Sony Xperia 1 Finally Launches This July for $949 in the U.S.

BY Evan Selleck

Published 16 May 2019

Back in February of this year, Sony officially announced its early-2019 flagship smartphone: the Xperia 1. It’s a tall handset with a big display, and now the smartphone is finally coming to market.

On Thursday, Sony officially announced that it will launch the Xperia 1 in the United States on July 12. When it arrives, the smartphone with a big display will boast a $949 price tag. That puts it right in line with a variety of other top-tier smartphones, as far as pricing is concerned. The question for Sony, of course, is whether or not the Xperia 1 can actually compete with those other devices.

The display is the major selling point for the Xperia 1. It’s tall, measuring in at 6.5 inches and boasting an aspect ratio of 21:9. This is actually a perfect screen to watch movies on, because it won’t have any letterboxing like other phones. But the screen is also a 4K OLED panel, with a resolution of 1644×3840 for good measure.

Under the hood, there is a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor, which is paired with 6GB of RAM. There is 128GB of built-in storage and it supports a microSD card up to 512GB. Around back, there are three cameras, all three of which are 12 megapixels. The primary camera is coupled with a super wide-angle and a 2x optical zoom for depth data. The front-facing camera is an 8MP sensor.

The battery measures in at 3330mAh, it’s running Android 9 Pie out of the box, and the Xperia 1 has a USB-C port for charging.

The Xperia 1 is set to launch in the United Kingdom first, with a release date of May 30. It has a price tag of £899.

What do you think of the Xperia 1 for that price?

[via Sony]