While almost all other smartphone brands jumped onto the notch bandwagon in 2018, Samsung was the only one that managed to stay clear of this trend. While the company eventually gave in and is on the verge of launching its new M Series handsets with the much more acceptable ‘waterdrop’ notch, Samsung spent most of 2018 perfecting the much talked about ‘Infinity-O’ display that was initially supposed to arrive on the Galaxy S10 series. However, with the likes of Huawei and Honor beating Samsung to even this design trend, the company a few weeks ago announced the launch of the Samsung Galaxy A8s in the Chinese market. This essentially became the first Samsung handset with an Infinity-O display. A few weeks later, we now have information about another handset called the Galaxy A9 Pro (2019) that has been launched with an eerily similar design and spec-sheet. According to Android Headlines, the A9 Pro (2019) is in fact, the international version of the A8s.
Let us now quickly delve into the details of this new smartphone.
Samsung Galaxy A9 Pro (2019): What we know
The Samsung Galaxy A9 Pro (2019) has become the first smartphone from the company to feature an Infinity-O display to launch internationally – the keyword here being international. As mentioned earlier, this seems to be the same device as the Galaxy A8s that first launched in China. In case you are unaware, the ‘Infinity-O’ display essentially negates the need of a notch. The ‘O’ shaped cutout is where the front-facing camera is located. It remains to be seen, however, if the cutout will affect the overall viewing experience.
Samsung Galaxy A9 Pro (2019): Specifications
Since the spec sheet of the A9 Pro (2019) is identical to the A8s, we can expect the smartphone to use the same 6.4-inch AMOLED panel with a resolution of 1080 x 2340 pixels in the 19.5:9 aspect ratio. The phone has a PPI density score of 403. The phone is likely to be powered by the same Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 SoC which is based on a 10nm manufacturing process. This chipset houses the Adreno 616 GPU for graphics. The phone comes in two versions – a base 6GB version with 128GB storage, and an 8GB RAM version with 128GB of storage. Both these versions get a microSD card slot for additional memory.
Moving on to the camera, the phone features a triple camera setup that includes a primary 24-megapixel sensor with f/1.7 aperture, a 10-megapixel secondary camera, and a 5-megapixel, f/2.2 depth sensor. The primary rear camera supports LED flash as well as HDR. The camera also records 1080p videos at 30fps. The front camera is a 24-megapixel unit with f/2.0 aperture.
The A9 Pro (2019) gets a Non-removable Li-Ion 3400 mAh battery that should be more than capable of keeping the handset powered for a complete day. At launch, the phone will come in three color options, Absolute Black, Black, and Blue. In South Korea where the handset has now been launched, it has a price tag of 599,500 won that translates to around $530 in the US. The handset is set to go on sale starting February 28 – which is more than a month away.
