The company’s co-founder Lin Bin stepped on stage at Qualcomm’s Tech Summit in Hawaii to make the mic drop announcement, claiming that the Mi 10 would be ‘one of the first’ Snapdragon 865-powered phones. That probably means an early 2020 release, maybe at February’s MWC in Barcelona, which is where the company made a fuss about the Mi 9 earlier this year. The Snapdragon 865 is Qualcomm’s 2020 flagship chipset, which will include 5G support through the company’s X55 modem – so confirming that the Mi 10 will run on the 865 essentially also confirms that it’ll be a 5G device. Bin didn’t reveal much more about the Mi 10, though we hope it’ll pack the same 108Mp sensor seen in the recent Mi Note 10, if not something with an even higher megapixel count. It’s also rumoured to include the latest generation ultrasonic in-display fingerprint sensor Qualcomm announced today, which would let you scan two fingerprints simultaneously for extra security. That’s not all though. Bin promised that Xiaomi will ship more than ten 5G phones in 2020, from “premium tiers, to mid-tiers, and hopefully to the lower tiers.” Alongside the 865-powered Mi 10 the Redmi K30 will ship with the mid-tier Snapdragon 765 chip – also announced today – but the rest of the phones are still up in the air. It’s not just phones either. Highlighting the recently announced Mi Watch, Bin said that “In the next year or so we are hoping that the 5G version of this watch is going to come out,” which isn’t quite a commitment but does suggest that the days of the 5G smartwatch aren’t far off. Tech Advisor’s Deputy Editor, Dom covers everything that runs on electricity, from phones and laptops to wearables, audio, gaming, smart home, and streaming - plus he’s a regular fixture on the Tech Advisor YouTube channel.
