After many leaks, the F7 Ultra is finally here. With Snapdragon 8 Elite being hot property right now, Xiaomi has pulled out the big guns to make the latest F series appeal to a wider audience.
In January, Xiaomi unveiled the latest update to the Redmi family of smartphones, this range covers the entry-mid level group of devices, then, at the start of March, Xiaomi’s flagship series received its update and I reviewed the Xiaomi 15 variant at the same time.
Today, the brand launches the newest update to the F series which has typically been priced to target mid-range buyers but offering high-end specs. The POCO F7 series consists of the Ultra and Pro variants, and this review is for the global version of the Ultra.
It is important to point out the last bit, because Xiaomi still releases global models with lower specs than the Chinese variants of the same handset, just under a different name, for example:
It’s a little frustrating that in 2025 this practice still continues, 700 mAh smaller battery is no small omission, and the 5300 mAh power pack isn’t the Silicon Carbon variant either. The naming convention differences between regions may cause some confusion for those of use across the pond, too.
50MP (12.6MP binned) 2.5x telephoto, f/2.0, 60mm, OIS, 120° FOV
In the past the global variant of a particular model resulted in a slimmer package, for example, no charger included in the box, or if there is then the output wattage is reduced due to the global model of the handset being restricted by the manufacturer. These days, this is less of an issue, and here we see a 120 watt charger in the box, although it is USB-A to C instead if being C to C like everyone else.
This means you will need to use the included white cable which might frustrate those like me who prefer a colour-matched approach tot hings like this. It also means my other Type-C to C cables capable of up to 240 watts of USB Power Delivery (USB-PD) are not usable with this wall wart, so i’d have to buy more cables that are compliant if I wanted to keep spares in different locations I frequent.
Nevertheless, it is a welcome inclusion, and on top of that the usual high quality dark grey gel TPU case and pre-installed screen protector are included, too.
My only gripe with the screen protectors that Xiaomi install on all of its phones is that when you move the phone around in the light, there is a rainbow effect across the screen which is subtle, but still noticeable, and the image quality is slightly reduced as a result. This is an effect I have seen when using cheap quality screen protectors, so I tend to just peel these off on day 1.
Going back to the case, credit where due, this is superb, very thin and retains the ergonomics of the handset without adding bulk.
The first thing that stands out when taking the phone out of the box is that the camera bump appears quite large, more than other phones, yet put the F7 Ultra side by side with something like the Pixel 9 Pro XL, they both appear similar. It seems that the stepped edging on the F7 Ultra gives the illusion of being a bigger bump.
The same applies comparing against the Xiaomi 15, though on the flip-side the 15’s back panel gently curves up to seamlessly meet the camera bump which in turn ends up masking the camera bump extension for the most part:
Staying on the backside for a moment longer, the frosted glass back panel is different both in terms of feel and acoustics compared to the Xiaomi 15.
The 15 has an almost chalky/stone-like finish when I run a fingernail across the surface, the F7 Ultra on the other hand has a more standard feeling finish, it’s still good quality but it sounds hollow under a nail and visually has an almost speckle-frosted aesthetic when viewed under a strong light source:
I find the branding text on the back a bit distracting as well, take a look at the photo below under normal room lighting, it draws the eye to the lines of text below the POCO branding and just looks ugly to me, the extra text should have been darker in shade:
Other phones hide these extra bits of text on the mid-frame, or print discreetly on the back and only visible under certain conditions. The Xiaomi 15 series does have similar text on the back as well, but it’s placed out of the way so as not to catch the eyes. and isn’t as blindingly obvious.
These quirks tend to be the hallmarks of a mid-range priced handset where visual aesthetics generally end up being an afterthought. Thankfully, it’s on the inside where the F7 Ultra is top-end, so let’s take a closer look at what’s under the hood.
Chinese phone makers still put infrared transmitters on phones, it seems these are very popular in some regions, even though many products these days are starting to use Bluetooth LE for pairing a remote control.
I gave the IR blaster a try with the pre-installed Mi Remote app and found it worked well with a large database of appliances and devices in the database from brands around the world, though unlike those One-4-All universal remotes from the 1990s, you cannot use the IR blaster to learn the functions from an already existing remote, if your model of device is not in the database, no IR blasting for you I’m afraid.
If you are curious as to where the IR emitter is, since none of the photos show the usual porthole for one, it’s on the back with the camera array, only visible through a digital camera:
There are no additional unique features that don’t also exist on other phones that might be worth mentioning, though the 50W wireless charging is cool, and I will cover that in the battery portion of the review shortly.
Snapdragon 8 Elite is powering the F7 Ultra, and with that comes the expectation of superb performance, minimal stuttering and an overall polished experience when using high bandwidth parts of the phone such as 5G/Wi-Fi, or making use of the rather snappy UFS 4.1 storage system. Bluetooth 6 and Wi-Fi 7 come as part of this whole package, although supporting products using these are few and far between today, it bodes well for future-proofing if you intend on keeping the F7 Ultra for several years at least.
This much seemed to be all fine in my testing, with 5G speeds on the EE network rivalling speeds seen on the Xiaomi 15, Pixel 9 Pro XL and Galaxy S24 Ultra, easily exceeding 650Mbps here in the UK’s south coast.
