The Japanese company Sharp has announced a new smartphone that is unlike any other on the market at the moment. That Aquos R6 boasts the largest camera sensor ever seen on a handset, a higher dynamic refresh rate than competing products, and the Qualcomm 3D Sonic Max fingerprint scanner below the display.
The Aquos R6 features a Leica-branded camera system with a one-inch sensor
The Sharp Aquos R6 reportedly has a one-inch Sony sensor. Image Credits – Engadget
The Aquos R6 comes with a one-inch smartphone sensor, and if you count Launched as a communication camera capable of running Android, the Panasonic Lumix CM1 is the first handset to have a module of this size specially built for a smartphone.
Although Sharp has not confirmed this, word on the street is that the Aquos R6 is equipped with Sony’s rumors IMX800 one-inch sensor that was expected to debut with the Huawei P50 series. It has taken the crown off Samsung’s 50MP ISOCELL GN2, which is 1 / 1.12-inch.
It’s the only sensor on the back of the phone, probably because the company thinks it’s enough for all the heavy lifting. The downside is that the device only offers digital zoom. Leica worked closely with Sharp on the camera system, and this is all the more an indication that the optics company no longer works exclusively with Huawei in the smartphone room.
The one-inch unit is a wide-angle camera with a resolution of 20MP, an aperture of f / 1.9 and a focal length of 19 mm. It boasts a 7-element “Summicron” lens made exclusively by Leica. Sharp claims that it has a tenth of the distortion of conventional lenses, which should lead to sharper images.
The lens is much wider compared to the main camera on most other phones, but still not as wide as ultra-wide cameras. The camera does not take surprisingly much space, but it is not too clumsy. It is accompanied by an LED flash and a fly-time module.
Aquos R6 comes with a Pro IGZO OLED
The Aquos R6 has a 6.6-inch proprietary display with a resolution of 2,730 x 1,260 and a refresh rate of as high as 240Hz. The refresh rate is dynamic and can go as low as 1Hz depending on the content displayed. The screen has a brightness of 2,000 nits.
The phone is also one of the first smartphones to have 3D Sonic Max ultrasound fingerprint reader announced by Qualcomm in December 2019. It comes with enhancements that solve the problems that plagued the first iteration – it is 17 times larger to avoid positioning problems and can read two fingerprints at once for better security.
The Aquos R6 has not skimped on the core specifications. The phone is powered by the flagship Snapdragon 888 chipset, which is paired with 12 GB LPDDR5 RAM and 128 GB UFS 3.1 storage space that can be expanded up to 1 TB. The front camera is 12MP and the device has a 5,000mAh battery. It also has a headphone jack and runs Android 11.
On paper, it sounds like one of the best smartphones of the year. Unfortunately, it is likely to be released only in Japan. Nevertheless, it provides a window into what should come from other smartphone manufacturers.
The phone is set to ship in June, when pricing information is likely to be announced. Color options include black and white.
