Xiaomi’s modern smartphones, which run MIUI shells and the new HyperOS, offer users the flexibility to personalize the interface. One of the most common challenges owners face after buying is to get rid of the classic control buttons at the bottom of the screen. Navigation buttons, familiar to many from older Android models, occupy a useful display area and often interfere with full immersion in content or games.
The process of deactivating the standard control unit and switching to more modern methods of interaction with the system does not require root rights or complex technical manipulations. All the necessary tools are already built into the developers’ settings menu, but their location can vary depending on the firmware version and regional modification of the device.
By removing physical or screen buttons, you not only free up space, but also prolong the resource. OLED-In addition, gesture control is often perceived as smoother and more intuitive after a short period of habituation.
Transition to gesture management in MIUI and HyperOS
The most common and standard way to remove buttons is to activate full screen mode. In current versions of Xiaomi shells, this process is unified and takes only a few seconds. You need to open the main settings menu of your device. Usually the icon is a gear located on the desktop or in the notification curtain.
Once you log in, look for a section that might be called “Advanced” or “Advanced Settings,” although in recent HyperOS updates, these items are often placed in a separate Desktop category. Inside this section, you look for Navigation or System Navigation, and that’s where the two interface modes switch.
In the window that opens, you'll see two options: Buttons and Gestures. To hide the navigation bar, you'll need to choose the second option. The system will instantly apply the changes, and the usual triangle, circle and square will disappear from the bottom of the display. Now swipe control is done: return is done by swipe from the edge of the screen, and exit to the desktop by swipe from the bottom up the center.
It's worth noting that after switching, you can have a thin bar at the bottom of the screen, which shows you the area to call the multitasking menu. If your goal is to maximize the purity of the image, you can also hide that bar in additional settings on the same menu, which we'll talk about later. Signal navigation is the standard for today's Android smartphones.
Hiding the bar-indicator and completely cleaning the screen
Even after you activate gesture control, many users notice a thin horizontal line at the bottom of the screen, which serves as a visual cue to swipe up to open a list of running applications, but in some scenarios, such as watching videos or reading books, it can be distracting.
To achieve perfect screen cleanliness, you need to go to the same navigation settings where you chose Gesture mode. The navigation type you choose is usually the Hide the hint or Hide the indicator switch, and activating this switch removes the visual marker, leaving the bottom of the display completely black (on AMOLED screens) or color.
⚠️ Note: After the indicator is hidden, the navigation becomes completely blind. You need to remember that the swipe should be done from the bottom edge of the screen, since there will no longer be a visual landmark.
It's important to understand that the complete absence of any controls can be disorienting in the first days of use. If you accidentally forget how to go back or call a menu, it can cause slight discomfort. However, muscle memory is formed quickly, and after a couple of days you will no longer notice the lack of visual cues.
Some of the themes downloaded through the Themes store can force the user interface elements to return on top of the system. If the bar appears again after a theme change, check the settings of a particular theme or try to reset it to a standard one. System fonts and interface zoom can also affect the display of the bottom indentation.
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If the indicator bar disappeared on its own after the system update, check if Full Screen mode is turned on for specific applications in the display settings.
Switching sensitivity and swipe area
The switch to gestures is sometimes accompanied by sensitivity issues, especially on devices with curved edges of the screen or low-quality protective glass. MIUI allows you to adjust the sensitivity of the edges, which helps to avoid accidental taps or, conversely, makes swipes more responsive.
To set up, go to Settings → Additional → One-handed mode (location may vary in different versions). Here you can find a slider that adjusts the size of the active area for side swipes. Enlarging this zone makes it easier to perform returns from applications without requiring a precise hit to the extreme pixel of the matrix.
- 📱 Side swipe: used to return to a previous menu or close the keyboard.
- 🏠 Lower Swipe: Instant return to the main desktop from anywhere in the system.
- 📋 Lower Switch with pause: opens the menu of running applications and allows you to switch between them.
Particular attention should be paid to compatibility with protective glass. Cheap glass often has thick black bezels that physically overlap the extreme zone of the screen, making swipes impossible, in which case calibrating the screen through an engineering menu or replacing the accessory becomes necessary measures.
☑️ Checking the operation of gestures
Navigation management in specific applications
Even with gestures enabled, some applications can behave unpredictably, such as video players or games can hide the system navigation automatically to provide a full view, but sometimes this mechanism fails. In the system settings, there is a section called Full Screen Mode where you can force the behavior for each application installed.
This list shows all the apps you have installed, and you can choose between three options for each of them: Default, Full Screen, or Disable. If you have buttons that spontaneously appear or disappear in a program, try changing that option manually, which often solves the interface scaling problems.
| Regime. | Description of behaviour | When to use |
|---|---|---|
| By default. | The system decides whether to hide the navigation or not. | For most standard applications |
| Full screen | Navigation is always hidden, content is on the whole screen | For video, games and reading |
| Shut down. | Forced display of buttons or frames | For old applications with incorrect layout |
Also worth mentioning are floating windows and split-screen mode, which when multitasking is activated, the navigation bar may behave differently, offering buttons to fold windows, which is the normal behavior of the Android system in multi-window mode, and you can't turn it off with standard means.
⚠️ Note: In some banking and anti-cheat-protected games, the concealment of system navigation may be blocked by software developers for security or fraud prevention purposes.
Use of third-party launchers for customization
If you don't have enough of the system's regular capabilities, or if you want to return buttons, but in a different style, third-party launchers come to the rescue. Apps like Nova Launcher, Microsoft Launcher or specialized navigation management tools allow you to completely change the logic of the bottom of the screen.
Alternative buttons often require special permissions through ADB or superuser rights, although many modern launchers have learned to get by with standard Accessibility Service. Once installed, you can create your own dashboard with whatever buttons you need.
- 🎨 Visual Style: the ability to change color, transparency and shape of buttons.
- ⚙️ Functional: Assigning any action to one or double press.
- 📍 Location: Place buttons anywhere on the screen, not just at the bottom.
Using third-party software to replace system navigation can consume additional battery power, as the launcher process must work constantly in the background. In addition, on new versions of HyperOS, the system can aggressively unload such applications from memory, requiring constant manual adjustment of power saving.
Risks of using third-party launchers
Solving common problems and bugs
Sometimes users are faced with a situation where the navigation buttons “stick”, disappear on their own or, conversely, do not want to hide even after switching settings. Most often, this is a software failure of the SystemUI interface. The first step should always be a banal reboot of the device.
If the reboot didn't work, try clearing the system process cache. To do this, go to Settings → Apps → All applications, search the System Interface or System UI list and click Clear Cache. Don't confuse this with data cleanup, although in this case it's usually safe, it's better to start with cache.
In rare cases, the problem is with a conflict with the installed themes or fonts. If you have recently changed the visual style of the device, try returning the standard theme "Classic" or "No Limits" to help you understand whether the problem is systemic or caused by third-party intervention.
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90% of navigation problems are solved by restarting the phone or switching the navigation mode back and forth in the settings.
If nothing works and the buttons are chaotic, the firmware files may be damaged, so check for system updates or, in extreme cases, reset to factory settings, saving important data beforehand.