Miyoo Mini Plus vs RG35XX: 2026 Retro Handheld Comparison

Design and feel

The Miyoo Mini Plus and the original RG35XX occupy the same basic genre: cheap, Linux-based, vertical retro handhelds for people who want to spend more time choosing firmware than playing Phantasy Star IV. The practical question is not whether either one is “good,” because both can be made good. The practical question is which compromises you prefer to tolerate every day.

The comparison material in the supplied results makes one thing clear: the Miyoo Mini Plus is the more networked machine, while the original RG35XX is the more old-fashioned one. Miyoo gets Wi‑Fi, USB‑C, and a larger battery; RG35XX gets HDMI output and a higher RAM figure in the comparison table, but no Wi‑Fi. That is the entire personality of the pair in a sentence. One is a pocketable, connected toy for OnionOS people. The other is a slightly more austere brick for people who think a retro console should behave like a retro console and not ask to join the wireless world.

There is also a family resemblance that matters. The comparison page describes both as Linux-based devices with similar controls: a D-pad, four face buttons, and two shoulder buttons. That means neither one is trying to reinvent ergonomics. They are both designed around the same 1990s control grammar, which is fitting because their best-supported systems live there too.

The deadpan truth is that the physical difference that matters most is not aesthetics but logistics. The Miyoo Mini Plus uses USB‑C, which is the kind of detail that sounds boring until you are the person packing a cable bag. The RG35XX uses micro-USB, which is less charming in 2026 than it was in the decade where people still tolerated micro-USB as a fate. HDMI output on the RG35XX also matters more if you actually intend to use the device as a tiny console rather than a private museum object.

Specs comparison table

The table below sticks to the data in the supplied sources and separates the original RG35XX from the newer RG35XX Plus where the results do so. That distinction matters because the search set repeatedly drifts toward the Plus revision, and pretending otherwise would be lazy even by internet standards.

The only honest interpretation of this table is that the original RG35XX is the less connected machine and the Miyoo Mini Plus is the easier machine to live with if you care about modern convenience. The RG35XX’s HDMI output is the lone obvious hardware advantage in the original-vs-original matchup. The Miyoo Mini Plus wins on Wi‑Fi and charging port convenience, while the RG35XX wins on external display output.

What the data does not tell you is equally important. It does not give us a clean, 2025–2026 primary-source spec sheet for the original handhelds beyond the comparison material already supplied, and it does not establish a lab-tested hierarchy for every edge case. The source set itself admits that the later material leans toward RG35XX Plus coverage rather than the exact original-vs-original matchup. That is not a flaw to hide. It is the condition of the evidence.

Performance, accuracy, and emulation

On these devices, “performance” mostly means “how much Dreamcast optimism you can fit into a shell that was clearly built for PlayStation-era humility.” For the original Miyoo Mini Plus and original RG35XX, the supplied comparison material does not provide benchmark-grade frame-time charts, emulator-by-emulator test matrices, or repeatable throughput numbers. So the sane way to talk about performance is by using the hardware and firmware characteristics that the sources do give us, then making conservative inferences from them.

The most relevant hardware difference in the original pair is RAM: the Miyoo Mini Plus is listed at 128MB, while the RG35XX is listed at 256MB. On paper, the RG35XX has the larger memory pool. On paper, lots of things have happened. In practice, for 8-bit through most 32-bit emulation, both machines are operating in a regime where CPU efficiency, OS tuning, and frontend overhead matter more than the raw brag number attached to RAM. The supplied results do not show a direct, apples-to-apples benchmark proving the original RG35XX’s extra memory translates into materially better gameplay in the systems most people actually use.

The newer RG35XX Plus data is more explicit, but it describes a different device. According to the supplied 2025–2026-adjacent review, the Plus uses an H700 quad-core ARM Cortex-A53 at 1.5GHz with a G31 MP2 GPU and 1GB LPDDR4 RAM. That is obviously stronger than the original devices, and it explains why modern commentary tends to migrate toward the Plus family when the topic is “which Anbernic box is worth buying now?” But if you are specifically choosing between the original Miyoo Mini Plus and original RG35XX, the Plus numbers are context, not verdict.

Accuracy is where the conversation usually gets dressed up like science and then turns out to be brand loyalty in a lab coat. Neither device is a magic accuracy machine. Both run Linux-based firmware, which means their emulator quality depends on the software stack, BIOS handling, and core selection just as much as the hardware itself. The comparison source explicitly notes that both platforms can use custom firmware or alternative operating systems, which is the actual lever for compatibility and timing tweaks.

For 8-bit and 16-bit systems, the difference is mostly one of quality of life rather than raw performance. For PlayStation, the gap can narrow or widen depending on the emulator core and firmware. For anything beyond that, the original devices are already living on borrowed time, and the supplied results do not pretend otherwise. The later RG35XX Plus data suggests Anbernic understood this problem and answered it with a better SoC, more RAM, and a larger battery. That does not retroactively upgrade the original RG35XX into something it was not.

Benchmarks from the supplied results are not clean numerical frame tests, so the only responsible performance comparison is a hierarchical one:

• The RG35XX Plus is the strongest performer in the broader family because the supplied review lists a newer H700 platform with 1GB LPDDR4 RAM.
• The original RG35XX has more RAM than the Miyoo Mini Plus in the supplied comparison, but no benchmark evidence in the results proves a universal emulation advantage.
• The Miyoo Mini Plus compensates with a mature firmware ecosystem, especially OnionOS, which can make the machine feel more polished than its spec sheet suggests.

That last point is not an aesthetic opinion. It is the recurring pattern in handheld emulation: better software polish can feel like better hardware because it lowers friction. You notice the difference when the device boots, resumes, scrubs through menus, and handles saves. You do not need a synthetic benchmark to discover whether one machine makes you want to throw it in a drawer.

Firmware, saves, shaders, netplay

The supplied comparison gives us the names that matter: OnionOS for the Miyoo Mini Plus and GarlicOS for the RG35XX. Those names are not decorative. They are the real product. The shell is merely the container for the social contract between user and firmware.

Both devices are described as Linux-based, which is why custom firmware is even possible in the first place. That matters for save states, shader support, ROM organization, scrape workflows, and the usual small acts of obsessive maintenance that define the retro-handheld hobby. In a device class this cheap, the firmware often determines whether you get a competent toy or a smug paperweight.

Save states are effectively table stakes on both devices. The supplied results do not enumerate save-state architecture in detail, but the Linux firmware environment and the presence of custom firmware ecosystems imply standard emulator save behavior. For an editorial comparison, the useful distinction is not whether save states exist; it is how trustworthy the resume experience feels. OnionOS is repeatedly associated in community commentary with stability and maturity, while the RG35XX ecosystem is more fragmented across revisions and firmware variants.

Shaders and overlays are likewise more a firmware story than a hardware story on these machines. The results do not give a formal shader support matrix, so the only defensible statement is that both handhelds are capable of custom-emulator presentation tweaks because both are Linux-based and both have active CFW ecosystems. Whether a given shader pack is pleasant on a 3.5-inch IPS panel is a separate philosophical problem, and most of the time the answer is “not as often as forum screenshots imply.”

Netplay is where hardware really starts to matter. The Miyoo Mini Plus has Wi‑Fi, which makes network features plausible and, at minimum, not self-parody. The original RG35XX does not have Wi‑Fi, which means netplay is not a serious out-of-box strength for that model. The newer RG35XX Plus, by contrast, includes Wi‑Fi 5 and Bluetooth 4.2, which is exactly the kind of revision that happens when a manufacturer notices users keep asking why a handheld in the 2020s cannot participate in basic network features.

There is a practical hierarchy here:

• Best firmware reputation: Miyoo Mini Plus, because OnionOS has the stronger name recognition in the supplied sources and the community commentary leans toward stability.
• Best built-in networking: Miyoo Mini Plus over original RG35XX, because Wi‑Fi exists on one and not the other.
• Best “modern revision” features: RG35XX Plus, because Wi‑Fi 5 and Bluetooth 4.2 are explicitly listed.

That does not mean the Miyoo is better at everything, only that its feature set is less embarrassing for modern use. The original RG35XX is still the more direct little machine if you care about HDMI output and do not care about connecting it to the outside world. Which is an oddly specific worldview, but retro handheld buyers are nothing if not committed to their own rituals.

Battery, charging, and I/O

This category is where the comparison stops being abstract and becomes arithmetic. The supplied results consistently list the Miyoo Mini Plus battery at 3000mAh and the original RG35XX at 2100mAh. That is a meaningful gap, and unlike many internet arguments, this one has an actual number attached to it.

The video transcript in the results says the Miyoo Mini Plus battery is 3000mAh and the RG35XX’s is 2100mAh, and it also describes the Miyoo as delivering about six hours in the transcript context. A later review of the RG35XX Plus lists a 3300mAh battery and up to eight hours of playtime, which reinforces the general pattern that Anbernic’s newer revision solved one of the family’s older annoyances. None of this turns battery life into a universal metric, because screen brightness, emulator load, and volume settings matter, but it does establish the direction of travel.

Charging and connectivity are where the Miyoo Mini Plus becomes the less annoying device. It uses USB‑C, while the original RG35XX uses micro-USB. That is not a minor footnote. It changes how likely you are to reach for the correct cable without anger. The Miyoo also has Wi‑Fi, which broadens the practical utility of the port selection because transfers and network functions do not have to involve as much card-slinging.

The RG35XX’s compensating feature is HDMI output, which the comparison page gives it and denies to the Miyoo Mini Plus. If you want to dock a tiny handheld to a larger display for couch use or testing, the RG35XX has the more straightforward hardware story. That said, the supplied results do not indicate that this makes the RG35XX a better living-room device than the Miyoo overall; it just makes it more versatile in one specific direction.

Here is the operational reality, stripped of romance:

• Miyoo Mini Plus is better if you care about longer runtime, modern cabling, and wireless convenience.
• RG35XX is better if you care about HDMI output and do not mind old-port behavior.
• RG35XX Plus is better than both on battery capacity in the supplied review, but it is not the original RG35XX and should not be smuggled into the comparison by accident.

If you are the sort of person who evaluates a retro handheld partly by whether it can be charged from the same cable as your phone, the Miyoo wins before the BIOS screen appears. If you are the sort of person who still owns micro-USB cables in organized drawers and feels no shame, the RG35XX remains coherent enough.

Pricing and availability

The supplied search results do not provide a clean 2025–2026 pricing table for the original Miyoo Mini Plus and original RG35XX, and pretending they do would be nonsense. What they do show is that the RG35XX Plus ships in 64GB and 128GB card options, which implies the market for these handhelds is still being segmented by bundled storage rather than by pure hardware alone.

In practice, availability in 2026 is a moving target because the original models often coexist with newer revisions, flash-card bundles, and marketplace relists. The exact street price matters less than the usual budget-handheld principle: if the newer revision of a device exists in the same price neighborhood, the older one must justify itself with a feature the new one does not have. For the original RG35XX, that feature is mainly HDMI output. For the Miyoo Mini Plus, it is the OnionOS ecosystem plus Wi‑Fi plus the generally friendlier daily-use profile.

There is a dry rule here. The original RG35XX only makes sense if it is priced low enough that HDMI output is a real bonus rather than a consolation prize. The Miyoo Mini Plus only makes sense if its cost buys you convenience rather than nostalgia for all the cables you used to own. Once the prices drift too close to stronger revisions, the original models become museum pieces with batteries.

Real-world use cases

The best way to compare these devices is by scenario, because retro handhelds are rarely purchased for abstract spec-sheet purity. They are bought for habits. Here are the five most defensible use cases, with the caveat that the supplied material does not give every emulator-specific detail and so some recommendations are based on the feature sets the sources actually establish.

1. Pocket carry and commuting
Best pick: Miyoo Mini Plus. The supplied community commentary says it is more pocketable, and the combination of Wi‑Fi, USB‑C, and OnionOS makes it the more civilized carry device. If you want something that disappears into a bag and resumes without fuss, this is the cleaner choice.

2. Simple home plug-in setup with a TV
Best pick: RG35XX. HDMI output is the decisive hardware feature here, and the supplied comparison gives that to the original RG35XX and not to the Miyoo Mini Plus. If your intended use includes actual external display output, the Miyoo is the wrong machine by design.

3. Wireless-friendly library management and sync-adjacent use
Best pick: Miyoo Mini Plus. Wi‑Fi is the difference-maker. Anything involving wireless convenience, network-aware features, or less tedious content management favors the Miyoo over the original RG35XX.

4. Battery-first portable sessions
Best pick: Miyoo Mini Plus for the original-vs-original comparison, because the supplied sources list 3000mAh versus 2100mAh. If you are comparing against the RG35XX Plus, the answer shifts, because that later model is listed with a 3300mAh battery and up to eight hours.

5. Firmware-tinkerer’s playground
Best pick: Either, with a slight edge to Miyoo Mini Plus for stability. OnionOS and GarlicOS are both named in the supplied results, which means both families have active custom-firmware cultures. The community post in the search results says the Miyoo Mini Plus has more stable Onion OS, which is exactly the kind of answer a tinkerer already knows before asking.

6. Cheapest competent handheld for mostly 8-bit and 16-bit play
Best pick: RG35XX if priced meaningfully lower. Because the original RG35XX still has enough RAM headroom on paper and brings HDMI output, it remains the more utilitarian buy when cost is king and Wi‑Fi is unnecessary.

7. “I want one device to keep for years” scenario
Best pick: Miyoo Mini Plus if you prioritize convenience over display output. The software ecosystem and charging/wireless setup make it easier to keep using without resenting it. If your use case is more “living-room box,” the RG35XX is still the better shape of machine.

Notice the pattern: the original RG35XX’s best argument is specific and hardware-tangible. The Miyoo Mini Plus’s best argument is cumulative and habitual. That distinction is the difference between a device that looks good in a forum thread and one that gets used on a Thursday.

Expert opinions and community verdicts

The supplied results include one community post that is at least useful because it states the obvious without pretending to be neutral: the RG35XX Plus has a better chip and build quality, while the Miyoo Mini Plus is more pocketable and has more stable Onion OS. That is not a lab evaluation, but it is exactly the sort of blunt community consensus that usually survives contact with reality. People keep carrying the thing that disappears in a pocket and boots cleanly.

The search set also gives us source names and firmware ecosystems that function as expert signals even when they are not direct quotations: OnionOS and GarlicOS are not marketing slogans; they are community shorthand for the software camps that define user experience on these devices. The presence of those named ecosystems in the comparison material is itself evidence that software reputation matters as much as hardware spec.

Because the provided results do not contain additional named developer interviews or direct quotes from firmware maintainers, the honest move is to distinguish between explicit source statements and editorial inference. Explicitly, the comparison page says the Miyoo Mini Plus uses OnionOS and the RG35XX uses GarlicOS. Explicitly, the community post says the Miyoo Mini Plus is more pocketable and has more stable Onion OS. From that, the reasonable inference is that the Miyoo has the stronger reputation for day-to-day polish, while the RG35XX community more often treats hardware revisions as part of the experience rather than a solved problem.

That reputation split matters because it shapes buying advice:

• If you value firmware maturity: the Miyoo Mini Plus is the safer psychological purchase.
• If you value hardware flexibility: the RG35XX’s HDMI output gives it a specific utility the Miyoo lacks.
• If you value modernized internals: the RG35XX Plus exists, and the supplied review is basically an argument that this is the one Anbernic made for people who were done waiting for compromises to feel elegant.

A serious comparison also has to admit that much of the “expert” discourse around these devices is just the internet rediscovering that software support evolves faster than shell molds. The Miyoo Mini Plus wins praise when people care about OnionOS and general usability. The RG35XX wins praise when people want a pocketable HDMI-capable box and are willing to manage the rest themselves. The Plus revision, naturally, appears when users want the brand to stop pretending 2100mAh and micro-USB are still exciting.

How to switch from one to the other

Switching between these devices is less like migrating between consoles and more like changing your preferred set of compromises. The game files are easy; the habits are not. The supplied results do not give a formal migration manual, so the guidance below is an editorial procedure grounded in the feature differences the sources do establish.

From RG35XX to Miyoo Mini Plus

1. Back up saves, states, configs, and BIOS files.
2. Copy your library to a neutral folder structure before touching the new SD card.
3. Rebuild your folder names for OnionOS conventions if needed.
4. Verify that Wi‑Fi-based features are configured before importing expectations.
5. Test one core per system before moving the whole library.
6. Re-map hotkeys if your muscle memory was built around GarlicOS behavior.
7. Only then migrate the rest of the catalog.

The main reason for this order is that the Miyoo Mini Plus’s appeal is not raw horsepower but the smoother software experience, especially around OnionOS and wireless use. You want to meet the machine on its terms, not force the old layout onto the new shell and complain that the handheld failed your prophecy.

From Miyoo Mini Plus to RG35XX

1. Back up everything, then assume nothing about file compatibility.
2. Prepare for HDMI use if external display output matters to you.
3. Replace any Wi‑Fi-dependent workflow with card-based transfers.
4. Re-test save behavior and hotkeys under GarlicOS or your preferred firmware.
5. Expect the charging and cable setup to change because micro-USB is involved.
6. Keep one small test set of games before committing the full migration.
7. Decide whether the HDMI advantage is worth the loss of wireless convenience.

The practical trade-off in this direction is obvious: you gain display output, but you give up the Wi‑Fi convenience that the supplied comparison explicitly lists on the Miyoo Mini Plus. If your entire reason for switching is “I want the same thing but different,” you are probably shopping with your feelings and should be gently escorted away from the checkout page.

Migration checklist for both directions

• Copy saves before testing firmware.
• Keep one known-good ROM set for validation.
• Use the same BIOS set where legally appropriate and technically required.
• Retain screenshots of hotkey mappings.
• Test sleep, resume, and battery behavior before declaring victory.

Because both devices are Linux-based and support custom firmware ecosystems, switching is mostly a matter of adapting to interface conventions rather than learning an entirely new emulation universe. That sounds easier than it is, because “interface conventions” is a polite phrase for “the reason your shortcuts stop working.”

Pros and cons

The most interesting thing in that table is how little “better” and “worse” mean without a use case. The original RG35XX’s HDMI output is a concrete advantage only if you use it. The Miyoo Mini Plus’s Wi‑Fi is a concrete advantage only if you need it. Battery and USB‑C matter on any day ending in y, so those are the more universal wins.

There is also a hidden con that both devices share: neither one is the end of the road. They are affordable entry points into a hobby that tends to immediately produce revision anxiety. You buy one box for NES, then you notice the next revision has better charging, then the community says the firmware on the other brand is cleaner, then you have somehow become the person maintaining three SD cards and an opinions folder. The sources in hand do not solve that, because no device can. They only clarify the shape of the trap.

Verdict

If the comparison is strictly between the original Miyoo Mini Plus and the original RG35XX, the Miyoo Mini Plus is the better all-around buy for most people because it combines Wi‑Fi, USB‑C, a larger battery, and a stronger firmware reputation in the supplied sources. The RG35XX’s HDMI output is useful and real, but it is too specific to outweigh the Miyoo’s broader day-to-day convenience unless TV output is a central requirement.

If the comparison is allowed to drift into the newer RG35XX Plus, the verdict becomes messier, because the supplied 2025–2026-adjacent review gives it a stronger H700 platform, Wi‑Fi 5, Bluetooth 4.2, and a 3300mAh battery. That revision is plainly the more modern machine, but it is also no longer the exact same buy. The original-vs-original matchup therefore still favors the Miyoo Mini Plus on usability, while the newer RG35XX Plus becomes the broader hardware recommendation if you are shopping the whole family rather than the named pair.

My recommendation, with the usual lack of sentimentality: buy the Miyoo Mini Plus if you want the cleaner, less irritating handheld to live with; buy the RG35XX only if HDMI output is genuinely valuable to you; and buy the RG35XX Plus if you were never interested in pretending the original hardware ceiling was anything other than a temporary compromise.

That is the machine’s answer, and it is not complicated. The Miyoo Mini Plus is the better daily companion. The original RG35XX is the better little HDMI box. The RG35XX Plus is the manufacturer quietly admitting the first two were a chapter, not the book.

External authority links

• DroiX review of RG35XX Plus
• Original comparison source used in the supplied results
• Reddit SBCGaming community
• OnionOS GitHub repository
• GarlicOS GitHub repository

These links are provided as authority anchors for further verification, not as decorative ornaments. That would be too optimistic for a hobby built on SD cards and firmware branches.