Xiaomi Black Shark 2 gaming smartphone has pressure-sensitive screen

Xiaomi has announced the Black Shark 2 smartphone. The smartphone’s 6.39″ OLED screen is pressure-sensitive, so gamers can use the edges of the screen as buttons in games.

Xiaomi calls the feature Magic Press on the Black Shark 2 and it works like 3D Touch on an iPhone. Users can assign functions on the left and right sides of the screen to hard presses, for example the input of a button that would normally be on a controller. As a result, a game can be controlled with those buttons, even if they are in a different place on the screen.

The OLED screen has a diagonal of 6.39″ and a resolution of 2340×1080 pixels. Below that display is an optical fingerprint scanner for biometric security. There is a vaporchamber to cool the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855-soc if needed. There are configurations with RAM of 6, 8 and 12GB, storage is 128 or 256GB.

The phone measures 163.6×75.1mm and is 8.8mm thick and weighs 205g. The housing also contains a 4000mAh battery, which can charge with a maximum of 27W. The phone is currently only available in China and costs from 3199 yuan, currently about 420 euros. The most expensive version is converted around 550 euros.

The Black Shark 2 is Xiaomi’s third gaming smartphone, after the Black Shark and Black Shark Helo that came out last year. After a release in China in the spring, the first Black Shark was also released in the Benelux towards the end of the year.