Xiaomi’s Black Shark 4 is a game phone with shoulder buttons

Sometimes it feels like phone makers are trying to hit mobile gamers by slapping RGB lighting on an otherwise blah phone full generations components, but with the Black Shark 4, Xiaomi is trying something new: addition built-in tangible shoulder buttons that can make a real difference.

Unlike other game phones like the Red magic 6 and Asus’s ROG Phone 5, The Black Shark 4 and Black Shark 4 Pro have touch sensors on their sides, and have real physical buttons that you can use as triggers in landscape mode. Xiaomi says the triggers can see the difference between a light and hard pressure, and can even be locked in place when not in use, to accidentally press. Some people may now call me a traditionalist, but especially when it comes to mobile games, sometimes it’s just nice to have real tangible ministries instead of just relying on touch.

Tthe Black Shark 4 has a nice tame design (at least under game phones) with a back cover triple lens camera module and a small RGB light on its back, though it’s unclear if the screaming X-theme paints work is optional or not on every model.

Both models feature a 6.67-inch AMOLED screen made by Samsung, with a refresh rate of 144Hz and a responsive 720Hz touch sample rate (which is the highest touch sample rate ever seen on a phone), along with ‘ a super fast 120 watt wired charger. en a decent size 4500 mAh battery, which Xiaomi claims it can charge from full to dead in less than 15 minutes.

Unfortunately, if you want peak performance, you should go for the more expensive Black Shark 4 Pro, as it has a more powerful Snapdragon 888 processor (the standard Black Shark 4 gets a SD 870) and a special RAMDISK with which the phone can use memory like traditional storage, which according to Xiaomi can significantly improve the performance of a specific app.

Other Specifications include 8 GB or 12 GB RAM and up to 256 GB storage, with a special 16 GB RAM and 512 GB configuration reserved for the top-spec Black Shark 4 Pro. You also get a dedicated 3.5mm headphone jack and a bunch of software-based game adaptations, such as performance enhancements and settings that do not interfere, built into JOYUI 12.5, which is based on Android 11.

Wwith Chinese prices for the Black Shark 4 and Black Shark 4 Pro starting at just 2,499 yuan (about $ 385) and 3,999 yuan (about $ 615), respectively, Xiaomi’s new gaming phone may end up being a pretty good value, also. ThRed Magic 6 begins at about $ 585 and the ROG Phone 5 arrives even higher at about $ 950 to start.

Wwith three new game phones debuting within the last few weeks, mobile gamers should have many more options when it comes to their phone of choice soon.