Sony Launches Xperia Z5 Family, Including The 'World's First' 4K Smartphone

Sony announced its newest flagship smartphone today, the Xperia Z5, along with two other smartphones from the same series, the Xperia Z5 Compact and the Xperia Z5 Premium, the "world's first" 4k smartphone.

The Xperia Z5 has kept much of the same "OmniBalance" design language that Sony has used for the past few years. It can still be considered competitive with most of what is currently out there at the high-end, but many users would have liked to have seen something a little different from Sony by now.

The main feature of the new device is likely to be its brand-new camera module, which had not been changed since the launch of the Xperia Z1. The camera comes with a new 23MP sensor and what Sony calls the fastest auto-focus in the world -- it's only 0.03 seconds to be ready for capturing pictures. That's about 10 times faster than what we see other new smartphones announce these days.

However, even if pictures can be "taken" instantaneously, there's still an ~1 second delay in processing the picture completely, and sometimes the device even lags slightly because of it.

Other specifications include the Snapdragon 810, a 5.2" display, LTE support and Quick Charge 2.0 support, which enables it to handle 5.5 hours of talk with only 10 minutes of charging.

The Xperia Z5 Compact is going to replace the previously launched Xperia Z3 Compact, which was praised for its compact size and battery life. The Xperia Z5 Compact also has only a 4.6" screen, just like the predecessor, and Sony promises it can last up to two days on a charge.

The third device from the Z5 series is the Xperia Z5 Premium, which includes the 5.5" 4k screen, a 3,430 mAh battery, and the ability to expand its 32 GB of default internal storage by up to 200 GB through microSD cards. The 4k Triluminos IPS display promises to have a high color gamut, higher contrast and higher sharpness, as well. In the few moments I've spent with it at IFA, the screen did indeed look crystal clear.

Sony also talked about its support for high-resolution audio in the latest products, which sometimes works simply by upscaling the current MP3 and AAC files into newer higher-res versions.

Sony has also begun selling a pair of smartphone headphones designed to almost completely eliminate background noise. Sony said it eliminated noise by 98 percent, and after testing the headphones myself at IFA, I can believe that's very close to the truth. Once a button is activated, almost all background noise simply disappears. However, I found that the headphones did not sit well in my ears, and according to a Sony representative, they are quite pricey at 180 euro a pair.

Xperia Z5 will launch globally in October this year, while the Xperia Z5 Premium should arrive a month later, in November. Both single-SIM and dual-SIM variants will exist for both models.

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Lucian Armasu
Lucian Armasu is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He covers software news and the issues surrounding privacy and security.
  • 3ogdy
    Brand new smartphone with lots of storage and THANK GOD, a microSD card slot! I'm so interested in this one!
    Reply
  • Bloob
    Too bad we don't really have enough power in phones to push any meaningful content on a 4K display. I'm sure it looks amazing though.
    Reply
  • pocketdrummer
    The Z5 and Z5 Compact might be good, but I can't see any practical purpose for a 4k display on a phone.
    Reply
  • sna
    4k lol .. and we need Titan X for 4K on PC...

    how on earth they play 3D games using that resolution and the crappy phone hardware?
    Reply
  • wtfxxxgp
    4k lol .. and we need Titan X for 4K on PC...

    how on earth they play 3D games using that resolution and the crappy phone hardware?

    It depends on the game. Also, 1080p will still look decent on that phone, so why play at the native resolution if it's choppy? Let's not be assholes about this. We all knew this was coming no matter how practical it would really be. Sony says they're the first, yay to them. I'm not really interested though.
    Reply
  • Cryio
    4k lol .. and we need Titan X for 4K on PC...

    how on earth they play 3D games using that resolution and the crappy phone hardware?

    Phone games aren't PC games. Bad comparison.

    You only need an Atom for mobile gaming, regardless of resolution. Intel HD 4000/4600 is already Titan X levels for mobile games.
    Reply
  • Xajel
    4k lol .. and we need Titan X for 4K on PC...

    how on earth they play 3D games using that resolution and the crappy phone hardware?

    In most cases, everything will render at 1080p and then upscaled to 4K, hell even Xbox One do upscaling in some games... Sony mentioned this with Video & pictures also... they have a pretty good upscaling engine used in their TV's.. so this is a mobile version.. might be not as good as that one but it should make a different...
    Reply
  • virtualban
    I LOVE the 4K phone!
    It will be such a heaven-sent for VR applications, and I don't mind a few rich schmucks paying for the R&D.
    Reply
  • kawininjazx
    Sony phones have terrible replacement parts, I fix iPhones and Android phones all the time, rarely am I able to find a good part for a sony phone that actually works.
    Reply
  • salgado18
    I LOVE the 4K phone!
    It will be such a heaven-sent for VR applications, and I don't mind a few rich schmucks paying for the R&D.
    I believe THAT is the only really usefull application for a 4K screen on a phone.
    Reply