Remember, recently Xiaomi presented their gaming smartphone, Black Shark? No? It’s not scary, nothing revolutionary was shown there.

The presentation was remembered by others: Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun flashed a new Mi Band 3. The bracelet on his arm fell under the sights of cameras during the event.

The accessory clearly traces the legacy of previous generations, but at the moment, there is practically no information about the new product. Still, we can try to predict what chips the next (fourth?) generation of the bracelet will get.

Enlarged touch screen

Mi Band has long-standing problems with screens. The first models did without it at all, and in the third generation it is practically useless. Time don’t look too hard: Rise to Wake works every other time, and tapping with the other hand does not always work.

Everything must change. The photo shows that the screen of the bracelet is completely new: it is larger, and the edges are rounded. I would like to believe that the display will display more information, for example, a couple of lines of text. I don’t think that such a screen will hit the budget hard, after all, there are a lot of cheaper devices with a larger diagonal on the market.

Plus, the screen will finally become touch. They would also wind up automatic brightness control: it won’t eat up the battery, and it won’t blind at night.

New menu

In addition to the fawn photograph, screenshots of the new menu have been leaked to the Web.

The frames show that large sections with subsections in each will appear in the fitness tracker. For example, Notifications, Distance traveled or even Weather (!). Within these sections, the user is taken to an endless «carousel» of sub-items. There may be messages from different messengers, and switching between steps / calories, stopwatch (!) Or just settings.

Definitely Mi Band 3 will get more features than shown in the screenshot. We wait.

New gestures

The redesigned menu and touch screen gave way to new gestures. The Mi Band 2 menu scrolled strictly in one direction, if you missed something, turn it over again. The management of the fourth generation bracelet will not be limited to taps on the button. Here is the list new gestures:

• The bracelet will be unlocked with a swipe from the bottom up
• Vertical swipes switch between sections
• Tap on the screen will switch among subsections
• Tap on the button will return to the main screen (hello, the «Home» button)
• Long tap on the same button to confirm the action

GPS module

The new Mi Band should stop attributing steps. In reality, now the bracelets are spinning plus up to 1500 steps a day. Users do not particularly complain, apparently, everyone likes to receive achievements.

The GPS module solves the problem. With it, the bracelet will disassemble when you walk, drive or just wave your hand. Most likely, this will hit the autonomy of the device. Well, if you have to charge it every two to three weeks. But something tells me that due to all the new features, the bracelet charge will last for a week at most.

New Bluetooth 4.2 protocol

This is the upgraded version of Bluetooth 4.0. It is just as energy efficient, but 2.5 times faster. The size of the transmitted data packet has increased by 10 times.

The feature of the new specification is different: in Bluetooth 4.2, the IPSP (Internet Protocol Support Profile) profile appeared, which defines support for the transmission of IPv6 packets between devices. In other words, it will be much easier for the bracelet to upload data to the Internet.

Plus, the Bluetooth 4.2 protocol is better protected than its predecessors. The process of pairing devices consists of more parts, within which encryption keys are generated.

Bluetooth 4.2 literally asks for Mi Band 3. It is faster, safer and can access the Internet. And all this without sacrificing energy efficiency.

What exactly will Mi Band 3 not get?

Normal, not buggy application.

Xiaomi, the main thing is to throw a cheap device on the market, and how it will work is secondary.

At first, we could not get a normal translation and interface for a long time, Mi Fit often broke into illegible Chinese, and the fields climbed on top of each other. Then, tracking of sleep phases was suddenly cut out of Mi Band.

Yes, Mi Fit is slowly finished. It has become more beautiful, smoother, with the correct translation. But the bracelet still falls off several times a day.

And hardly anything will change. Xiaomi does not develop the application on its own, another company does it. It is clear that they are connected, but the responsibility is, as it were, shifted. They say the bracelet is perfect, just the developers let us down.

But you will still have Mi Band 3

It will just be extremely cheap. At the start of sales, the expected cost will be 4-4.5 thousand rubles, and in a couple of months the price will drop to 2-3 thousand.

Well, what if it works? Would it be convenient? Suddenly you start to take care of yourself and lose weight?

Even if you do not buy it yourself, there is a high probability of receiving a bracelet as a gift for some holiday. Well, it’s solid and inexpensive. They gave me a bracelet like that, not knowing that I already have one.

Apple Watch owners must resist. Although I personally know a few who took the Mi Band «purely to try.»