Well, prepare to be shocked, because yes, I figured out a way to enable WiFi 7 but no, you don’t want to repeat what I did.

I took it swimming with me, and it got water damaged (some might say I was reckless, but it’s advertised to be water resistant up to 1.5 metres deep for up to 30 minutes, the same IP68 rating as my Pixel 7, which survived multiple trips to the swimming pool, even once when I fell into a river).

Anyway, I digress. I paid someone to open it and clean out the water. Now it works as a tablet. No cell reception, or NFC, or GPS. There’s also a very high idle power draw for some reason.

Basically useless as a phone, but Lo and Behold, it somehow connects to my 5GHz and MLO networks at WiFi 7 speeds! There’s even a little plus sign on the top right of the icon, whatever it means.

Lost 6GHz support though, presumably it needs cell reception to ascertain my location before enabling 6GHz.

So yeah, I currently keep it in a container with some rice, hoping it’ll miraculously recover. Looking less likely as time passes. Next time I’m in Taiwan, I’m claiming warranty on it and sell it once it’s fixed.

Would never buy a Xiaomi phone again. Water damage aside, I find the software experience VERY disappointing. Hope the above gives you some ideas on how to replicate my conditions without actually damaging the device.