Xiaomi 17 Pro Max review

Design and handling

Apart from the secondary display camera bump, the phone features a standard glass sandwich construction with a metal frame in the middle. Notably, the front display is protected by Xiaomi's in-house Dragon Glass 3, which is marketed as very resilient. In fact, the Chinese landing page suggests that this is a ceramic-infused composite.

There's no mention of the back glass or the type of aluminum for the frame, but subjectively speaking, it feels rigid and premium in hand. After some digging, we found out that the back panel is fiberglass, similar to the Xiaomi 15 Ultra. The side frame is flat and smoothly transitions to the front and back glass.

Since the back and the frame have matte finish, the phone is generally slippery, but we are happy to see the frosted glass on the back smudge- and fingerprint-free most of the time. At least the Black color we have for review isn't attracting too much fingertip grease.

Xiaomi 17 Pro Max

In addition to the Black color, the Xiaomi 17 Pro Max can be found in White, Purple and Green.

The handset is also IP68-certified against water and dust, although Xiaomi promises it can be immersed up to 6 meters for 30 minutes, and it will still be fine. That's more than what the IP68 certification promises.

The fingerprint reader is ultrasonic and works even if the display is turned off. It's reliable and snappy as always, but this time around, Xiaomi used the latest generation Goodix ultrasonic FP reader, which reportedly performs much better with glass screen protectors. A well-known limitation of ultrasonic fingerprint scanners.

Given the battery capacity (7,500 mAh) and the wireless charging coil, we are quite impressed by the phone's thin profile. The phone measures 8mm without the camera/screen bulge. Given the context, that's very good.

Xiaomi 17 Pro Max

The SIM card tray is located right next to the USB-C port and offers two physical SIM card slots. There is no eSIM support here. The Infrared blaster is at the back of the phone, as has become customary in recent times.

No matter the angle, the Xiaomi 17 Pro Max is still a big phone, and it's a challenge to handle it with one hand. It's 6.9" in diagonal and weighs almost 220 grams, so it's somewhat hefty, too. Then again, that's not too shabby given the extra hardware on the back.