It looks like the long-rumored Nokia flagship is set to launch this month and new, leaked photos may reveal the final Nokia 8 design. Evan Blass, a highly regarded smartphone journalist, got his hands on these leaked images of the Nokia 8. He also added that he expects HMD Global, the company that holds the rights to manufacture the Nokia brand, to announce the Nokia 8 on July 31st.
You may be asking what has happened to the Nokia 9. While it’s not sure thing that the Nokia 9 is dead; it sounds like the company was working with both names and ended up choosing Nokia 8. Of course, the Nokia 9 still could be coming down the pipeline or it could also be released as a version of the Nokia 8 with more RAM or a new processor, for example.
Looking at the leaked pictures of the Nokia 8 design gives us a good look at what to expect. The side bezels are nice and slim but the top and bottoms bezels are not what we hoped to see from a flagship smartphone in mid-2017. The home button at the bottom of the device makes it look somewhat dated. Even Samsung has moved away from hardware home buttons this year.
The back of the device looks sleek. The anodized aluminum is a refreshing change from the usual glass and ceramic that many manufacturers seem to be moving ahead with. The dual, Zeiss-branded camera sensor is a bit of a nostalgia moment that calls back to the days of when Nokia sat on top of the mobile phone world. MD Global has the huge advantage of launching a smartphone bearing the brand of a highly respected manufacturer, even if the best days of Nokia are well behind us.
As for what’s running under the hood, recent leaks have given us as idea of what to expect internally on the Nokia 8. The screen will be a 5.3 inch QHD display. That’s somewhat small for a flagship smartphone for these days but we have to remember that not everyone wants a phablet sitting in their pocket.
We can also expect a Snapdragon 835, paired with either 4 or 6 GB of RAM. That Carl Zeiss camera sensor should come in at 13 megapixels. All in all, a very nice smartphone but nothing that will blow your socks off. The pricing is probably the most attractive part of this device, coming in at an estimated $675. That’s less than almost every other similarly spec’d flagship smartphone from other manufacturers.
Of course, the Nokia 8 design is only half the story. Software is the other half. HMD Global doesn’t have a lot of history to point to but they have mentioned that they want to offer a pure Google experience as well as timely updates. That should be music to the ears of smartphone fans but action speaks louder than words and we will see if HMD Global sticks to their promise. For now, they’re on the right track by launching the Nokia 8 with Android 7.1.
What do you think of the Nokia 8 design? Would you consider picking one up on launch date or will you be waiting until the first few reviews start to roll in?
