The Xiaomi Mi Band series has been a pretty series competitor in the fit tracker line up. And now, with their latest iteration, the Mi Band 4, they’ve basically put their experience from their previous versions, and refined it to this device. The Mi Band 4 retails for RM 149, making it quite an affordable little device. But lowkey, you could get it for much cheaper only, for maybe RM 100.

Just a precursor, I didn’t really test it to it’s full capabilities as a ‘fitness’ tracker. But, I tried. Anyway, that being said, let’s get into the review, of the Mi Band 4!

Design and Form Factor 

The design of the Mi Band 4 is fairly simple. It comes with a adjustable silicone band, and the main tracker unit. In and of itself, it’s pretty standard, and I didn’t really expect much out of it’s whole design philosophy, because that’s not what it’s for. The one thing I found that was quite interesting is that I could find metal and leather bands to replace the silicone, just in case you were feeling a bit more fancy with your fitness tracker.

There’s a pre-set amount of watchfaces that are available in the ‘Mi Fit’ app, and most of them are pretty cool. Some are more cheesy than cool, but I found it good enough to do the job. But on a sidenote, it is possible to sideload your own watchfaces from an external site, which gives the Mi Band 4 a bit more personality, and that’s exactly what I did.

Battery Life

The one thing I will say about the Mi Band 4, which I absolutely loved, was the battery life. Out the box, they claim that the fitness tracker can last upto 20 days without needing a charge, so I tested it out. I received the Mi Band 4 on August 6th, and charged it fully to 100% (which only took an hour or so), and it finally ran out of battery on August 18th. Safe to say, this thing can really last. But it’s not 20 days, which I already felt was ridiculous, but it was good enough for me. It’s nice, considering I didn’t need to have one more thing to charge on the daily, which usually averts me from ‘wearables’ and smartwatches.

The Mi Band 4 actually comes with a LiPo, 135mAh battery, but the thing I kinda disliked about it was the fact that you had to remove the watch itself from the band, and charge it in a little dock thing they gave with the watch. It charges with a 2Pin Pogo Pin, so you can tell it was kind of a pain in the a**. But considering I only had to charge once every two weeks, I wasn’t that concerned.

Performance and Features 

The Mi Band 4 has quite a lot of features for the price. It can track your heart rate, (which I assume was accurate), how many steps you take in a day, and the usual notifications and what not. However, one thing before I get into the fitness aspects of the device, I need to address something that kind of bugged me. You can set the notifications to whatever messengers/apps you want, so at least it doesn’t crowd your notifications on the Mi Band 4 itself.

But the Band also inadvertently shows only a set number of messages. For example, if someone texts you multiple times on Whatsapp, the messages will appear individually, but only till the next message. After a set number, they’ll stop displaying what the messages say. It will instead show the name of the group/person, with the amount of messages they’ve sent. That’s a small thing I disliked about it, but maybe that’s just me.

The rest of the features are actually pretty standard for a fitness tracker. It can track your heart rate, what kind of workouts you’re doing, steps, calories burnt through the day, control your music, and such. Another useful feature I actually used with the fitness tracker, is the ‘Find My Phone’ feature. It really was useful for those times where I’d misplace my phone. It’ll start ringing quite loudly, until you disable the feature on the watch.

Final Verdict

In all honesty, I loved the Mi Band 4. It was something I didn’t really need but something I ended up wanting more than I had thought. The features are quite well implemented, with very few flaws that I had problems with. And for the money, it certainly is a nifty little device. If you were looking to be more fit, or even if you just wanted a smart wearable to quickly check emails, Whatsapps, and other messages. It definitely does the job, and for again, for the money, I really can’t complain.