Xiaomi to Drop 'MI' Branding with Future Releases

Xiaomi is phasing out its “Mi” product branding, products including flagship smartphones like this year’s Mi 11 will instead simply carry the Xiaomi name. The news was first reported by XDA Developers.

“Starting in 2021 Q3, Xiaomi’s product series ‘Mi’ will be renamed to ‘Xiaomi,’” says the spokesperson. “This change will unify our global brand presence and close the perception gap between the brand and its products. This change may take some time to take effect in all regions.”

Xiaomi says that it’ll still keep the Redmi brand around, meaning that the higher-end Xiaomi products will form a distinct line alongside Redmi products.

Xiaomi products “represent the pinnacle of technology and offer a premium experience,” according to the company, while Redmi products “bring big innovation at a more accessible price point and are aimed at a younger audience.”

This naming convention “will also be applied to our ecosystem and IoT products over time,” says the spokesperson, though the Mi brand logo will continue to be used in Xiaomi’s Mi Home stores for now.

This month’s announcement of the latest phone in the Mi Mix series served as a harbinger of the shift, since Xiaomi referred to it as the Xiaomi Mix 4. The previous phones were called the Mi Mix, the Mi Mix 2, and the Mi Mix 3.

The Mi brand was largely used in Western markets, presumably for readability and pronunciation reasons — phones like the Mi 11 are already called the Xiaomi 11 in China, for example. But Xiaomi evidently believes its company name is now recognizable enough and better represents its products.

Lei Jun, the co-founder and CEO of Xiaomi, once commented on the origin of the company’s name. “Mi”, he said, stands for two things: “Mobile Internet” and “Mission Impossible.” Xiaomi sees itself as a mobile Internet company that sets out to complete “impossible” tasks, which is something you’ll hear a lot in the company’s product unveilings. The word “Xiaomi” itself translates to English as “millet”, a small-grain crop, while “Xiao” translates to “small.” Lei Jun thus tied the company’s name to the concept that a grain of rice for a Buddhist is as great as a mountain, meaning the company focused on the smaller things before moving its way up.

Now that Xiaomi has become the world’s top smartphone brand, perhaps they think it’s time for customers to associate their products with the company’s name rather than just “Mi.” It seems that in China, the company already sells devices without “Mi” in the name, so this move also brings their global product naming strategy in line with their Chinese one. Don’t think for a second that this will clear up any confusion about the company’s product branding per market, though, because that’s still a huge mess.

Mi, Redmi, and POCO are the three brands under which Xiaomi currently categorizes all of its products. Soon, that list will become Xiaomi, Redmi, and POCO, changing the conversation from sub-brand versus independent brands (Redmi and POCO were both spun off from Xiaomi a few years back) to three companies competing with one another, or at least the illusion of it.

August 24, 2021