While Prime Day might be drawing to a close, there's still time to snap up a great smartphone deal and one that caught my eye was the near-£255 reduction available on Xiaomi's current flagship, the Xiaomi 12.
As someone who reviews phones for a living, there's seldom a smartphone deal enticing enough that I'd drop money on it, namely as I change phones so often that I wouldn't get to really enjoy using the phone I'd just paid for, but I often think, 'were I not in this job, what would I consider a good-value buy right now that I'd be willing to spend my own money on?'
In the case of this Amazon Prime Day reduction on the Xiaomi 12, the phone usually costs £749.99 for the base 8GB RAM/128GB storage option, however, currently you can nab the handset for over a third off (a 34% discount of £254.99), meaning it sails just under the £500 threshold (at £495), into the same price range of many mid-range phones.
Balancing act
Although the Xiaomi 12 isn't the most powerful entry in the company's current phone portfolio or even the best Prime Day phone deal outright, it strikes a nice balance of quality, longevity and value that a lot of other deals can't quite match.
With perhaps the exception of Samsung and Google, Android flagships usually receive special treatment when it comes to long-term software and security updates compared to the more modestly-priced smartphones further down a particular brand's range.
Longer-lasting
While there are plenty of Prime Day phone deals on cheaper Android handsets (namely from brands like Oppo, Realme, Motorola and even Xiaomi itself), these devices don't receive the same level of attention and support as higher-end handsets like the Xiaomi 12, meaning they lose official support far sooner into their lifespan.
This Snapdragon 8 Gen 1-powered Xiaomi 12 boasts a robust three years of OS updates and four years of regular security patches from Xiaomi, making it a great value buy for those looking for a capable phone that'll still deliver (and remain secure) for more than a couple of years.
This sweet-spot offer also puts Apple to shame, with the biggest Prime Day iPhone deals in the UK almost exclusively falling on older or renewed (read: refurbished) devices.
