After Xiaomi announced the Xiaomi 18 Pro and Xiaomi 18 Pro Max, it revealed that the two are headed for a global launch. That was a bit unusual, since the Xiaomi 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max never left China. Maybe this has something to do with the rumor from August that claimed that the Xiaomi 18 Ultra had been canceled.
Now leakster Digital Chat Station is reporting the same – the Ultra is off the launch calendar. Apparently, it would have cost CNY 10,000 for a 12/256GB unit, which Xiaomi felt would have been too much and wouldn’t have generated enough sales.
CNY 10,000 is not cheap – it converts to $1,500 / £1,125 / €1,330 / ₹143,500. It’s a hefty price hike over the Xiaomi 17 Ultra, which was CNY 7,000 for a 12/512GB unit (with double the storage) and even the Xiaomi 17 Ultra Leica Edition was CNY 8,000 for a 16/512GB unit.
Digital Chat Station’s post about the Xiaomi 18 Ultra (machine translated)
Still, if the specs reported by DCS are true, this would have been one mighty camera phone. The Xiaomi 18 Ultra was reportedly planned with a 200MP 1/1.12” LOFIC main camera, a 200MP 1/1.28” LOFIC periscope with a continuous zoom lens and a 200MP 1/1.56” ultra-wide camera.
It would have had other niceties like a flagship chipset, a flat display with even 1mm bezels and symmetric stereo speakers, but most of the budget would likely have been spent on the camera hardware – especially considering the base level RAM and memory configuration.
For what it’s worth, it looks like DCS’ original post is no longer accessible, so we’re not sure whether the leakster still stands by this information. The price would have surely been an issue for sales, but we haven’t seen what the vivo X500 Ultra and Oppo Find X10 Ultra will cost – maybe CNY 10,000 is the new normal for a camera-focused Ultra flagship.