Sony’s latest flagship phone brings 21:9 aspect ratio displays to the mainstream phone market.
Sony has issued a new flagship phone every six months for the last few years, and the company has done so yet again with the brand new Xperia 1.
This is the flagship phone following up the Xperia XZ3, but instead of the long rumored Xperia XZ4 name the company has decided to slim down its branding for a more easy to understand Xperia 1 name.
The company isn’t starting from the bottom in terms of hardware though – this is the most advanced Sony phone yet taking a lot of what made the Xperia XZ3 great, mixing in a little of the Xperia XZ Premium and a few extra features and quirks we’ve never seen before on a Sony phone.
We’re soon set to try out the phone at MWC 2019 where we’ll be sure to share with you all of our first impressions of the phone, but for the time being you can find below all of the details we know so far about Sony’s flagship choice.
We’ve yet to find out when the Sony Xperia 1 will be on sale, but it’s expected to land in Q2 2019. Exactly when that’ll be has yet to unveiled, and we don’t know how much it’s set to cost either.
We’d expect it to be a similar price to the Xperia XZ3 that cost £699 / $899 (around AU$1,260) at launch.
The big upgrade here is a brand new display technology, and for another generation the company is exploring the possibilities of a 4K display on a phone.
The Xperia 1 comes with a 6.5-inch display, and while on paper that may sound huge it’s unlikely to feel as big in the hand because of the new aspect ratio the company is using which is 21:9.
It’s an OLED display with the company’s own BRAVIA tech division working toward improving the panel so it should be the same quality as the display on the Xperia XZ3 or even better.
The company has adopted the 21:9 aspect ratios to give you a bigger display for watching films and when you’re looking at photos. The reasoning here is because most filmmakers make their projects in 21:9, so why can’t you watch in that same aspect ratio on your phone?
If you’re watching other content in a different aspect ratio it’ll appear with black bars along the edges of the phone, but the company says that shouldn’t happen a lot as almost 70% of films on Netflix.
