Watch Xiaomi send the Redmi Note 7 to space for a photoshoot

Smartphone manufacturers sometimes go to odd lengths to promote their products; it takes a lot to stand out in the crowded market with phones that all do essentially the same thing. In a video posted on its official YouTube channel earlier today (via Sparrow News), it was Xiaomi’s turn to go to extremes in a new promo for the Redmi Note 7.

The video shows what happened when Xiaomi sent the budget handset into space — or almost — to take some snaps. The handset reached 35km on a balloon-aided, 3D-printed rig before falling back to earth.

The phone survived minus -58 degrees Celsius (-72 degrees Fahrenheit) temperatures and took a few photos of the earth with its 48MP rear camera before landing. Xiaomi posted some of the snaps it took on Twitter, which you can see below.

There are, however, a few peculiarities in the promo. For one, there’s a camera filming the Redmi Note 7 while it’s in the air and it looks like the Note 7’s camera points almost directly at it — as well as the rest of the sizeable rig. Why don’t we see any of this in the final images? The answer potentially relates to some other Note 7s briefly glimpsed in the footage: there seems to have been several phones attached to the rig — perhaps the one being filmed wasn’t the one taking the photos.

Adding further weight to that notion is the fact that one of the Xiaomi team appears to switch on the phone after retrieving it in the field (it shows the Xiaomi logo from the boot screen).

None of this is particularly important since nobody will be using the phone in those circumstances anyway. But if OEMs are going to try and grab our attention with this type of marketing, it would be nice to know they’re authentic: I doubt anybody would hold it against Xiaomi for filming one Redmi Note 7 while shooting photos with another Redmi Note 7 just behind it, if that’s actually what happened.

The Xiaomi Redmi Note 7 goes on sale in the U.K. tomorrow starting at 179 pounds (~$233), for more on its launch, head to our Redmi Note 7 coverage at the link.

What do you think of the Xiaomi space video? Let me know in the comments.