After a bunch of leaks and rumours, HMD Global has now formally announced the Nokia 6 (2018) as its first smartphone of the new year. The new Nokia smartphone is the successor to the last year’s Nokia 6 and is debuting in China. Details about its global rollout are yet to emerge. However, the smartphone is quite likely to go on sale in India following the initial availability in the Chinese market. China’s Suning has started taking pre-orders for the Nokia 6 (2018), and its sale will begin starting January 10. The 32GB Nokia 6 (2018) variant will be available with a price tag of CNY 1,499 (roughly Rs. 14,600), whereas its 64GB variant will come at CNY 1,699 (approximately Rs. 16,600). Both the variants will come in Black and Silver colour options.
Nokia 6 (2018) specifications, features
Unlike the original Nokia 6 model that was launched back in January last year with a front-facing fingerprint scanner, the Nokia 6 (2018) features a fingerprint scanner on the back. The new smartphone has also dropped the capacitive keys that were available on alongside the frontal fingerprint scanner on the previous Nokia handset. The Finnish manufacturer has apparently chosen on-screen navigation to make the interface of the new Nokia 6 closer to stock Android UI. The decision is conspicuous as it has maintained a 16:9 display aspect ratio, and not used a 18:9 aspect ratio that was the primary cause of other manufacturers ditching front fingerprint scanners and hardware capacitive buttons. Further, the Nokia 6 (2018) has a metal unibody build that is made of 6000 series aluminium.
The dual-SIM (Nano) Nokia 6 (2018) runs Android 7.1.1 Nougat out of the box. The handset is also expected to receive an update to Android 8.0 Oreo sometime in the future. But the company hasn’t so far provided any official details on the latest Android update. On the display part, the Nokia 6 (2018) features a 5.5-inch IPS display with a full-HD (1080×1920 pixels) resolution and 16:9 aspect ratio. The smartphone is powered by an octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 630 SoC, which is clocked at 2.2GHz, coupled with 4GB of LPDDR4 RAM. Also, the internal storage of the new Nokia 6 is upgradable via microSD card slot (up to 128GB) in a hybrid dual-SIM configuration.
HMD Global has provided a 16-megapixel rear camera sensor on the Nokia 6 (2018) with dual-tone LED flash and PDAF lens that has f/2.0 aperture. Similarly, an 8-megapixel camera is available on the front with an f/2.0, 84-degree wide-angle lens. The smartphone also supports the company’s proprietary Dual-Sight technology that allows you to capture simultaneous shots from the rear and front camera sensors to create a Bothie. In terms of connectivity, the smartphone has FM radio, 4G VoLTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, Bluetooth v5, GPS/ A-GPS, USB Type-C, and 3.5mm audio jack.
Besides, the Nokia 6 (2018) packs a 3000mAh battery that supports fast charging technology. It measures 148.8×75.8×8.6mm and weighs 172 grams.