Samsung announced the Galaxy On8 earlier this week and it will be available for purchase starting October 2 during Flipkart’s Big Billion Sale at Rs 15,900. Meanwhile Xiaomi’s Mi Max is another device in this price range with similar specifications. Well, the Android experience on both these smartphones will be a little different and this is why we are here with on-paper comparison to help you decide as to which one should you buy. Xiaomi Mi Max is available for Rs 14,999 across different websites.
Design and Display
Xiaomi Mi Max comes with a metallic design with curved edges that helps while holding the device of this size. It is a fairly thin device and is a well crafted phablet. The IPS LCD display is of 6.44 inches and has 1080 x 1920 pixel resolution. It is protected by Corning Gorilla Glass 4. To summarize the design, Mi Max is a bumped up Redmi Note 3.
On the other hand, the Samsung Galaxy On8 has a metal uni-body with diamond cut metal frames and brushed metal finish at the back. Up front, there is 5.5 inch full HD, Super AMOLED Display with a Pixel density of 400 ppi. The screen on the Galaxy On8 is apparently better given the same resolution but smaller size. Also the design is a lot similar to what we have been seeing in the On series.
Processor
The 32GB Indian variant of Xiaomi Mi Max sports a 64 bit Hexa-Core Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 clocked at 1.8GHz. For graphics there is Adreno 510 GPU. This variant features a 3GB RAM for multi-tasking. Whereas, the Galaxy On8 is powered by an Octa-Core 1.6 GHz Exynos 7580 processor with no information about GPU as yet. It also has 3GB RAM. In this department there is not much to choose as Samsung’s Exynos 7580 has been a pretty promising processor and Qualcomm is the leading smartphone Chipset manufacturer. Both the phones run on Android 6.0 Marshmallow with MIUI 7 on Mi Max and Samsung’s own TouchWiz UI on Galaxy On8.
Storage and Memory
The Samsung Galaxy On8 comes with a 16GB of internal storage which can be expanded up to 128GB via micro SD card. Whereas, the Xiaomi Mi Max comes with 32GB internal storage which is also expandable up to 256GB via a micro SD card. Both the phones come with Dual SIM capabilities but Xiaomi Mi Max has a hybrid SIM slot so either a micro SD or Dual SIM cards. Though we don’t know for sure but the Galaxy On8 might have a hybrid slot as well.
Camera
In camera department the things are pretty close too. The Xiaomi Mi Max sports a 16 Megapixel rear facing camera with f/2.0 aperture, dual-tone LED flash, HDR etc. The rear camera is capable of recording 2160p videos at 30fps and offers 120fps slow-motion video at 720p. The front camera is a 5 megapixel shooter with the same f/2.0 aperture.
The new Samsung Galaxy On8 features a 13 megapixel rear camera with f/2.2 Aperture and LED flash. Unfortunately, this camera can only record 1080p videos. At front, there is a 5 megapixel camera with f/2.2 aperture and a front facing LED flash as well. Well, we cannot compare the cameras on both the phones without evaluating there actual performance. However, spec wise, Mi Max seems to be a better camera phone.
Battery and Connectivity
The Xiaomi Mi Max being almost an inch bigger diagonally sports a massive 4850 mAh battery where as the Galaxy On8 houses a 3300 mAh battery. Well, though the battery difference is of more than 1500 mAh, the actual performance won’t be that different, thanks to the massive 6.44 inch screen in Xiaomi Mi Max. Also don’t forget that Galaxy On8 has Super AMOLED screen so it can further save up some juice there as well.
Connectivity options are pretty regular with WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, Bluetooth 4.2 on Mi Max and Bluetooth 4.1 on Galaxy On8, GPS etc. The Galaxy On8 sports a USB Type-C port whereas Mi Max has a regular Micro USB 2.0 port. Another missing feature in the Galaxy On8 is the fingerprint scanner which Mi Max has at the back.
Wrapping Up
Xiaomi Mi Max is straight away for those who really want a huge smartphone. Mi Max is more of a tablet than a smartphone so you have to make a decision there. Galaxy On8 on the other hand has the standard 5.5 inch display which is far more compact than Mi Max. But, Mi Max supposedly have better battery life, a finger print scanner and a competitive camera as well. If I had to decide between the two, I would go with Galaxy On8 simply because of its smaller more compact design.