Andy Rubin’s $649 Essential phone with Titanium body, four cameras and a stunning display

The tech world was eagerly waiting for Andy Rubin’s smartphone when he teased about the handset after announcing it back in January. We were expecting the details to be showcased at a launch event but the company posted all the details about the smartphone on the website. The device is priced at $649 and will be available in four colours, ‘Black Moon’, ‘Stellar Grey’, ‘Pure White’, ‘Ocean Depths’.

The unique part about the Essential Phone is that it is made out of Titanium, the same metal used to “build rockets and replace bones” as detailed on the website. Essential claims that this smartphone will not get scratched, dented, or bend. They do add a disclaimer that Titanium is harder, stronger, and more resilient than aluminum. The company is confident in the build quality and will not sell any phone cases for the smartphone.

 The company has not added the logo on the smartphone pointing that ‘Your phone is your personal property. It’s a public expression of who you are and what you stand for.’ Essential phone sports a 5.7-inch display with QHD display panel with an effective resolution of 2560 x 1312 pixels and 19:10 aspect ration. The display is protected by Corning’s Gorilla Glass 5 on the front. The smartphone comes with an edge-to-edge ‘Full Display’ that gives the same screen estate as you would find on a phablet.
The smartphone will be powered by 64-bit Octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 clocked at 2.45 GHz, and Adreno 540 for graphics. It will pack 4 GB RAM along with 128 GB UFS 2.1 storage. The company supports HSPA+, GSM, CDMA EV-DO, FDD-LTE, TDD-LTE, and SCDMA networks. Essential Phone comes with Bluetooth 5.0 LE, Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac with MIMO, NFC, GPS with GLONASS, and USB Type-C, two accessory power pins, in terms of connectivity options.

Moving on to the camera, Essential sports 13 MP Dual RGB camera sensors along with a 13 MP Mono camera sensor. The smartphone will fuse the information from the three sensors on the back using the ‘image fusion technology. All the three camera sensors on the back will come with f/1.85 aperture. The camera sports a hybrid auto-focus system that uses contrast detection, phase detection and IR laser assistance to get a focused image. It can shoot 4K video at 30fps, 1080p video at 60fps, and 720p video at 120fps.

The company pointed out that the smartphone uses both color and monochrome sensors that can capture up to 200 percent more light than normal cameras on other smartphones. It also offers a true ‘monochrome’ mode for people who want to shoot in black and white. The front camera on the smartphone takes 8 MP images along with 4K video recording. A fingerprint reader sits at the back along with a proximity sensor on the front of the smartphone, just above the camera cutout. The Essential phone comes with a barometer, accelerator, magnetometer, and gyroscope sensors.

One thing to note is that the Essential Phone will come with a dock. The dock will come with a magnetic connector that will charge the smartphone without the need of any cable. The company has also launched a 360-degree camera that uses the magnetic connectors on the back like MotoMods. Last but not the least, the smartphone comes with a 3040 mAh battery that supports fast charging.


You can reserve the Essential Phone at Essential.com as of May 30th, 2017 in the United States. The international release of the Essential Phone will be announced at a later date. Additional information pertaining to the date of shipping and delivery will be provided to those registered during the reservation period via email. Once the Essential Phone is ready after the reservation period you may complete your order and purchase.

Via Tech2