Today at CES, Sony unveiled three new smartphones, the Xperia XA2, Xperia XA2 Ultra and Xperia L2, with selfie-taking featuring heavily in the lineup’s priorities.
According to Sony, the Xperia XA2 range has been created for those who are “living online and are creating and consuming content on social media daily”, in other words: digital zombies millennials and sub-millennials.
In a case of what some may consider overkill, Sony has crammed some sophisticated camera technology into sleekly designed frame of the XA2. Creators will be able to capture high-resolution stills with the phone’s 23MP 1/2.3-inch Exmore RS sensor rear camera, which has a maximum ISO 12800 sensitivity for improved lowlight performance. For video, the XA2 can record up to 4K-video and 120fps slow motion video capture, great for dramatic clips.
But of course, no phone for online types would be complete without an impressive front-facing camera. Sony has used a similar 8MP camera on the front to that featured in the Xperia XZ1, with a 120° super wide-angle 8MP camera. The ultra-wide angle lens is ideal for fitting in friends, family and scenic surroundings into selfie shots and vlog-style videos.
The XA2 Ultra has all of the same tech and features of the XA2, but with a bigger screen (6in vs 5.2in) and it ups the ante on the selfie front with an innovative front facing dual camera. The XA2 Ultra features two front facing cameras in a unique dual front camera design. Designed “with all kinds of selfies in mind” – we’re not sure how many kinds of selfies there are – but that’s what Sony says their enabling so we’re putting it out there. What we do like is that on one side it has a 16MP front-facing camera with Optical Image Stabilisation and promises to give clear shots even in low light, while the 8MP 120° super wide-angle camera (from the XA2 standard) allows you to capture more of your surrounding scenery. It’s larger screen measures 6 inches but is only Full HD resolution. However, it is described as providing a vibrant viewing experience with impressive detail and beautiful colours.
The XA2 range is mid tier, so their only packing the Qualcomm Snapdragon 630 chipset and 4GB RAM. But with 64GB onboard memory + microSD card expansion, rear fingerprint scanner, a respectable battery (3,300mAh XA2, 3580mAh XA2 Ultra with quick charging) and solid camera specs, we think this line of phones offer a lot of value for the money.
The Xperia L2 is a lower-tier phone, but equally offers a lot of promise on paper. It has a large 5.5-inch HD screen, 3,300mAh battery, 13MP rear camera and the Sony super-wide 120° 8MP front-facing unit, as well as rear fingerprint scanner for security. The phone comes in single and dual SIM iterations, depending on market and will be available in reflective Black, Gold and Pink.
We’ll be looking out for all of these phones at the Sony Press conference so look out for our pictures and thoughts on @Gadgetsboy socials.
