Finally! The Nokia 9 PureView is probably one of the most anticipated flagship devices this year. The phones have been circulating the web for quite some time now. Since 2017 to be exact. The phone marks the return of the well-respected PureView brand which before is used to describe premium Nokia phones with innovative cameras.
We while the old technology may not see a return in the future, the camera technology on the new Nokia 9 PureView has fully redefined the PureView brand. First of all, all the five cameras at the back of the device don’t have a telephoto or wide-angle lens. Instead, HMD, ZEISS, and Light opted for 3 monochromatic sensors and 2 color sensors (all 12-megapixel, f/1.8 ZEISS lenses). The idea behind this is not new. However, the execution on the Nokia 9 is entirely new.
Every time the user snap photos, all the five cameras work in unison. The result is a photo with 12.4-stops of dynamic range with extreme details. Users can even refocus all the photos taken with Nokia 9 after the fact. According to HMD, the Nokia 9 takes up to 1200 planes of depth (equivalent to 12-megapixel depth map), versus the 10 planes most of the competitions ( or 0.1-megapixels). This makes the bokeh more accurate and natural looking.
The Nokia 9 excels in low light too. Thanks to its 3 monochrome cameras, HMD and Light.co claim that the Nokia 9 can collect 10 times more light than any other smartphone cameras today. Of course, reviews will be able to tell if those were real. But so far, seeing all the camera samples taken with the phone, I can say that it’s very promising. Given that the unit is still using pre-release software.
The Nokia 9 is also capable of capturing RAW DNG photos. HMD also seek help from its partner, Adobe, to fully optimize the Adobe Lightroom for the Nokia 9 PureView. Google is also behind the refocus feature of the Nokia 9, fully baked into the Google Photos app. But there’s just so many things to talk about the Camera on the Nokia 9 PureView, so if we left out something, tell us in the comment section below.
To wrap up the phone’s imaging prowess, the selfie camera on the Nokia 9 is a 20-megapixel sensor also wit ZEISS lens. There are no OIS. Instead, HMD opted for EIS. Users can also take videos in color and native monochrome sensor. As we have heard, all the cameras (selfie camera, one RGB, and one monochrome sensor at the back) can capture up to 4K @30fps in HDR. Lastly, making all these things possible is the Light’s Lux Capacitor baked on top of the Snapdragon 845 SoC. Of course, Qualcomm also helped the process. So it’s not just a one company ambition. It’s a combined effort between HMD, Light.co, ZEISS, Qualcomm, and Google.
Coming to the specs, the Nokia 9 PureView features a 5.99-inch 2K P-OLED panel. Like the recent Nokia phones, the phone also uses Pixelworks’ PureDisplay technology. Enabling real-time SDR to HDR10 content conversion. As we have understood, PureDisplay has its own chip to handle this workload. So that’s so cool.
As mentioned, the Nokia 9 uses a Snapdragon 845 SoC, with 6GB of RAM, and 128GB of storage. Storage is not expandable though. There is also no headphone jack, so that’s a bummer. The battery is also lower than any other flagships in the market at only 3320mAh. Thankfully, the phone supports fast charging via USB-C, and also ships with an 18-Watt charger. There is also a Qi Wireless Charging, NFC, and support for Qualcomm AptX. The fingerprint sensor is also baked under the P-OLED panel. To wrap up, the device is cased on a Gorilla Glass 5 and 6000-series aluminum frame and is IP67 water and dust resistant certified.
Unfortunately, the handset is a limited edition device. It already started shipping for a global average price of only 699 USD. It’s only available in Midnight Blue color option for now.
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