Xiaomi Mi Max 2 review: Gentler Giant

Gallery

The Xiaomi Mi Max 2 comes with the Mi Gallery app that shows the camera row by default, but the second tab includes all images and videos on the phone. You can set up a photo backup with your Mi Cloud account.

The Gallery app remains unchanged

The integrated editor offers various effects, filters, and enhancements, plus fun stuff like stickers and doodling.

Editing an image

Music player

The MIUI music player is a custom app with a well laid out, easy to navigate interface. The player has cool effects, transitions, and transparent elements, especially on the expandable Now Playing section. Lyrics are supported, too.

The music player • Albums • Now Playing • Audio settings • Audio settings

Xiaomi Mi Max 2 offers customizable equalizers within the phone's Settings menu - there are a few default presets already available for use. You can also try Xiaomi's MiSound enhancer, which comes into play when you use headphones, and especially, a Xiaomi-branded headset.

Video player

Videos are launched from the gallery. There's no subtitle support here, but DLNA is on board.

The simple video player

FM radio

The FM radio requires a headset to be connected, but can play sound either through this or through the loudspeaker. The app can record audio and there's a sleep timer.

FM Radio

Audio output quality is decent

The Xiaomi Mi Max 2 did well with an active external amplifier - it’s readings were indicating perfectly accurate output, while its volume was just above average.

Quality was almost as good with headphones with the only affected reading being stereo crosstalk and even that remained good. Volume however plummeted so the phone may have issues delivering enough loudness to larger headsets. Other than that however, it won’t leave anyone disappointed.

Test	Frequency response	Noise level	Dynamic range	THD	IMD + Noise	Stereo crosstalk
Xiaomi Mi Max 2	+0.15, -0.51	-93.4	93.5	0.0013	0.0084	-98.8
Xiaomi Mi Max 2 (headphones)	+0.05, -0.04	-92.6	92.6	0.0014	0.026	-67.1
Sony Xperia XA1 Ultra	+0.02, -0.18	-93.9	94.0	0.0053	0.0089	-91.3
Sony Xperia XA1 Ultra (headphones)	+0.65, -0.18	-93.2	93.3	0.176	0.485	-51.9
Oppo F3 Plus	+0.03, -0.01	-93.5	93.3	0.0010	0.0066	-92.0
Oppo F3 Plus (headphones)	+0.55, -0.02	-92.4	92.5	0.0090	0.315	-58.1
Huawei Honor 8 Pro	+0.04, -0.01	-93.3	95.0	0.0018	0.0075	-93.3
Huawei Honor 8 Pro (headphones)	+0.15, -0.02	-92.6	94.2	0.0023	0.100	-63.9
Samsung Galaxy A7 (2017)	+0.05, -0.28	-91.9	92.2	0.0037	0.051	-90.3
Samsung Galaxy A7 (2017) (headphones)	+0.18, -0.05	-91.0	91.6	0.019	0.230	-57.9

Xiaomi Mi Max 2 frequency response

You can learn more about the tested parameters and the whole testing process here.