Stephen Silver
Many Android phones have been heavily influenced by the iPhone X since Apple's flagship arrived last year, but the latest from Xiaomi may be the most blatant ripoff yet.
The Chinese manufacturer unveiled its new flagship smartphone, the Mi 8, at a press event in China, with more details released in a company blog post. And, the iPhone X influence is rather obvious.
Yes, there's a notch. Yes, the shape and curves are about the same, and yes, there's a facial-unlock feature much like Face ID. The only clear difference is the size — the screen the Mi 8 is slightly larger at 6.21 inches as opposed to 5.8 for the iPhone X.
The Mi 8 is also the first smartphone to use Qualcomm's Snapdragon 710. Xiaomi has been seen as possibly entering the U.S. smartphone market this year, but there's been no announcement about that.
Copycat notches
At the Mobile World Congress back in February, various manufacturers showed up with smartphones that featured the notch with some, such as Asus, even openly admitting that they were copying the feature from the iPhone X. This indicated that notches are the next evolution in smartphone design, soon to see adoption industry-wide.
LG, which placed a notch on its ThinQ phone, has been adamant that it didn't copy the feature from the iPhone.
As for the legal implications, there's been no word yet about Apple trying to pursue patent litigation related to the notch. Apple filed a patent for what would become the notch in November of 2016, which was granted in January 2018. Apple certainly hasn't been shy in the past about suing rivals who it feels have copied aspects of its iPhone designs.
The Essential Phone actually came to the market with the notch before the iPhone X, although that company recently cancelled its next release.
Andrew Orr
Amber Neely
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
AppleInsider Staff
111 Comments
Just because it has a notch does not make it as good a phone as iPhone. These Android people will steal everything.
So they notch the screen to accommodate sensors/camera/earpiece but still have a decent sized bezel at the bottom of the phone? The reason the iPhone X has a notch is there is no bezel area to put them in. They could've scored a win by having a notch-less screen going right to the bottom and used the bezel space at the top, but then it wouldn't "look" like an iPhone X. :lol: smh
1) Considering their Face ID-like tech is considerably worse than Face ID that notch is huge. Its lines are also considerably less attractive compared to the iPhone's.
2) Note that the top has more space between the display and edge than the sides of the display, while the iPhone X is uniform on all sides.
3) I question their 90% screen to body ratio considering the chin at the bottom.
The bezel at the bottom of iPhones never held those sensors. Those were always at the top, so the question is why do these copycats still need a bezel at the bottom? They put the finger print sensor on the back.