Xiaomi 17 Pro durability test: Surprising plastic but glass almost as scratch-resistant as iPhone 17 Pro's ceramic shield

China's most important smartphone flagships rarely appear on the JerryRigEverything YouTube channel, which primarily reviews smartphones available in the United States. Exceptions are sometimes made, such as for the new Xiaomi 17 Pro. At first glance, the 6.3-inch flagship smartphone looks like an iPhone 17 Pro, but its secondary display in the camera bump on the back is rather special.

The AMOLED display is protected by Dragon Glass 3.0 protection on the front and does not scratch at the usual Mohs level 6 in the scratch test, but only starting at level 7. This makes Xiaomi’s Gorilla Glass alternative almost as scratch-resistant as Apple's new Ceramic Shield 2, which performed a bit better in this durability test. Unfortunately, Xiaomi only utilizes this new glass on the front, as the glass on the back already shows the usual scratches starting at level 6 on Mohs hardness scale.

The back holds a surprise for such a high-end flagship, as it’s made of plastic instead of glass. The frame is made of anodized aluminum. Plastic certainly has advantages because it naturally does not break as easily as glass. Nevertheless, this could potentially surprise many prospective buyers, especially since many cheaper phones typically feature a plastic back panel. That being said, the bend test was uneventful, so the Xiaomi 17 Pro passes JRE’s durability test. A quick teardown follows in the second part of the video, which is embedded below.