Top 13 New Features Of MIUI 12 (+ MIUI 12 Hidden Settings)

The MIUI 12 was in beta testing when I published the top 12 features of the MIUI 12 article. But, now MIUI 12 global stable version has been released officially, and also some more features have been added to its UI. Today, we’ll be decoding the top 17 features of MIUI 12 along with hidden settings.

Features of MIUI 12

We have listed all the major update changes to MIUI 12 including features and hidden options. To update your Xiaomi smartphone to MIUI 12, open the updater app from settings and check for updates. Read this article to the end to see if your device is eligible for MIUI.

1. New Control Center

The new control center is truly an amazing feature in MIUI 12. The notification icon (Internet data, Bluetooth, WIFI, etc) gets more bigger and attractive. Also, you can access all the quick settings from the notification bar by swiping down the screen from the right side and accessing all the recent notifications from the left side of the screen. Along with that, you can customize the notification panel by clicking on the edit icon. By default, the new notification panel is turned off in some Xiaomi devices. Open MIUI 12 Settings > Go to Display > Control Centre and Notification shade > Enable New Control Centre.

2. Separate App Drawer

The most awaited feature in MIUI has finally arrived. In the new update, you can decide whether you want a separate app drawer or just a home screen. To enable this feature, open settings in your Xiaomi smartphone and choose the app drawer option from under the home screen option. You’ll option to customize the app layout and change the size of app icons as well. Along with that, you can divide apps into categories and hide apps as well.

Some latest Xiaomi smartphones (such as POCO M2 Pro, and POCO X2) that are running on the POCO launcher app also have a separate app drawer option.

3. Navigation Gestures Support

Those Xiaomi smartphones which are running on Android 10 operating and received the latest MIUI 12 update, will now have an option to switch over navigation gestures. It follows the same iPhone-style gestures to access the home screen, recent menu, and go back. To enable full screen gestures, open Settings > Additional Settings > Full Screen Display > Full Screen Gestures option. Also, toggle the “Go back to the previous app” option to turn it on, which allows you to access the previous app within the same app.

4. Ultra Battery Saver

Ultra battery saver is another new MIUI 12 feature that has been added along with the battery saver option. By turning on this mode, you can increase your smartphone battery life by more than twice. Since Ultra battery saver restricts most power-consuming features & apps and decreases the smartphone performance by leaving some functionalities (e.g. calls, SMS, Data connections, etc), which leads the battery to survive longer. You can enable ultra battery saver from settings under Battery & performance option.

5. Video ToolBox

As per its name, the Video toolbox is a set of tools that can be used while playing videos to perform some operations. The toolbox lets you take screenshots, record the video, cast the screen, and turn off the screen while playing the video. Along with that, you can run another app in PiP (Picture in Picture) mode at the same time. The video toolbox is disabled in MIUI 12 by default. To enable this feature, go to device Settings > Special Features > Video toolbox > toggle to turn on “Video Toolbox” and “Video toolbox shortcut” options. Also, choose the video apps from the “Manage video apps” option.

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6. Floating Window

Floating Window is a similar feature to Picture in Picture mode. Basically, it allows you to minimize and run the app into a floating window even when an app is running already. You can use this tool to send WhatsApp messages while browsing the internet on Chrome browser, etc. This feature is enabled by default and there are two ways to archive floating windows.

Press & Hold and then pull down a notification to open it in a floating window.
From the recent menu, press & hold an app and tap the “Floating window” icon.

7. Game Turbo

Game Turbo is a game speed booster that can improve your gaming experience. If you play games quite a lot you should enable this mode from MIUI Settings > Special Features > Game Turbo. You can add your games here. It gives you optimized gaming performance. Also, you get In-game shortcuts which include some tools and can be used while playing games.

8. Focus Mode and More

Xiaomi officially added Digital wellbeing & parental controls inside the settings. There you can access a bunch of features such as focus mode, bedtime mode, etc. You can set a schedule for the selected apps and it will notify you to pause the app and focus on other tasks. Yeah! this is a similar feature to OnePlus Zen Mode. To get this feature on your device, open Settings then select Digital Wellbeing & Parental Controls and enable focus mode.

9. Change App Icon

Now you can officially change app icons if you’re using a Xiaomi POCO smartphone or POCO launcher. To do that, Tap & hold on to the home screen and go to settings then tap more then choose the icon pack. Here you can download different icon packs (e.g. Pixel, iPhone icons pack, etc.) from the play store by clicking on the plus icon and then apply button.

10. Game Driver Preferences

This option is found under developer settings. Go to Settings > About phone and tap 7 times on the MIUI version to get developer options on your Xiaomi phone.

Basically, Game driver preferences let you choose the graphics for the apps. There are four types of game driver preferences you can choose from: Defaults, Game Driver, Pre-release, and System Graphics Driver. This feature is still not revealed officially, however, it might be a new feature of Android 10.

11. Disable Ads in System Apps

As you may know that MIUI recently started showing ads in its UI. Many users & YouTubers find it very inconvenient and reported it to Xiaomi. And finally, MIUI 12 gives you an option to disable all system ads within a single click. Read here How to Disable Ads in MIUI 12 From Xiaomi Phones

12. Sunlight Mode

Sunlight mode is a newly introduced feature with Android 10, now you get it in MIUI 12. It uses a smartphone light sensor to measure the incoming lights on the screen and switches to the highest brightness level when the light gets strong. This feature is useful if you travel outside a lot. If somehow you forget to adjust the brightness while going outside, it will do that automatically for you.

13. Change Feed to Google News

Earlier, there was no option in MIUI 11 to change Mi feed to Google feed. However, now it is possible with MIUI 12 and Poco launcher. Here’s how

Open Settings on your Xiaomi phone
Tap on the home screen
Choose Google Discover from the -1 screen menu

Conclusion on MIUI 12 Features

You can enjoy all these features & hidden settings on your Xiaomi smartphone with the latest MIUI 12 update. I hope you enjoyed the article. If you’ve any questions or queries regarding MIUI, comment down.