Xiaomi and Leica’s Leitzphone wowed me with its incredible photography skills and fancy physical settings wheel, but it’s not the only exciting phone the company launched at this year’s MWC. The base Xiaomi 17 Ultra has many of the Leitzphone’s impressive specs but strips back some of the Leica stuff to be, well, more like a regular phone. 

It has the same potent Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 processor, 6.9-inch display and 6,000-mAh battery. The camera hardware is identical too, with the main camera using the same large LOFIC image sensor and the telephoto zoom using moving lens elements for continuous optical zoom. It’s an extremely potent camera setup — I absolutely love the images I’ve taken with it. 

So what’s different between this and the Leitzphone? It lacks the physical control wheel around the camera unit for one thing. Though I did enjoy using the dial, especially when I set it to control the exposure compensation, it’s absolutely not a dealbreaker that the 17 Ultra lacks it. There are no Leica color profiles in the camera app that let you mimic the tones you get from Leica’s regular standalone cameras. This is a shame as I adore the look of many of these profiles — especially Leica Chrome — but that’s just one man’s opinion. You may very well never miss them.

The base Ultra doesn’t have the custom black-and-white Leica Android interface either, but I don’t really like it anyway, as I struggle to tell which app is which without proper color cues. 

Physically, the Xiaomi 17 Ultra forgoes the Leica red dot logo on the back and the “Leica Camera Germany” etching on the side, which is no big deal if you’re not a Leica fan. Instead of being minimalist black and silver, the 17 Ultra comes in a sparkly, deep green tone that I really like. It reminds me of a fancy kitchen work surface. I honestly mean that as high praise.

The 17 Ultra is ostensibly the same phone as the Leitzphone; it’s just less in-your-face about its Leica credentials. It also comes at a lower price: £1,299 in the UK instead of the £1,699 you’ll need to shell out for the Leica model. Neither phone will be officially offered in the US, but for reference, those prices convert roughly to $1,750 and $2,290. 

Is that extra £400 worth it? Well, if you’re a real photo nerd like me and love the idea of having a Leica product in your pocket, then sure. The control wheel and Leica color profiles do make for a superb photography experience. But the base model is still an incredible camera, and that sparkly green design really is lovely. 

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