> Most Xiaomi devices have a custom UX and additional weirdness. That's true. Just like Samsung, Huawei, OnePlus, and any other Android manufacturer except Nok

> Most Xiaomi devices have a custom UX and additional weirdness. That's true. Just like Samsung, Huawei, OnePlus, and any other Android manufacturer except Nokia, Xiaomi maintains its own Android ROM, called MIUI[1]. It's not as vanilla as Android One, but at least it also receives monthly security patches. > Among which is the need to "sign up" online for bootloader unlock and wait for a timeout period. They do this because resellers used to ship bootloader-unlocked versions with "unofficial" mods of sorts, often with customers being none-the-wiser. Not an issue on the 'Mi A' line, for whatever reason. It's not an issue with Xiaomi Mi A line, because Xiaomi's reputation is not affected as much if there is something wrong with a smartphone that is not running its custom ROM. Nokia has only recently started allowing to unlock the bootloader of some of the models, and has a similar process[2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIUI https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIUI [2] https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_int/bootloader https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_int/bootloader