BlackBerry Mobile took to Twitter on Friday to tease the unveiling of the upcoming BlackBerry Mercury smartphone at this year’s Mobile World Congress (MWC). The teaser image which can be seen above clearly reveals that the Canadian tech giant will be unveiling its latest flagship during a conference scheduled for February 25, two days before the Barcelona-based trade show officially kicks off. Apart from that, the image shows that the upcoming Android device will feature a physical QWERTY keyboard and a USB Type-C port, which was already confirmed at CES 2017 last month.
It’s worth noting that the TCL-made device won’t be called the BlackBerry Mercury once it hits the market as the company previously revealed that’s just the name that was made up by the Internet. Regardless, recent rumors suggest that the upcoming BlackBery smartphone will feature a 4.5-inch display panel with a 4:3 aspect ratio, but there’s still no word on what kind of resolution that screen will offer. The QWERTY keyboard on the front of the device can double as a trackpad, while its spacebar features a fingerprint sensor. The device is expected to ship with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 625 system-on-chip (SoC) and 3GB of RAM, both of which will be powered by a 3,400mAh battery. Latest rumors indicate that the BlackBerry Mercury will boast an 18-megapixel rear camera, not unlike the one featured on the Priv, in addition to sporting a 3.5mm audio jack. Finally, the device will run Android Nougat out of the box. Overall, the main selling point of the phone seems to be its physical keyboard, though that isn’t to say its alleged specs aren’t up to par with other contemporary Android smartphones.
In any case, more information on the BlackBerry Mercury will be available in just over two weeks. Following its official unveil on February 25, MWC visitors will likely be able to try out the Mercury in person during the trade show seeing how CES visitors were already able to do the same last month. While there’s still no information on when BlackBerry and TCL are planning to launch the Mercury, the upcoming Nougat-powered phone will likely be released by spring.