Sony’s Explanation as to Why the Xperia XZ2 Lacks a Headphone Jack Is Lame

BY Rajesh Pandey

Published 14 Mar 2018

Sony was the last major Android OEM which continued to include a headphone jack on its flagship devices. That was until the company unveiled the Xperia XZ2 and XZ2 Compact at MWC 2018.

With its latest flagships handsets, Sony switched to a new design language with its latest flagship smartphones — something which users had been asking for a long time, but it also took away the headphone jack which consumers did not want it to take away from their phones.

Most companies have had some or the other reasoning behind removing the headphone jack from their phone. What about Sony? It surely cannot be the lack of internal space since the Xperia XZ2 is among the thickest flagship smartphones out there.

Well, Sony wants us to believe that its due to the switch to its new Ambient Flow design language. It says that “in order to create the beautiful seamless design,” its designers had to remove the headphone jack. And Sony was also aware of the “major market trend toward wireless headphones.”

Essentially, Sony is saying here that it had no good reason for removing the headphone jack from its latest flagship devices. It did so because every other OEM was also doing the same thing. The whole rubbish about the design aspect does not work since not only is the Xperia XZ2 a thick phone, its bezels are also pretty big that Sony could have easily included a headphone jack in the device.

As a consolation, Sony does include a 3.5mm-to-USB-C adaptor with the Xperia XZ2 and XZ2 Compact which supports Hi-Res Audio using which one could use their existing wired headphones with the handsets. Or you know, just buy a smartphone which comes with a headphone jack like the Samsung Galaxy S9.

[Via Sony, 9to5Google]