The Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 6 was announced at the end of March last year and featured several major upgrades, including a larger display and SpO2 tracking. It’s March again and a detailed leak reveals what to expect from the new model. Note that this info was dug out from an early firmware for the band (found in the Zepp app) and the final product may be different.
Let’s start with the display. Version 6
has a 1.56” pill-shaped display with 152 x 486 px resolution (that’s 326 ppi
pixel density). The new model, the Xiaomi Smart Band 7 will have a 192 x 490 px
resolution. Note that the vertical resolution is essentially the same, but the
horizontal one is larger – this suggests a wider display. We expect that the
pixel density will remain the same since it’s that magic "Retina
resolution" number.
Also, some watch faces have an Always On
version that shows the time. AOD is one of the advantages of Xiaomi
smartwatches over the bands, in no small part because it puts a strain on the
battery. A wider band may fit a bigger battery, but not enough to offset the
drain of AOD. Still, it’s great to have the option.
GPS is another major feature that’s
missing from the Xiaomi bands (some competing bands do have it), current bands
rely on your smartphone to get positioning data. The Smart Band 7 may support
GPS, GLONASS, Galileo and BeiDou. “May support” since the Mi Band 5 Pro (which
was supposed to have GPS) was canceled. If version 7 does have positioning, it
will offer several modes: All Satellites (more accurate, more power hungry) or
GPS + one other constellation (less accurate, but needs less power).
Going back to the battery, there will be a
couple of power saving modes, which will deactivate some features. One of the
modes will keep only the step counter and basic sleep tracking running in the
background. The Mi Smart Band 6 offered 15 days of battery life, the 7 will
probably target 15 days as well. Another feature mentioned in the leak is Smart
Alarm, which waits for you to enter light sleep before waking you up. This
feature was available on the original band but was removed and hasn’t been seen
in subsequent versions.
There’s no mention of NFC, Xiaomi
typically offers that in a separate version of its bands (available in China
and usually released globally as well).
