We recently published our review of the Xiaomi Mi Band 4, knowing that the Xiaomi Mi Band 5 was on it’s was. The newer version has some major benefits if you ask me. Personally, I would go for the newer version, but I get why people will save a few bucks and go for the previous one. Let’s dive in and show you the difference between the Xiaomi Mi Band 4 and Xiaomi Mi Band 5.

Introduction & Specifications

Finally, the Xiaomi Mi Band 5 arrived! I already read a lot about the new Mi Band online and the specifications are great. A bigger display, better sleep tracking, more sport activities, what else do you want? Well, the battery life is shorter, which is a bit of a downside, but with 14 days, it should still be good. Let’s dive in and test the Xiaomi Mi Band 5.

Specifications
Brand:	Xiaomi
Model:	Mi Band 5 (without NFC)
Bluetooth:	V5.0
Comptabile OS:	Android 4.4+, iOS 10.0+
Operating Mode:	Touch + Button
Application Name:	Mi Fit
Waterproof:	5ATM
Sensors:	Heart Rate, G-Sensor
Watch Faces:	Over 100+
Display Size:	1.1"
Display Type:	AMOLED
Display Resolution:	126x294 pixels
Battery Capacity:	125mAh
Standby Time:	Around 14 days
Usage Time:	Around 7 days
Charging Time:	Around 2 hours
Band Length:	155-219mm
Product Weight:	22g
Package Content:	1x Xiaomi Mi Band 5, 1x Charging Cable, 1x User Manual

Unboxing

The box is almost identical if we compare it with the Xiaomi Mi Band 4. On the front, we see a picture with a big 5 underneath it. On the side, are a few pictures of features, like a 24/7 heart rate, and on the back, we find some more features. Nothing special. The inside does not offer a big surprise. We find the magnetic cable, the Xiaomi Mi Band 5, and the manual. That’s it! No plastic waste by filling up the empty space.

Hardware & Design

Looking at the hardware, the Xiaomi Mi Band 4 and the Xiaomi Mi band 5 are very similar. The Mi Band itself is slightly bigger, just a few millimeters. A thing that I noticed when I connected it, are the colors. They are very bright and sharp, I don’t know if it is different from the previous version, but it looks better. The screen itself is bigger, with 1.1″. You notice the bigger screen right away, a great improvement.

On the back, we find the heart rate sensor, which looks very similar to the Xiaomi Mi Band 4, so I don’t expect a more accurate result in heart rate reading. The strap is still made of TPU, and this proves to be a vulnerable material as it breaks quickly for some people. Overall, the design, materials, and upgrade on the Xiaomi Mi Band 5 are good and definitely an improvement.

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How To Operate?

You can control the Xiaomi Mi Band 5 with touch and swipe. The screen is all touch screen and underneath the screen is a small touch button. This acts as “Back”, and is able to bring you back to your watch face. Using this way of navigating is super easy. Just swipe around the menus, click on the screen to enter and press the home button to get back a level. Simple, but very easy and pleasant to use.

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Battery Life

Inside the Xiaomi Mi Band 5 comes with a 125mAh battery inside. This should give you around 14 days of standby time and 7 days of working time. That is shorter if we compare it to the Xiaomi Mi Band 4. I was able to get at least 20 days of battery life out of that version. On the Xiaomi Mi Band 5, it is still working without charging. During an activity of 1 hour, it uses around 1% battery. I guess that I’m still able to get around 14 days of battery life out of it since I’m not using notifications at all, just calls. I will update this once I get a complete cycle, from 100% to 10%.

There is a new way of charging. The Xiaomi Mi Band 5 comes with a magnetic charger. I like to use a single cable for multiple versions, but Xiaomi picked a new way of charging. This way is better, compared to the previous version. Now, I don’t have to take it out of the strap to charge it. Just click the charger on it and it is charging. Charging takes around 2 hours, using a normal charger. Super simple! Great move.

Software

The Mi Fit application is a simple, but very powerful application to track your healthy progress throughout your day. From the main screen, the Workout tab, you see your steps, sleep data, weight, stress, PAI, and heart rate. You also see your latest activities and on what streak you are with hitting your daily step goal. This gives you basically all the information you need on a single page.

The second tab, Friends, is used to show the progress of friends. Here you can see the steps they took, the hours they slept, and their current weight. From here, you can send nudges to them which will result in a small vibration on the Xiaomi Mi Band of your friend.

The last tab, Profile, is your personal profile. Here you can set up your account, fill in the information, and see your connected devices. There are a lot of options and settings to go through, so make sure to play around with this so you are not missing any important feature.

Clicking on your device will bring the settings page for that device. For example, you can see the battery percentage and the different features, like notifications, alarms, and heart rate settings. Make sure to check that out too.

If you are on Android, CLICK HERE to download the Mi Fit application.
If you are on iOS, CLICK HERE to download the Mi Fit application.

Start living your healthy lifestyle now, with the NEW Xiaomi Mi Band 5! CLICK HERE to get yours while it is on SALE!

How To Connect?

Connecting the Xiaomi Mi Band 5 is easy. When you open the Mi Fit application, click on the “+” sign in the top right corner. Click on Band and let the application search for the available Xiaomi Mi Band 5. Once found, it will make the connection within seconds and it will show you the basics, like how to modify the watch face, and show some features, like Stress and PAI.

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Notifications

You can set up all kinds of notifications from almost all applications on your phone. As seen below, I just have Mi Fit enabled. With the button at the bottom, you can manage the applications and allow WhatsApp, WeChat, or any other application to show the notifications on the Xiaomi Mi Band 5. Handy and highly customizable.

Features

Compared to the review of the Xiaomi Mi Band 4, there are some different features, of course. We will list the extra activities, the more in-depth sleep tracking, and other, extra features offered by the Xiaomi Mi Band 5.

Activities

Xiaomi made more activities available on the Xiaomi Mi Band 5! Yes! I was missing some activities on the Xiaomi Mi Band 4, so I’m really happy with this update. These are the supported activities on the Xiaomi Mi Band 5:

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Walking

Outdoor Running

Treadmill

Elliptical

Indoor Cycling

Cycling

Rowing Machine

Yoga

Pool Swimming

Jump Rope

Freestyle

For me, that is a pretty good list and it covers almost everything. If you like to ride your bike, go to the gym, do yoga, or like me, like to walk and cycle indoors on the home trainer. I’m really happy with this update. How does it look? Here is an example of a walk recorded with the Xiaomi Mi Band 5:

Sleep Tracking

Another thing that got an upgrade, is the sleep tracking. Before, the Xiaomi Mi Band 4 was able to record your awake time, light sleep, and deep sleep. I was really missing the REM sleep recorded with my Mi Band. My Withings Sleep Tracker measured it, but I like to have it all in one application.

Now, with the new Xiaomi Mi Band 5, REM sleep is added to sleep tracking! Again, really happy with this upgrade. How does it look? Here is an overview of a night recorded with the Xiaomi Mi Band 5:

Heart Rate Sensor

Like all fitness trackers, the Xiaomi Mi Band 5 is also equipped with a heart rate sensor. From the outside, it looks very similar to the one on the Xiaomi Mi Band 4. I doubt if the heart rate function is really accurate, but it is giving you an idea of your heart rate.
For future reviews, I will try to get a heart rate chest strap to compare it with that.

Start living your healthy lifestyle now, with the NEW Xiaomi Mi Band 5! CLICK HERE to get yours while it is on SALE!

PAI

PAI? What is PAI? Are we talking about the super nice and relaxed place in Thailand? No, this is your Personal Activity Indicator. I can not describe it better than Xiaomi, so here is how it is described in the Mi Fit application:

PAI is a personal physiological activity indicator. Based on heart rate data, daily activity intensity, and multi-dimensional dynamic comprehensive evaluation of personal physiological data, it is converted into an intuitive PAI value using an algorithm to help you understand your physical condition without relying on single data.

By maintaining a certain intensity of daily activities or workouts, you can obtain your PAI value. According to the HUNT Fitness Study research results, keeping your PAI value above 100 reduces the risk of death by cardiovascular disease and increase life expectancy.

So, in short, this is a value that is calculated on several different ratings, like heart rate data, intensity minutes, and activity. The goal is to keep the score over 100. This should reduce the risk of disease and increase life expectancy. Lovely feature to keep an eye on. See how hard it is to actually get 100 PAI and keep it above that number.

Stress

I’ve seen something like this before on my Garmin watches (which were not good by the way). They calculated your Body Battery, which showed the level of energy you should have. Stress is something different, but it shows you how much stress you have. This is how it is described by Xiaomi:

Monitoring the stress levels helps you check how much stress you have. If you are feeling overwhelmed by stress, you need to take actions to relieve it.

The stress level is calculated by combining heart rate variability data and stress models, and the results are for reference only. There are different levels of stress:
0%-39%: Relaxed, 40%-59%: Normal, 60%-79%: Medium, and 80%-100%: High.

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Breathing

Breathing exercise is really nice to use. This exercise will guide you with breathing in and breathing out with gentle vibrations. It can actually help you calm down and relieve stress. I tried it a few times during work at home and it really helps. You can set the time manually from 1 to 5 minutes. I would recommend doing this exercise at least once a week to calm down and be more relaxed. A great addition to the Xiaomi Mi Band 5.

Others

You can teach the software how to recognize activities, like walking the stairs for example. This is called Behavioral Tagging. You have to start the activity from the Mi Fit application and end it once you are done with it. This way, you share the data you collected with the Xiaomi Mi Band 4 while doing the activity and Xiaomi is better able to develop it for future generations. Like we have more sports activities in the Xiaomi Mi band 5 now!

You can also add friends and follow their activity throughout their day and send them nudges. This is a fun simple feature but keeps you connected to your close friends, which is a good thing in this global pandemic.

If you have music playing on your smartphone, you can control it from your wrist too. Just swipe right or left from the home screen and you enter your music controls. Simply pause it or skip to the next song, all from your wrist, and no need to take out your smartphone. This is especially handy when you are running outside or sitting on a bike.

Conclusions

The Xiaomi Mi Band 5, what an amazing device! Yes, there are still things to improve, like the battery life which has gone down a bit. Still, 14 days on a single charge is more than OK for me. The TPU strap is somewhat vulnerable. I’ve seen it break rather quickly sometimes, but AliExpress is offering some cheap replacement bands for that.

But compare this to the Xiaomi Mi Band 4 and there are some great new features. Sleep tracking is more in-depth with the addition of REM sleep. There are more activities to track with 11 sports activities now. Stress and PAI are new, and they are fun to play with. I find it absolutely worthy to upgrade from the Xiaomi Mi Band 4 to the Xiaomi Mi Band 5. The benefits of the new extra health features, new functions, and the bigger screen are big plusses for me.