anyone using the Xaiomi mi6 on vodafone

[Timpson]

Im thinking of getting the xaiomi mi6 which is a chinese phone not normally sold in the UK but which is a great phone tech wise. Ive checked that it can use one of the 4G bands that Vodafone broadcast but before buying would like to know if anyone is already using the mi6? 

Ive checked that the phone has a global ROM and supports English.

[BandOfBrothers]

I haven't personally used the phone but have seen YouTube reviews and unboxings. 

Just a word of caution - The phones specs may look to work on Vodafones frequencies and bands but it's not guaranteed to. You'll only know when inserting the SIM card. 

Vodafone wouldn't be able to provide support for an imported phone released to work in other countries. 

That said it's an awesome phone going from what I've seen. 

[Timpson]

the phone looks awesome and the price is half that of phones with similar specs. I have checked it out and it appears to recieve one of the 4G bands broadcast by vodafone but I wonder if any Vodafone customers are already using the Mi 6 or 5 and what their expeiences are. Thanks for the reply though.

[wrigglesworth]

A few months on from the original post, I'm also curious to know whether anyone has this phone up and running on Vodafone?

[iainmann]

Yes, I'm using the Xiaomi Mi6 on Vodafone in the UK. It's a very nice phone and works very well on the Voda network...except......

You'll know the phone is missing Band 20 LTE/4G, which is one of the two bands used by Voda. Band 20 is generally used in rural areas, because it covers longer distances from the transmitter. 

In practice, it means 4G is generally ok in towns and cities but generally lops back to 3G+ outside urban areas. And to be honest, it hasn't really caused me a problem.

Increasingly, Xiaomi is adding Global models to its range of phones, which include Band 20, but not yet for the Mi6, or the Mi5 for that matter. It tends to add a Global version to its lower-range phones, including the Redmi series.

Hope that helps. 

[wrigglesworth]

Thanks Iain, that helps a lot. I think I'll go for it. I spend nearly all my time in London, I have BT broadband, which means I'm mostly within usable distance of someone else's Wi-Fi hotspot, and I'm not actually a heavy user of data anyway, so if all else fails 3g would suit me fine.

[iainmann]

I'm sure you'll like it. It's a well-made and very fast phone. Xiaomi are fast becoming a respected phone manufacturer around the world and not just in China. 

Good thing about the Mi6 is it has NFC, which not many Chinese phones have, and works well with Android Pay. 

[wrigglesworth]

In the interests of completeness for anyone googling this, I bought the MI6 through Gearbest, and it's working perfectly, highly recommended for the price. I have no problem with 4g in London.

The only out-of-the-box hiccough I had was sometimes getting no push notifications on WhatsApp. If you Google you will find that this is due to the phone's aggressive policy of managing app's background power consumption, which apparently is necessary in the less tightly regulated far-east android environment. There are a handful of well-buried settings which you need to change and then all works well.