Xiaomi’s New Smartwatch Looks Like an Apple Watch

In the past, Xiaomi’s products have looked a lot like Apple versions, and Xiaomi’s first smartwatch, which will launch on November 5th, appears to be no exception. From the images and video teasers Xiaomi released through Weibo earlier this week, it bears a striking resemblance to the Apple Watch (via XDA Developers).

The watch has an almost-identical rectangular touchscreen face with rounded corners and a lookalike rotating ridged crown button for scrolling, which is also located above a similar-looking pill-shaped button on the right side of the watch.

Those are all right where you’d find them on an Apple Watch. Although the Xiaomi watch’s face is a little thicker and less rounded than the current Apple Watch Series 5 and the straps aren’t as sleek, you could still easily mistake it for an Apple Watch. The name for the watch hasn’t been revealed yet, but 9to5Google found the name “Mi Watch” in the code of the latest Wear OS app update, making that a likely name (and operating system) for the upcoming device.

It’s Wi-Fi, GPS, NFC, and Bluetooth-enabled, and it features an eSIM for making calls, according to the image. It has a Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 3100 processor, which is used in newer Wear OS devices.
Huami, Xiaomi’s exclusive partner and sole supplier of wearables, made a smartwatch called Amazfit last year, and it also looked a lot like the Apple Watch. Xiaomi is also an investor in Huami. It is unclear right now whether Huami will be in charge of making the Mi Watch.

Like the watch’s design, the resemblance to Apple products is nothing new. Xiaomi has been mimicking Apple for years now, and it goes beyond the products. Xiaomi’s AirDots wireless headphones looked like Apple AirPods.

Xiaomi imitated Apple’s macOS Mojave’s color-changing sand dune background. Xiaomi accidentally used an Apple Memoji ad when promoting its own animated augmented reality avatar counterpart, Mimoji. Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun even copied Steve Jobs’ signature black turtleneck and “one more thing” catchphrase.

This isn’t the first time Xiaomi has seemingly ripped off Apple, and it probably won’t be the last.

Xiaomi has a big event scheduled for November 5 in China, where it will showcase the Mi Watch, the Mi TV 5 series, and the Mi CC9 Pro smartphone. Xiaomi was notably absent from the smartwatch segment till now, leaving Android users to go for Wear OS or Tizen-based wearables. The experience has been far from good in comparison to the Apple Watch. The Mi Watch will aim to bridge that gap.

Along with the Mi Watch, Xiaomi will also unveil the Mi CC9 Pro which will be the world’s first smartphone with a 108MP Penta-camera setup, and the Mi TV 5 which will sport 4K Quantum Dot QLED panels.

November 01, 2019