Sony Xperia XZ4 rumor review: super-tall, extremely powerful, three cameras, price and release date

MWC is almost upon us and we are about to see the announcements of some sweet new devices. Heavy hitters Samsung and LG will be there, showcasing their latest smartphones, and so will Sony, supposedly showing off a brand-new Xperia XZ4.

Wait, didn't we just see an Xperia XZ3 get released this past October? Why yes, we did. But Sony insists on sticking to a 6-month refresh schedule for its flagship series, so it will not be all that unusual if the Xperia XZ4 gets announced in February and launches in April, just like the XZ2 last year.

So, what do we know about the Xperia XZ4? Well, we have some juicy leaks, actually. Let's put it all together!

To Compact or not to Compact

While Sony does refresh its flagship XZ line once every 6 months, the Compact series is usually an annual ordeal. Their name says it all — an XZ Compact will have the same hardware and almost all the perks of a regular XZ flagship, but it will be slightly smaller, catering to fans of the smaller phones.

We’ve heard a couple of whispers about the XZ4 Compact here and there, but the latest rumors say that Sony decided not to make a Compact this time around. Perhaps demand was low? Or the rumor could be a hoax, we’ll see.

Design — the tallest Xperia ever

For a couple of years now, smartphone manufacturers have been pushing their screens in the super-wide territory. Well, we call it extra tall, due to the way we hold a handset, but still. While the 16:9 display ratio used to be standard for years, but now we have phones with 18:9 and even 19.5:9 screens.

“Amateurs”, the Xperia XZ4 says. According to rumors and leaks, Sony is planning to equip its latest flagship with a super-long, 21:9 screen. We’ve already seen renders from reputable leakers as well as an alleged real-life photo of the phone (although the latter is not extremely reliable). And it looks like we are about to get a huge chocolate bar of a handset.



And yes, you will notice that, as per the rumors, the Xperia XZ4 is about to get a triple camera module on the back. “Where is the fingerprint sensor?”, you might ask. It seems it might move over to the side of the phone, embedded in the power button, as Sony used to do back with the Xperia Z line. One could speculate that Sony might be investing in facial recognition or under-the-screen fingerprint scanning, but no good leaks or rumors point this way.

Extra features we can spot — the phone comes with courage and no headphone jack, as well as a dedicated shutter button for the camera, which has been a Sony staple for years.

Hardware

Good news for the Sony fans — it seems that the Xperia XZ4 is going to be a very, very robust computing machine. It’ll come with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 processor — the golden standard for 2019 Android flagships and Qualcomm’s first SoC built on a 7 nm process. The phone will have 6 GB of RAM and either 64 GB or 256 GB of storage.



Now, these will be the specs of most Android flagships that will be coming out this year. So, what makes the Xperia XZ4 special? Well, a test unit was allegedly benchmarked with AnTuTu and it scored an impressive 395000, which is way above anything so far, including tests of the Galaxy S10 or benchmarks made with AnTuTu's own test device. So, Sony may have some insane optimizations going on under the hood of the XZ4.

About those triple cameras

Unfortunately, we’ve got no solid leads on why Sony decided to go with three cameras on the back. We would assume that at least one of these will be with a different lens.

It could be a combination of wide-angle, normal camera, and depth-sensing camera. Or a telephoto, normal, and wide-angle lens, a-la LG V40. The rumor mill is acting mum here, so we will have to wait and see.

Sony Xperia XZ4 price, release date

Again, leaksters haven’t commented on price yet, so we will have to go with educated guessing instead.

As we mentioned earlier, the Xperia XZ2 was announced in late February and launched in early April. If Sony wants the XZ4 to be a true annual refresh, it’ll have to do the same this year around. This means, we expect the Sony Xperia XZ4 to launch in the first week of April.

The Xperia XZ2 launched for $800, keeping up with the trend of recent smartphone price inflations. The XZ3 went even further, with a price tag of $900. We have to believe that this is as high as Sony would go with the Xperia XZ4 and maybe even bring it down a notch, at least to $850. If the company dares to go up to $999, it’ll face stiff competition in the face of Samsung’s super-productive Galaxy Note 9 and Apple’s ever-popular iPhone XS. And, let’s face it, Sony’s flagships don’t really have the sales momentum to battle these two.