Full Reviews of Xiaomi 13 Ultra:

Pros

• Cutting-edge main camera with large 1-inch sensor and variable aperture
• Great versatility with two high-quality zoom cameras
• Top flagship performance and features
• High resolution, vibrant and responsive display
• Long battery life and very fast charging

Cons

• Mediocre selfie camera quality
• No microSD card slot

The Xiaomi 13 Ultra lives up to it’s name and delivers an ultra experience, especially when it comes to mobile photography. Equipped with one of the most advanced camera setups on a smartphone, this flagship model aims to capture your attention along with those priceless moments.

Design and Build

As soon as you lay eyes on the Xiaomi 13 Ultra, your focus goes straight to the huge circular camera housing on the back. This prominent bump contains the phone’s formidable quad-camera array. Around the lenses, the phone has a textured vegan leather finish in black or white, giving it a premium look and feel

The leather backing meets the phone’s aluminum frame for a seamless and symmetrical design. At 8.4mm thick and around 229g, the Xiaomi 13 Ultra feels sturdy yet comfortable to hold. It carries an IP68 rating for dust and water resistance too.

Display

The Xiaomi 13 Ultra sports the same high-quality 6.73-inch QHD+ AMOLED display used on the Xiaomi 13t Pro. Expect to be wowed by the sharp image quality, excellent brightness levels up to 1700 nits, and buttery smooth 120Hz refresh rate.

With LTPO 2.0 technology, the screen can also dial its refresh rate down to 1Hz to conserve power when needed. Other display highlights include HDR10+ and Dolby Vision support, 10-bit colors, and curved edges for an immersive viewing experience.

Hardware and Software

Powering the Xiaomi 13 Ultra is Qualcomm’s cutting-edge Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chipset. Along with up to 12GB LPDDR5 RAM and 512GB UFS 4.0 storage, this hardware provides exceptional power and efficiency. In fact, the phone benchmarks among the highest of any Android flagship in 2023.

On the software front, the phone runs the company’s latest MIUI 14 interface on top of Android 13. Users can expect various optimizations and customizations to deliver a smooth and personalized user experience.

Battery Life and Charging

Despite having a bright high-res display, the Xiaomi 13 Ultra offers superb battery life thanks to its large 5000mAh cell and power efficient hardware. Expect to comfortably get through a full day or even longer per charge.

When it does come time to recharge, the phone supports blazing fast 120W wired charging. Using the included charger, you can go from 0 to 91% battery in just 30 minutes! 50W wireless charging is also supported.

Camera Capabilities

Main Camera

Now let’s dive deeper into the cameras, starting with the star of the show – the main 50MP shooter. It’s equipped with Sony’s advanced 1-inch type IMX989 sensor and paired with a bright lens with variable ƒ/1.9-4.0 aperture.

Together, this camera hardware enables the Xiaomi 13 Ultra to capture photos and videos with incredible quality and creativity. Expect excellent dynamic range, natural yet vivid color reproduction, striking bokeh effects, and lossless 8K video recording. Low light performance is also a highlight thanks to the sensor’s large pixel size.

Telephoto Zoom Lenses

But wait, there’s more! The Xiaomi 13 Ultra brings not just one, but two telephoto cameras with 3.2x and 5x optical zoom lenses. Both provide a 50MP resolution for crisp detailed shots of distant subjects. Whether you’re trying to capture your kid scoring a goal or a bird in a treetop, the zoom cameras help you get closer to the action.

Ultra Wide Camera

The fourth and final rear camera packs a 50MP sensor behind an ultra wide lens. It expands your shooting possibilities even further and comes in handy for panoramic landscapes, tall buildings, and other expansive scenes. Despite the distortion, image quality remains excellent across the frame.

Photography Modes and Features

On top of the versatile lens arrangements, Xiaomi has packed tons of computational photography modes and features into its new Ultra flagship:

• Portrait mode with background blur adjustment
• Multi-frame night mode for low light shots
• Long exposure mode for artistic light trails
• Panoramas up to 160 megapixels
• Pro mode with manual exposure controls
• Leica color science presets (Authentic & Vibrant)
• Real-time AI enhancements
• Plus much more!

Video Recording

With its advanced camera hardware and software capabilities, the Xiaomi 13 Ultra can capture video that looks like it was shot on a professional camera. You can record in resolutions up to 8K with the main and zoom cameras. Expect excellent quality in terms of color, dynamic range, stabilization, and detail.

Selfie Camera

If the rear cameras represent shooting for the stars, then the front camera brings us back down to earth. The Xiaomi 13 Ultra’s 32MP selfie camera performs decently. It captures nice colors and background blur in portraits.

However, the front camera quality isn’t quite as sharp or advanced as expected for such a premium device. For selfie lovers and vloggers, this could be disappointing. At least video tops out at 1080p resolution.

Other Features

Beyond mobile photography, the Xiaomi 13 Ultra brings almost everything else you could want in an Android flagship. Highlights include stereo speakers with Dolby Atmos sound, the latest Bluetooth 5.3 connectivity, snappy under display fingerprint unlocking, and dual SIM 5G support.

With all it has going for it, the only thing really missing is a MicroSD slot for memory expansion. But between 256GB and 1TB internal storage options, most users should have adequate capacity.

Frequently Asked Questions:

How good are the cameras compared to other flagships?

The Xiaomi 13 Ultra’s cameras represent a new pinnacle in mobile photography. Its advances in hardware and software lead to best-in-class image quality across the board. Photos and videos look fantastic with accurate colors, striking bokeh effects, and gobs of detail at all focal lengths.

Does it heat up a lot during gaming or camera use?

No, the Xiaomi 13 Ultra demonstrates excellent thermal management thanks to its large vapor cooling chamber and multiple layers of graphite. You can game or shoot photos/video at length without any performance throttling or overheating issues.

How long will the phone get software updates for?

While not on par with Pixel phones or iPhones, Xiaomi has improved their software support lengths over the years. For the 13 Ultra as their premium flagship, users can expect at least 2 major Android OS updates and several years of security patch support.

Conclusion

The Xiaomi 13 Ultra leaves an undeniably ultra impression across the board. It nails the fundamentals from top processing power to a vibrant high-res display, long battery life, and super-fast charging. Than when you factor in the groundbreaking quad camera setup co-engineered with Leica, this phone becomes hard to beat for mobile content creators. As long as you’re not banking too much on selfie capabilities, the Xiaomi 13 Ultra stands tall among the best Android flagships out now.