Xiaomi’s New Budget Watches Undercut Its Own Three-Month-Old Model

Xiaomi is preparing to sell a smartwatch for about $58, according to a fresh leak detailing two new entries in its Redmi Watch 6 family. The Redmi Watch 6 Active and Redmi Watch 6 Lite would join the standard Watch 6 that reached European shelves this spring, according to 91mobiles, which cited tipster Sudhanshu.

Both new models undercut Xiaomi’s own recent budget watch by more than half. That gap is opening at the exact moment global data shows shoppers paying more for their wrists, not less.

Three Redmi Watches, Three Very Different Price Tags

The Redmi Watch 6 Active is the smaller of the two newcomers. It carries a 1.85-inch AMOLED screen at 390 by 450 pixels, Bluetooth 5.3 with calling built in, and support for more than 140 sports modes. It tracks heart rate, blood oxygen, sleep, distance and calories, and adds pedometer support for step counting. A 470mAh battery powers it, and it works across both Android and iOS. The leak puts its price at roughly €50, or about $58, in black, gray and pink.

The Redmi Watch 6 Lite sits above it, at least on screen size. It gets a 1.96-inch AMOLED panel at 410 by 502 pixels, the same battery and health tracking as the Active, and a reported price near €60, or about $69, in black and a beige tone. Both watches share a square dial design, a notable departure from the standard Watch 6’s shape.

Here is how the leaked pair stacks up against the model already on sale.

Xiaomi has not confirmed any of this. Sudhanshu’s renders and spec sheet are the only source so far, and the usual caution around unofficial leaks applies until Xiaomi schedules an actual launch event.

Why Does the Cheaper Lite Outgun the Active?

Normally a watch labeled Lite gets fewer features than one labeled Active, not more. Here the naming runs backward. The Redmi Watch 6 Lite reportedly keeps every tracking feature of the Active and then adds hardware the pricier sibling skips entirely.

• A 9-axis motion sensor, giving finer movement detection than the Active’s simpler setup
• Multi-system satellite positioning, absent from the Active’s spec sheet altogether
• A built-in speaker, letting it handle calls and voice prompts without a phone close by

That inversion suggests Xiaomi is not building a simple ladder from worst to best. It is building three separate pitches: one for buyers who just want the cheapest possible tracker, one for buyers who want a slightly bigger screen and better positioning hardware, and one for buyers willing to pay double for a metal frame and a 550mAh battery.

Xiaomi’s Newest Budget Watch Undercuts Its Own Lineup

The standard Redmi Watch 6 is not old stock. It launched in China on October 23, 2025, alongside the Redmi K90 Pro Max, then began reaching Poland, Romania and Thailand in early May 2026 before arriving in the UK and Spain later that month. In Spain, it retails for €119.99, with an NFC version at €149.99. In the UK, it sells for £104.99 and £129.99 for the NFC model. Xiaomi’s own product listing for the Watch 6 confirms the 2.07-inch AMOLED panel and the 550mAh cell behind that pricing.

Set the leaked Active price next to that number and the gap is stark. €50 is less than half of €119.99. Xiaomi introduced a genuinely new watch in Europe barely two months ago, and now appears ready to sell a smaller, lighter version of it for a fraction of the cost, aimed at the exact same shopper.

That is a real risk to margin and to the standard Watch 6’s own sales, not just a marketing flourish. A shopper deciding between a €50 tracker and a €120 one, with similar health sensors on both, has an easy reason to pick the cheaper watch and pocket the difference.

A Market That’s Paying More for Wrists, Not Less

Xiaomi’s timing looks unusual next to the rest of the industry. Global smartwatch shipments grew 4% year over year in the first quarter of 2026, and the trend behind that growth was not bargain hunting.

• 4%: year-over-year growth in global smartwatch shipments in Q1 2026
• 23%: Apple’s share of that market, the largest of any single brand
• ~10%: Xiaomi’s share, good for third place worldwide
• 6%: growth in the global average selling price over the same year

Those figures come from Counterpoint Research’s Q1 2026 tracker, which found the recovery driven mainly by premium health-focused devices and Apple’s refreshed lineup rather than entry-level volume. A rising average selling price across a market Xiaomi is trying to grow inside is an odd backdrop for a strategy built on shaving a new watch down to $58.

There is a cautionary parallel closer to home, too. India’s once fast-growing smartwatch market contracted sharply in 2025 as demand for basic, low-cost trackers fell, even as premium segments elsewhere kept climbing. A bet on ultra-cheap hardware does not automatically pay off just because it is cheap.

Amazfit and the Rest of Europe’s Budget Tier

Xiaomi is not just squeezing its own lineup. It is squeezing a whole shelf of budget rivals that built their reputations around the sub-€100 price point. Amazfit’s Active 2, one of the better known names in that space, sells for €99.90 in its standard silicone-strap form and €129.90 for the leather-strap Premium version with sapphire glass, per Amazfit’s own regional listings. Amazfit’s official spec sheet for the Active 2 touts more than 160 workout modes, offline maps and a Zepp Flow voice assistant, features Xiaomi is not matching at €50, but the price contrast is hard to ignore.

The direction of travel elsewhere in the wearable market runs the opposite way. Pixel Watch 5 renders leaked alongside a reported $50 price increase for Google’s own line, the sort of move that widens rather than narrows the gap between budget and flagship wearables. Xiaomi is pulling in the other direction, adding cheaper rungs instead of raising the ceiling.

Can Xiaomi Undercut Itself and Still Win?

Three watches sharing one generation name is also a branding gamble. A shopper searching for Redmi Watch 6 online in a few months could land on three different screen sizes, two different battery capacities and a price spread running from €50 to €150 once the NFC variant is counted. That is a lot for a casual buyer to sort through at the point of sale, and confusion at checkout tends to help the rival sitting one shelf over, not the brand doing the confusing.

Xiaomi has clearly decided that owning every price point beats owning one clean product. Whether that pays off depends on whether European shoppers see three tiers as more choice or as one good watch getting quietly cannibalized by its own cheaper cousins. For now, none of it is official. Xiaomi has said nothing about a launch date, and 91mobiles’ leak remains the only word on price until the company schedules an event of its own.