A few weeks ago, we reported about Xiaomi bringing iPhone X-like gesture-based navigation to its range of new smartphones sporting the 18:9 design. After being tested extensively in several beta versions, Xiaomi has finally rolled out the feature via the latest MIUI 9.5 update for the Redmi Note 5. The update measures approximately 570MB and is available for download Over-the-Air.
The aim of the new gesture navigation is to liberate more usable screen space by eliminating the navigation buttons at the bottom. The Back, Home and Recents button will be replaced with three distinct gestures:
- The Home button’s function has been replaced with the ‘swipe up from the bottom’ gesture.
- The Back button has been replaced with the ‘swipe from the left or right’ gesture.
- The Recents button has been replaced with the ‘swipe up from the bottom and hold’ gesture.
- The in-app gestures will remain untouched — therefore no overlapping of system gestures and app gestures.
If you breathe tech every day, then you will find these gestures pretty familiar to the one on the iPhone X. Xiaomi’s implementation adds in an animation for the ‘back gesture’, which can be turned off if one doesn’t like it. However, if you still prefer the old school buttons at the bottom, you can keep using that — you don’t have to be limited in Xiaomi’s Android-based MIUI OS.
Apart from the gesture navigation, MIUI 9.5 finally brings new notification controls that have been part of other Android ROMs. Users can now swipe down on a notification to enlarge the content in the notification shade instead of using a two-finger swipe for doing the same. The slightly revamped interface also makes it easier to reply to messages.
The Redmi Note 5 also gets several tweaks and fixes to optimise the performance, an improved quick search and a revamped search page.
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