Set Up a Portable Wi-Fi Hotspot
If your Xiaomi phone still hands out a hotspot name and password nobody chose, other people nearby can guess it or connect without permission. A weak default SSID also makes it harder to spot your own hotspot among several devices in the same room. Setting a custom name and password fixes both problems and keeps the connection under your control.
Restrict Mobile Data Usage for an App
If a Xiaomi phone burns through your data plan even though you barely open certain apps, background data access is usually the cause. By default every installed app can use mobile data and Wi-Fi without restriction. On dual-SIM phones this applies separately to each SIM slot, which makes it harder to spot which line is actually consuming the data.
Turn Contact Sharing via Bluetooth On or Off
When you pair your Xiaomi phone with a car radio, the contact list sometimes stays empty even though the Bluetooth connection shows as active. That happens because MIUI keeps Contact sharing separate from the general Bluetooth toggle, so voice dialing and steering-wheel controls have no phonebook to pull from until you enable it. The same setting can also keep sharing your address book with a paired device after you no longer want it to.
Turn Off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth Scanning for Location
Even with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth switched off, your Xiaomi phone can still scan nearby networks and devices to sharpen its location fix. Apps with location permission trigger this background scanning automatically, keeping your radios active more often than expected. If you want tighter control over when your phone searches for networks, the scanning setting needs to be adjusted separately from the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth toggles.
Allow or Deny Do Not Disturb Access for Apps
When an app suddenly enables Do Not Disturb on its own, or a call app keeps muting notifications you actually want to see, a hidden system permission is usually behind it. On Xiaomi phones, individual apps can request permission to switch Do Not Disturb on or off, and that access is not always obvious from the app itself. Checking which apps hold this permission helps you regain control over your notifications.
Set Touch & Hold Delay
If long-pressing an app icon on your Xiaomi home screen either opens the shortcut menu too fast by accident or takes too long to react, the touch and hold delay is set to the wrong stage. This timing controls how long you need to keep your finger down before a long-press action triggers, and it affects every control element that supports it, not just app shortcuts.
Battery Saver: Extra Power Optimization Options
If Battery saver is switched on but your Xiaomi phone still lights up the screen for every notification, the standard saver mode is not doing its full job. Always-on display can also keep draining power even while Battery saver is active. Two extra toggles sit outside the main Battery saver screen and control exactly this behavior.
Back Up Phone Data to Google Drive
If your Xiaomi phone gets reset, lost or swapped for a new one, contacts, messages and app data disappear unless a backup exists somewhere else. MIUI has a built-in option to save that data to Google Drive, but the toggle sits buried in the general settings and is easy to miss until you actually need it.
Turn On App Lock
If anyone can open your banking, messaging, or gallery apps just by unlocking your phone, sensitive content stays exposed. Xiaomi phones include a separate app-level lock that adds a second layer of protection on top of your screen lock. Setting it up wrong, or skipping the fingerprint option, often leaves some apps unprotected.
Mark Contact as Favorite
If a contact you call or message often gets buried in a long list, you probably haven't set it as a favorite yet. Favorites move straight to the top of the Contacts app and speed up dialing from the Phone app. It's a quick toggle, but easy to miss since it's tucked inside the contact detail view.
Show Emojis in the Symbols Keyboard
On Xiaomi phones the symbols keyboard can display your most recently used emojis for quicker access, but that suggestion strip stays hidden by default. The Mi keyboard needs this behavior turned on separately before recent emojis appear next to the symbols and numbers.
Turn On/Off Sunlight Mode
Bright sunlight can make the Xiaomi display look washed out or hard to read, especially when checking messages outdoors. If automatic brightness is switched off, a separate Sunlight mode boosts the screen output whenever strong light hits the sensor. Without it active, the display often stays too dim outside even at maximum manual brightness.
Rename a Paired Bluetooth Device
When several Bluetooth accessories are paired to your Xiaomi phone, the device list can quickly fill up with cryptic model numbers or partial MAC addresses. Telling a pair of earbuds apart from a car stereo or a fitness tracker gets difficult once the default names look identical. Renaming each paired device gives you a clear label instead of guessing which entry belongs to which gadget.
Change App Lock Password Type
If you set up App lock on your Xiaomi phone with a pattern and now want something faster or more secure, you are not stuck with that choice. The lock type you picked during setup can be swapped for a PIN or password at any time, without disabling App lock first.
Add a New Contact
Saving a new phone number on a Xiaomi device sometimes feels confusing because the Contacts app hides extra fields like birthday, address or company behind a single Add button. Many users only enter a name and number, then wonder later why the birthday never shows up in the calendar. The trick is knowing which fields to expand before you save the entry.
Turn Speak Passwords On or Off for TalkBack
When TalkBack reads your password out loud while you type it, anyone nearby can hear sensitive login data. On Xiaomi phones with MIUI, this happens because the Speak passwords option inside TalkBack is turned on by default. Switching it off keeps entered characters silent, though you lose the audio confirmation that a password was typed correctly.
Turn On/Off Camera Live Tips
If your Xiaomi camera keeps popping up messages about a dirty lens or telling you to hold the phone level, the Live tips feature is running in the background. These prompts are useful for beginners but can get in the way during fast shooting, and not everyone wants every single tip active.
Power Button Ends Call Setting
Ending a call on a Xiaomi phone usually means tapping the red hang-up button on screen, which is awkward one-handed or when the display is hard to reach. MIUI has a hidden accessibility toggle that lets you end calls with the power button instead, but it is turned off by default and easy to miss in the settings.
Turn On/Off Emergency SOS
If your Xiaomi phone fires off an emergency text every time you grab it too fast, Emergency SOS is likely reacting to five quick presses of the power button. The feature sends your location and, if you choose, a summary of your last hour of call activity to selected contacts. Turning it off - or setting it up properly first - stops accidental alerts and unwanted location shares.
Download Videos via Mi Browser
Saving a video from Facebook, YouTube or Vimeo on a Xiaomi phone usually means installing a separate downloader app first. Mi Browser can skip that step, but only if you know where the download option for links is hidden in the profile menu. Without it, a pasted video link just opens for streaming instead of saving to your storage.
Turn On/Off Auto-Update
If your Xiaomi phone keeps installing system updates overnight without asking, or you never get notified when a new MIUI version is ready, the auto-update setting is likely working against you. Some users want updates to install by themselves while they sleep, others prefer full control before anything changes on the device. This setting decides which of the two happens.
Turn Autofill Service On or Off
If login fields on your Xiaomi phone stay empty or a browser keeps offering saved passwords you never asked for, the Autofill service is likely misconfigured. This system feature decides whether apps and browsers can pull addresses, payment details or passwords into forms automatically. Switching providers or turning the service off changes what gets filled in and which app holds that data.
Set Default SIM Card for Outgoing Calls
Every time you dial a number, your Xiaomi phone pops up a menu asking which SIM card to use for the call. If you only ever tap the same option anyway, that extra confirmation step just slows down dialing. A fixed default SIM removes the prompt for good.
Reject an Incoming Call
If a call comes in at a bad moment on your Xiaomi phone, you don't have to answer it or wait it out. The red decline icon on the incoming call screen lets you dismiss it right away, but only if you swipe correctly. Miss the gesture and the call keeps ringing or gets answered by accident.