Xiaomi spent its launch talking up dual 200 MP cameras and a 5 GHz chip. Then a red phone filled the stage screen, and I forgot the numbers for a good minute.
The Xiaomi 18 Pro Red Transparent Exploration Edition is the version of this phone I want. I know it won’t win the value argument, and I’ve made my peace with that already. You’ve seen clear phones before, usually as a sticker pretending to be a circuit board, and the question worth asking is whether Xiaomi has built a collector’s piece or dressed up a flagship in a costume.
Translucent red casing exposes the board’s lower solder traces and internal support ribs. The lower edge features a band of micro-molded grip dots, sitting just above a color-matched “Limited Edition” stamp.
In the launch video, what caught my attention was the rear display’s neat illusion. The 2.7-inch panel renders an internal map of the phone itself—so when the digital clock appears, it floats over printed circuit lines, leaving the camera island looking like a hollow shell.
Xiaomi’s own listing says this edition gets a glass back while the cheaper colors make do with fiberglass. Five extra grams come with it (208g against 203g). I’ll carry them.
A pretty phone still has to take good photos, and the brand’s samples give me hope. The 75 mm telephoto portrait of a bearded man in a denim cap has the compressed, flattering depth you’d normally pay a separate camera for, and the 23 mm frame stamped “Xiaomi 18 Pro,” showing a traveler striding under a stone arch with the Eiffel Tower dead center, is exactly the shot you’d post without touching an editor. Xiaomi picked those frames, of course.
Xiaomi sells the Xiaomi 18 Pro Red Transparent Exploration Edition in one build, 16 GB of RAM with 1 TB of storage. Wanting the red glass means paying for the top tier. One Japanese buyer on Reddit put that top transparent model at about $1,650, a figure I’d treat as a rough local estimate until official global pricing appears.
Early reports of freezing on the 18 Pro, rear screen included, are unconfirmed. They still worry me. Talk that global units ship with smaller batteries than the 7,000mAh China model is also unconfirmed, and the Pro gets the regular Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 while the Pro Max takes the faster Extreme chip.
If you’re paying for the clear red shell in your hand, you’ll love it. If you’re looking for the best price-to-performance ratio in an 18 Pro, the markup stings.
Keep watching when a 6.4-inch phone suits your hand better than a slab and you still miss the era of see-through gadgets. Importers comfortable with a China ROM can move first. Everyone else should wait for global pricing.
Carrying the red see-through design onto the secondary rear screen makes the 18 Pro Transparent Special Edition’s whole chassis feel like one piece. The hardware has my attention already. I just need to see the global software and final price before I decide whether the phone deserves a place on my shortlist.