Update [March 7, 2018]: More images of the Nubia N3 were discovered on Weibo, including those that reveal the contents of its retail packaging, all of which can be seen in the gallery below. The original story is as follows.
A real-life image of a device that’s said to be the Nubia N3 leaked online on Wednesday, having originally appeared on Chinese microblogging platform Weibo. The photograph that can be seen above shows a device with a tall display panel using the elongated 18:9 aspect ratio, the same image format that’s been gaining significant traction in the mobile industry for over a year now. Nubia already commercialized a slim form factor with the Z17s last year but is expected to embrace such a design with even more models throughout 2018, with the alleged N3 apparently being one of them.
The newly emerged handset features regular-sized bezels but lacks a physical Home button and instead relies on virtual system keys, whereas its fingerprint reader is presumably mounted on its rear plate. The leak shows the supposed Nubia N3 as running the company’s “nubia UI” software whose last commercialized version was based on Android Nougat, though the firm is soon expected to make the jump to Android 8.0 Oreo. The device is depicted as featuring a single front-facing camera and a glossy black finish, with no other discernible details being seen on the image. If the Chinese original equipment manufacturer is truly planning to release such a product this year, it’s likely to launch it this spring.
Nubia had a sizeable presence at this year’s Mobile World Congress where it bought a booth used for showcasing its latest advancements, including several prototypes of an extremely aggressive-looking gaming smartphone. The company is looking toward the gaming segment of the market in an effort to expand its business to more niches, with its current portfolio still being primarily targeted at price-conscious consumers. The Android OEM didn’t share many availability details on its gaming handset but confirmed the device is planned for commercialization in 2018 and should be powered by the Snapdragon 845 and 8GB of RAM.
