, Finnish manufacturer HMD Global showed off the first Android phones designed under the Nokia name. They actually look a lot like something that peak Nokia would’ve designed itself, but all the models were distinctly mid-range.
A few months later, it looks like HMD is setting up for the launch of the first Nokia flagship in years. The Nokia 8, seen here in leaked images from the ever-reliable Evan Blass, looks perfectly set up to take on the big boys.
The design is classic Nokia: simple front, although a front sporting the kind of thick bezels that are rapidly going out of style. The back is some kind of colored finish, likely using the same unibody aluminum design found on Nokia’s midrange phones. Blass says it will come in blue, steel, gold/blue and gold/copper.
Inside is where things get interesting. Likely specs are a 5.3-inch screen with QHD resolution, Qualcomm’s top-end 835 Snapdragon processor, 4GB or 6GB of RAM, and dual 13MP Zeiss cameras. The final phones produced by Nokia (under Microsoft ownership) stressed big, fancy cameras above all else, so it’s logical that HMD has the same focus.
Overall, it’s a serious set of specs that could go a long way to attracting Nokia loyalists back to the brand. It’s certainly not groundbreaking compared to big players like the LG G6 and Samsung Galaxy S8, but for a simple, powerful device that takes great pictures in a reasonably pleasant body, it could be perfect.
Blass reports that it will launch on July 31st for around $675, based on a pre-listing from a Scandanavian website. The price should hopefully be a little lower stateside, and if it comes in around $600, I could see a new cult classic in the making.
