Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) has unveiled it’s all new smartphone, dubbed the Fire. We’ve been hearing rumors about this new phone for almost a year, and now finally we’ve gotten a look at Amazon’s first smartphone.
As expected, the smartphone offers some cool new features to stand out from the already crowded smartphone market. Most notable is the new 3D interface, Firefly app which recognizes audio, images, objects and more, and the Mayday help service.
Amazon Fire specifications
The Fire smartphone comes with a 4.7-inch screen, 2.2 GHz quad-core Snapdragon processor, Adreno 320 GPU, 2GB of RAM, 13-megapixel rear camera and a 2.1-megapixel front-facing camera.
While all the features might look impressive at first, you should note that it comes with Amazon’s own Android-based Fire OS. It “starts with Android and adds cloud services, a content-forward user interface, built-in media libraries, productivity apps, and platform enhancements to integrate Amazon’s digital content and improve performance,” Amazon said.
Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) being the newest entrant in the smartphone market has to compete with the likes of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. (LON:BC94) (KRX:0059935). So without any further ado, let’s compare the Fire with Apple iPhone 5S and Samsung Galaxy S5.
[table] Specs, Amazon Fire phone, Apple iPhone 5S, Samsung Galaxy S5Display, “4.7-inch IPS LCD HD with 1,280×720 resolution”, “4-inch Retina display with 1,136×640 pixels”, “5.1 inches with 1,920×1,080 pixels”
PPI, 315 ppi, 326 ppi, 431 ppi
OS, Customized Android based Fire OS 3.5, iOS 7, Android 4.4
4G LTE, Yes, Yes, Yes
Rear camera, 13-megapixel, 8-megapixel, 16-megapixel
Front camera, 2.1-megapixel, 1.2-megapixel, 2-megapixel
WiFi, 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, 802.11 a/b/g/n, 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac
Processor, 2.2GHz quad-core Snapdragon 800, Proprietary A7 with M7 motion processor, 2.5GHz quad-core Snapdragon 801
Capacity, 32GB/64GB, 16/32GB/64GB, 16/32GB
Expandable memory, No, No, “Yes, up to 128GB”
Bluetooth, v3.0, v4.0, v4.0
NFC, Yes, No, Yes
Battery, 2400 mAh, 1560 mAh, 2800 mAh
Colors, Black, “Gray, White and Gold”, “Black, White, Blue, and Copper”
[/table]
Of course, technical specs are only half the story. There are many other things to consider such as premium software features, gestures, ease of usability, battery and device performance and such. We’ll need to wait for a detailed review of Amazon’s Fire smartphone to talk more about its performance, and whether it’s worth buying or not.
The Fire phone is exclusively available through AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T), and will cost $199 for the 32GB version with a two-year contract ($299 for 64GB). If you want to buy the phone without any contract, then the 32GB version will cost $649. You can pre-order right now from AT&T’s website and shipping starts July 25.
