, and open water swimming. Using them is easy, all you need is to press the Sports mode button and choose the modes you wish to use.
Well, that’s a whole lot of addition to the fitness features in my opinion. The modes are pretty much accurate if you ask, be it walking, running, or any workout, And with that, it appears to be that the Mi Watch Revolve could be among the best fitness tracking devices given the price.
Once paired, you can view all the activity record in the Xiaomi Wear app, the app interface is quite basic, you can view the activity done today or from any past date using the calendar provided in the app. You can view the sync data, battery percentage, customize the Activity interface, and change the permissions for the app notifications and calls.
Things that aren’t available on the watch are the microphone, loudspeaker, local storage for music, Wi-Fi adapter, and an app store for the watch to install apps or watch faces. WearOS-powered smartwatches offer Google Play store that will let you install apps for better user experience. You are limited to what Xiaomi’s user interface has to offer.
You can’t interact with the notifications like replying to the messages or making calls, you will require the phone to answer the calls and reply to the messages, although you can view the text messages at a certain limit on the watch. You also don’t have voice input and loudspeakers, you are only notified via the vibrations available on the watch.
Hardware & Performance
Speaking about the specs of the Mi Watch Revolve, it seems to be using some onboard hardware which is unlike the Snapdragon Wear or Exynos chips. It uses an eMMC dedicated internal storage that isn’t usable for adding music or installing apps since the interface isn’t one from the WearOS by Google. Despite the concealed hardware, we haven’t found any performance issues with the smartwatch, it is less likely to lag, and performs well when you interact with the interface, although not highly responsive as you see on high-end smartwatches.
The hardware is quite optimized for battery life, it can offer up to two weeks of battery life which shows the CPU is very power efficient. Smartwatches like the OPPO Watch which is based on the WearOS platform and using the Qualcomm Snapdragon 3100 SoC doesn’t live long enough when it comes to the battery life, however, it has its own perks that separates it from the Mi Watch Revolve such as using the Google Assistant, answering calls directly on watch as well as replying messages from the watch, using the internal storage to store and play music on it, and so on.
Battery Life & Charging
For its battery, it packs a 420 mAh Lithium Polymer battery that runs up to 14 days on a single charge. However, if you keep the GPS turned on, it can offer up to 20 hours of continuous usage. Know that if you are using GPS then the battery life will significantly drain.
Although Xiaomi says it runs as much as 14 days, our usage shows it didn’t die early, the battery life is very reliable and works excellent, doesn’t let you down. On average use, you are probably getting about 2 weeks of battery life in one full charge. If you are looking for a smartwatch with outstanding battery life, this is the one you should be considering.
For its charging, there’s a standard charging dock with 2 Pogo pins that can take about 2 hours 30 minutes or less to charge the Mi Watch Revolve from 0% to 100%. This isn’t the fastest charging in its class, we have already seen the OPPO Watch with its Watch VOOC Flash Charging that charges up to 46% in just 15 minutes and 100% in about an hour. You will have to wait a couple of hours if you want to charge the Mi Watch Revolve.
Verdict
For the price of Rs 9,999, the Xiaomi Mi Watch Revolve seems to be a good and well-made budget smartwatch, from its elegant metallic matte finish design and large AMOLED display to all the health and fitness perks, the smartwatch proves to be a worthy challenger. It notifies you about calls and messages and offers a bunch of health and fitness features. It is also worth mentioning that the smartwatch offers an outstanding battery life of 14 days which makes it among the best smartwatches that last really long.
With that being said, you can’t make or receive calls as well as interact with the notifications such as replying to the messages, you will require the phone to answer the calls as it doesn’t offer a microphone. You are only notified via the vibrations available on the watch, no loudspeaker. If you want a fully-featured smartwatch, you can opt for a WearOS-powered smartwatch at a higher price.
Strength
- Elegant looks and finish
- Extremely light in weight
- The AMOLED display is great
- A chunk of fitness perks to offer
- Uses Firstbeat Motion Algorithm for health statistics
- Notifies about calls and messages
- Built-in GPS & Bluetooth 5.0
- Reliable battery life – 14 days
- Value for money
Weakness
- No third-party apps support, UI could be more intuitive
- Can’t reply or answer calls right from the smartwatch
- Lacks microphone, loudspeakers, and Wi-Fi
