Sony Xperia Z 5-inch Android superphone announced officially

Sony Mobile has announced the launch of its new flagship smartphone for 2013, the Sony Xperia Z.

The new phone, a mammoth 7.9mm thick, 5-inch beast, has previously gone under the guise of the Sony Yuga and enjoyed the usual array of leaks ahead of its unveiling at CES, where Sony has finally made the phone official.

Called the Xperia Z – because, according to Sony, everything before has been a build-up to this moment – the new smartphone will go on sale in the UK in the coming weeks, with mobile phone operators including Vodafone all keen to stock it in white, black and purple.

The phone itself, which Pocket-lint has already had a chance to play with, measures 139 x 71 x 7.9mm and weighs 146 grams, and comes with a Full HD 1080p Reality Display with Mobile Bravia Engine 2 that builds on the technology found in the company’s 2012 range of phones.

That screen, which is as stunning as it looks in our hands-on pictures, is the main focus of the design, with the casing emphasising Sony’s “OmniBalance” approach that means it looks the same from all angles.

That means the front is void of all buttons and fixtures aside from a front-facing camera and the Sony logo. It’s the same for the back – and, for the most part, the sides – with Sony opting to cover all the ports to create not only an almost seamless design, but also one that is waterproof. Yep drop it in the swimming pool, or more likely the toilet, and it’ll be fine.

There is one feature that breaks away from the smooth lines, and that’s the rather large aluminium power button on the right. It’s an interesting choice, but one that feels well-made and comfortable to use. It’s the phone’s worry button and many will welcome that.

Of course that 5-inch 1080p 443ppi display (a lot more than most phones on the market) is big – like, really big as our hands-on pictures show – and like the Samsung Galaxy Note II makes phones like the iPhone 5 and even the Samsung Galaxy S III look tiny by comparison.

Surprisingly it’s not quite as big as we were expecting, with the screen real-estate smaller than the SGN2 and the casing (just 7.9mm thick) keeping the size to a minimum as much as possible. Interestingly the Sony Xperia XL, also announced at CES 2013, comes with the same display in a smaller non-waterproof housing, but Sony has confirmed to Pocket-lint that it won’t be coming to the UK.

But it’s not just a big screen. There is power behind the Xperia Z too in the guise of the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon processor – the 1.5GHz asynchronous quad-core Snapdragon S4 processor with 2GB RAM – a 13-megapixel fast-capture camera, 4G LTE, NFC, and a 2400mAh battery which, with additional help from a new software feature from Sony, should give you more than nine days of battery life. We’re thinking standby, not active use here.

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