Smartphones > Xiaomi 12T Pro > Audio Test Results
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Xiaomi 12T Pro Audio test

OTHER AVAILABLE TESTS FOR THIS DEVICE

We put the Xiaomi 12T Pro through our rigorous DXOMARK Audio test suite to measure its performance both at recording sound using its built-in microphones, and at playing audio back through its speakers.

In this review, we will break down how it fared in a variety of tests and several common use cases.

Overview


Key audio specifications include:

  • Three speakers (top and bottom side, top front)
  • No jack audio output
  • Dolby Atmos technology

Scoring

Sub-scores and attributes included in the calculations of the global score.


Xiaomi 12T Pro
127
audio
124
playback
121

158

123

149

141

162

104

162

132

157

137
recording
121

147

142

146

115

157

105

170

145

Best

136

166

Playback

Pros

  • Decent dynamics performance
  • Audio artifacts very well under control

Cons

  • Inconsistent tonal balance, weak bass and dull trebles
  • Inaccurate distance rendition

Recording

Pros

  • Pleasantly natural tonal balance
  • Good dynamics performance
  • Excellent spatial performance

Cons

  • Not suitable for recording at high sound pressure levels
  • Lack of bass in tonal balance, and slight excess of lower treble

In our testing, the Xiaomi 12T Pro delivered a decent audio experience but was not quite up there with the very best. Overall, its audio performance was very similar to the standard 12T, with only a few differences here and there.

In playback, the 12T Pro performed best for listening to music and playing games, scoring slightly lower for watching movies. The testers liked the dynamics, with good attack and punch as well as an overall precise bass, and the almost artifact-free experience. However, they also noted an inconsistent tonal balance, with a weak bass and dull trebles. The distance of instruments and voices in the sound scene was not rendered correctly either.

As a recording device, the Xiaomi 12T Pro did fairly well across all use cases, but it isn’t a great option for recording loud events, for example, at concerts. Recordings also showed a lack of bass and slightly excessive treble. This said, the tonal balance was overall pleasant, the recordings showed good dynamics in all situations, and a wide recorded sound scene contributed to an overall excellent spatial performance.

Test summary

About DXOMARK Audio tests: For scoring and analysis in our smartphone audio reviews, DXOMARK engineers perform a variety of objective tests and undertake more than 20 hours of perceptual evaluation under controlled lab conditions.
(For more details about our Playback protocol, click here; for more details about our Recording protocol, click here.)

The following section gathers key elements of our exhaustive tests and analyses performed in DXOMARK laboratories. Detailed performance evaluations under the form of reports are available upon request. Do not hesitate to contact us.

Playback

124

Xiaomi 12T Pro

163

Black Shark 5 Pro
How Audio Playback score is composed

DXOMARK engineers test playback through the smartphone speakers, whose performance is evaluated in our labs and in real-life conditions, using default apps and settings.

In playback, the Xiaomi 12T Pro delivered a natural timbre, but our testers noticed a lack of treble and a slightly weak bass. The device also did well for dynamics, with good attack rendition, decent punch and overall precise bass. The envelope lacked precision, though. The Xiaomi speakers created average wideness, with a stereo scene that could be little narrow. Localizability of individual sound sources was average as well, but it was an improvement over the 12T model. Voices sounded too distant in some instances, though, and the sound scene lacked depth.

The Xiaomi delivered good loudness at maximum volume, but the first volume step was too quiet, making it hard to understand voices. Artifacts was an area where the 12T Pro really stood out, with only some minor distortion and compression at maximum volume. In normal use, speaker occlusions did not occur, or at least did not have any negative impact on sound quality, resulting in an overall artifacts-free listening experience.

Listen to the tested smartphone’s playback performance in this comparison with some of its competitors:

Xiaomi 12T Pro
Xiaomi 12S Ultra
Xiaomi 12T
Recordings of the smartphones playing some of our music tracks at 60 LAeq in an anechoic environment by 2 microphones in A-B configuration, at 30 cm
Here is how the Xiaomi 12T Pro performs in playback use cases compared to its competitors:
Playback use-cases scores

Timbre

121

Xiaomi 12T Pro

158

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Timbre score represents how well a phone reproduces sound across the audible tonal range and takes into account bass, midrange, treble, tonal balance, and volume dependency. It is the most important attribute for playback.

Music playback frequency response
A 1/12 octave frequency response graph, which measures the volume of each frequency emitted by the smartphone when playing a pure-sine wave in an anechoic environment.

Dynamics

123

Xiaomi 12T Pro

149

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Dynamics score measures the accuracy of changes in the energy level of sound sources, for example how precisely a bass note is reproduced or the impact sound from drums.


Spatial

141

Xiaomi 12T Pro

162

Black Shark 5 Pro

The sub-attributes for spatial tests include pinpointing a specific sound's location, its positional balance, distance, and wideness.


Volume

104

Xiaomi 12T Pro

162

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Volume score represents the overall loudness of a smartphone and how smoothly volume increases and decreases based on user input.

Here are a few sound pressure levels (SPL) measured when playing our sample recordings of hip-hop and classical music at maximum volume:
Hip-Hop Classical
Xiaomi 12T Pro 74.1 dBA 69.8 dBA
Xiaomi 12T 74.8 dBA 69.4 dBA
Xiaomi 12S Ultra 72.6 dBA 69 dBA
The following graph shows the gradual changes in volume going from minimum to maximum. We expect these changes to be consistent across the range, so that all volume steps correspond to users’ expectations:
Music volume consistency
This line graph shows the relative loudness of playback relative to the user selected volume step, measured at different volume steps with a correlated pink noise in an anechoic box recorded in axis at 0.20 meter.

Artifacts

132

Xiaomi 12T Pro

157

Asus ROG Phone 5

The Artifacts score measures the extent to which the sound is affected by various types of distortion. The higher the score, the less the disturbances in the sound are noticeable. Distortion can occur because of sound processing in the device and because of the quality of the speakers.

Playback Total Harmonic Distortion (Maximum Volume)
This graph shows the Total Harmonic Distortion and Noise over the hearable frequency range.
It represents the distortion and noise of the device playing our test signal (0 dB Fs, Sweep Sine in an anechoic box at 40 cm) at the device's maximum volume.

Recording

137

Xiaomi 12T Pro

157

Black Shark 5 Pro
How Audio Recording score is composed

DXOMARK engineers test recording by evaluating the recorded files on reference audio equipment. Those recordings are done in our labs and in real-life conditions, using default apps and settings.

In our testing, the 12T Pro did relatively better as a recording device than for playback. The tonal balance of recorded audio material was nice and fairly natural, thanks to a very clear and natural midrange. Our testers noticed a lack of bass and slight excess treble, though. In terms of dynamics, the Xiaomi delivered consistent envelope rendering across all use cases, with great transients and attack sounds as well as sharp plosives.

The recorded sound scene was very wide when recording video with the camera app or using the memo app but dropped slightly when holding the phone in portrait orientation for selfie videos. It was easy to localize individual voices and instruments in all use cases, though, and distance rendition was pretty realistic as well. In addition, the device offered pretty good recording volume. On the downside, our testers found that recording at high sound level pressures, for example in concerts, would result in noticeable modifications of the original sound signal.

We also noticed some audio recording artifacts, including slight compression when recording loud content with the selfie camera and distortion with loud content, such as shouting.

Here is how the Xiaomi 12T Pro performs in recording use cases compared to its competitors:

Recording use-cases scores

Timbre

121

Xiaomi 12T Pro

147

Honor Magic3 Pro+

The Timbre score represents how well a phone captures sounds across the audible tonal range and takes into account bass, midrange, treble, and tonal balance. It is the most important attribute for recording.

Life video frequency response
A 1/12 octave frequency response graph, which measures the volume of each frequency captured by the smartphone when recording a pure-sine wave in an anechoic environment.

Dynamics

142

Xiaomi 12T Pro

146

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Dynamics score measures the accuracy of changes in the energy level of sound sources, for example how precisely a voice's plosives (the p's, t's and k's, for example) are reproduced. The score also considers the Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR), for example how loud the main voice is compared to the background noise.


Spatial

115

Xiaomi 12T Pro

157

Asus ROG Phone 5

The sub-attributes for spatial tests include pinpointing a specific sound's location, its positional balance, distance, and wideness on the recorded audio files.

Recording directivity
Directivity graph of the smartphone when recording test signals using the camera app, with the main camera. It represents the acoustic energy (in dB) over the angle of incidence of the sound source. (Normalized to the angle 0°, in front of the device.)

Volume

105

Xiaomi 12T Pro

170

Black Shark 5 Pro

The Volume score represents how loud audio is normalized on the recorded files and the how the device handles loud environments, such as electronic concerts, when recording.

Here are the sound levels recorded in the audio and video files, measured in LUFS (Loudness Unit Full Scale); as a reference, we expect loudness levels to be above -24 LUFS for recorded content:
Meeting Life Video Selfie Video Memo
Xiaomi 12T Pro -30.3 LUFS -21.8 LUFS -20.2 LUFS -25.3 LUFS
Xiaomi 12T -27.9 LUFS -21.3 LUFS -19.5 LUFS -21.4 LUFS
Xiaomi 12S Ultra -28.3 LUFS -20.8 LUFS -19.1 LUFS -20.4 LUFS

Artifacts

145

Xiaomi 12T Pro

Best

The Artifacts score measures the extent to which the recorded sounds are affected by various types of distortions. The higher the score, the less the disturbances in the sound are noticeable. Distortions can occur because of sound processing in the device and the quality of the microphones, as well as user handling, such as how the phone is held.

In this audio comparison, you can listen to the way this smartphone handles wind noise relative to its competitors:

Recordings of a voice sample with light background noise, facing a turbulent wind of 5 m/s

Background

136

Xiaomi 12T Pro

166

Black Shark 5 Pro

Background evaluates how natural the various sounds around a voice blend into the video recording file. For example, when recording a speech at an event, the background should not interfere with the main voice, yet it should provide some context of the surroundings.

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