Xiaomi’s Leica Leitzphone Mostly Earns The Name

Xiaomi and Leica’s long-running telephone business conscionable sewage a small closer. Alongside nan caller world merchandise of its 17 Ultra flagship, Xiaomi has been entrusted pinch manufacturing a abstracted type that is nan first Leica Leitzphone to merchandise extracurricular of Japan, pursuing 3 Sharp-made models exclusive to nan country.

In truth, nan Leitzphone is simply a 17 Ultra pinch Leica branding and a rotatable camera ring, and isolated from a fewer creation tweaks, it’s mostly nan aforesaid arsenic nan Leica Edition of that telephone already disposable successful China. But nan branding is simply a large deal: Leica hasn’t fto Xiaomi usage its reddish dot logo connected hardware until now, moreover though nan companies person collaborated connected Xiaomi’s flagship cameras since 2022. The jump to a afloat Leica-branded telephone is simply a ballot of assurance from nan camera company.

After 2 weeks utilizing nan Leitzphone type of nan 17 Ultra, it’s clear that assurance was good placed. This is my favourite telephone of 2026 truthful far, Leica logo aliases not, though astir buyers would beryllium amended disconnected redeeming money pinch nan modular 17 Ultra.

The 17 Ultra and its original Leica Edition launched successful China connected December 25th, 2025. The world type and nan Leitzphone were launched astatine Xiaomi’s pre-MWC property convention successful Barcelona connected February 28th, alongside nan regular Xiaomi 17. The 17 Ultra starts from £1,299 / €1,499 (about $1,750) pinch 512GB storage, rising by £400 / €700 for nan Leica version. That’s a hefty premium, but location are a fewer differences from nan regular 17 Ultra.

Let’s commencement pinch nan Leica of it all. It’s evident first and foremost successful nan design: an ever-so-slightly glossy achromatic decorativeness connected nan back, an business touch successful nan knurled aluminum-alloy edges, and Leica’s reddish dot logo successful 1 corner. It’s a somewhat different creation to nan 17 Ultra Leica Edition that released successful China astatine nan extremity of December, which has a two-tone decorativeness and orients nan Leica logo nan different way. It besides ships pinch branded accessories, including a faux leather lawsuit pinch a Leica lens cap, a microfiber cleaning cloth, and a agleam reddish wrist strap.

Other changes tally done nan software. While some versions of nan 17 Ultra tally Xiaomi’s HyperOS 3, based connected Android 16, nan Leitzphone’s interface has been customized. There are dedicated Leica widgets, including photograph galleries and a golden-hour timer, and civilization monochrome app icons for nan astir celebrated apps from Xiaomi and 3rd parties — which look awesome erstwhile you first move nan telephone on, but little truthful erstwhile they’re mixed successful pinch each nan non-monochromatic apps you’ll inevitably download from elsewhere.

Most of nan customization is successful nan camera. There’s an expanded array of Leica filters, and nan interface uses Leica fonts and reddish arsenic its accent color, alternatively of Xiaomi’s accustomed yellow. A caller Leica Essential shooting mode lets you prime betwixt 2 camera simulations: a colour re-creation of nan M9 and a monochromatic return connected nan M3. The Leitzphone besides adds nan action to alteration C2PA contented credentials connected each changeable you take.

None of this is arsenic caller arsenic nan Leitzphone’s unsocial hardware feature: a rotatable camera ring. The separator of nan camera land tin beryllium twisted round, pinch a satisfying haptic buzz to emulate nan consciousness of gears clicking. It makes for an fantabulous fidget spinner, though its existent intent is to power zoom successful nan camera app, aliases rhythm done vulnerability settings aliases filters if you prefer.

This sounds for illustration a awesome idea, and it’s thing I’ve wanted to spot connected much phones since spotting it connected Nubia’s Focus 2 Ultra. In practice, it’s not that useful. The camera land whitethorn beryllium tremendous by telephone standards, but it would beryllium mini connected a existent camera, and it’s excessively flush against nan assemblage to clasp comfortably. I’ve had to force myself to usage nan camera ringing to zoom, uncovering nan onscreen controls quicker and much earthy each time. Perhaps pinch persistence I could drill it successful my musculus memory; for now, I mostly rotate it by mishap and get irritated erstwhile I do.

The summation of nan zoom ringing makes consciousness fixed nan 17 Ultra’s header photography feature: a telephoto pinch continuous optical zoom. While Xiaomi’s 15 Ultra featured 2 telephoto cameras, nan 17 Ultra combines them into one. (The institution skipped 16 to drawback up pinch Apple.) A azygous 1/1.4-inch type 200-megapixel sensor is paired pinch a Leica APO zoom lens that covers 3.2-4.3x magnification — nan balanced of 75-100mm — adjusting nan aperture from f/2.39-2.96 arsenic it goes.

The evident disapproval is nan aforesaid we levied astatine Sony’s Xperia 1 IV, which boasted continuous 3.5-5.2x zoom: This is excessively short a dispersed to make overmuch difference. It’s uncommon that nan framing of a photograph changes drastically arsenic you move done nan range, and extracurricular those limits you’re backmost to nan aforesaid integer zoom and sensor cropping that each different telephone offers.

Photos are excellent. The ample sensor delivers earthy bokeh, on pinch macro support astatine a minimum region of 30cm. It tin grip challenging lighting conditions, pinch bully results successful dim ray — though it did erstwhile struggle pinch nan inverse, blowing retired highlights connected an particularly agleam day. Mostly I’ve changeable exclusively connected nan Leica Authentic mode — nan different action being Leica Vibrant — which I for illustration for its filmic qualities, preserving much of nan highlights and shadows than astir phones and avoiding nan flattened sheen of excessive HDR.

The different lenses are conscionable arsenic impressive, though I do find myself defaulting to nan telephoto. The main camera has a ample 1-inch-type sensor, and nan aforesaid 50-megapixel solution arsenic nan ultrawide and selfie camera. It’s 1 of nan first phones to see a LOFIC (lateral overflow integration capacitor) sensor, which expands nan move scope for highlights, helping maine return immoderate of nan astir melodramatic skyline shots I’ve managed connected a phone, and contributing to fantabulous capacity successful nighttime shots pinch agleam lights.

Despite nan Leica logo, this isn’t just a camera. The Leitzphone has each of nan flagship specs you’d expect: Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset, 16GB of RAM (in this economy?!) and 1TB of retention (with an action for 512GB connected nan regular 17 Ultra), a 6.9-inch 1-120Hz LTPO OLED display, and IP68 protection.

The artillery is different standout feature. The 6,000mAh silicon-carbon compartment isn’t nan biggest around, and is smaller than nan phone’s Chinese edition, but it’s still impressive. Even powering a demanding telephone pinch a large display, I’ve usually been capable to conscionable astir get 2 days of usage from it betwixt charges, though pinch very small near successful nan vessel afterwards. 90W PPS wired charging and 50W wireless apical it backmost up fast, though you’ll beryllium constricted to slow Qi speeds complete third-party wireless chargers, and there’s nary support for nan magnetic Qi2 standard.

The biggest problem nan Leitzphone has is that it’s mostly a much costly type of nan 17 Ultra, which shares astir of its champion features. I for illustration nan look of nan Leitzphone, and for illustration a fewer of nan Leica-specific shooting styles and nan included case. But those aren’t worthy £200, and nan rotatable camera ringing isn’t either. Unless that small reddish dot is very beloved to your heart, there’s not rather capable logic to ammunition retired other for it — but mostly because nan 17 Ultra is specified a bully telephone successful its ain right.

Photography by Dominic Preston / The Verge