Google Pixels have really picked up in popularity in Japan in recent quarters and while they are mostly eating into Apple’s share of the market, local brands may be worried too. With this in mind, check out the new Sharp Sense8, which just launched at JPY 62,150 (while a Pixel 7a is JPY 62,700). According to Sharp, the phone was designed primarily for two things – a good, simple to use camera and long battery life. For the latter, the battery capacity has been upgraded to 5,000mAh (up from 4,570mAh on the Sense7), not bad for a phone that weighs only 159g.
This is a relatively compact device, it
measures 153 x 71 x 8.4g, and despite its mid-range status it has a premium
aluminum unibody design and an IP68 rating for dust and water resistance. As
for the display, it is a 6.1” IGZO OLED panel with 1,080 x 2,432px. It has a
variable refresh rate, 1-90Hz, with black frame insertion (which Sharp claims
makes it look like a 180Hz display). Brightness tops out at 1,300 nits. The
Sense7 from a couple of months ago had a 60Hz display, so this is one of the
upgrades.
Another one is the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1
chipset, which has a 36% faster CPU and 33% faster GPU compared to the
Snapdragon 695 found inside the Sense7 (based on Sharp testing). The chipset is
paired with 6GB of RAM and 128GB storage, which can be expanded with a microSD
card up to 1TB. Then we get to the cameras. The new model has a 50MP sensor in
the main camera (1/1.55”) with 1.0µm pixels, 2.0µm if you use binning. There is
no tele camera, but the main sensor supports native 2x zoom. While this is the
same sensor as the Sense7, the new model also features OIS. The other camera on
the back is an 8MP ultra wide module.
The Sense8 features a microSD slot as we
mentioned already, there is a 3.5mm headphone jack too and the USB-C port does
DisplayPort to boot. The one thing it lacks is fast charging – the official
specs list the charge time at 160 minutes. There is no wireless charging. This
is a dual-SIM phone with nano-SIM and eSIM. It supports 5G (2.1Gbps) along with
WiMAX 2+ (WiMAX is still a thing in Japan, apparently). Additional wireless
connectivity includes Wi-Fi 5 (ac), Bluetooth 5.1 and NFC. Another thing to
mention is the side-mounter fingerprint reader.
The Sharp Sense8 is available in Japan
only.
You can pick it up on contract too, check out DoCoMo and UQ for more. The phone
should be available through the other major Japanese carriers as well.