China-based OEM ZTE Corporation has taken the wraps off the cheapest smartphone to pack-in a fingerprint scanner. Meet the ZTE Blade A1, the latest addition to the Blade lineup of affordable handsets.
On Thursday, Dec. 3, ZTE officially introduced its mid-range Blade A1 smartphone which houses the popular fingerprint scanner - a rare feature for devices in this bracket.
The Blade A1 is the first smartphone under $100 - it will be priced at CNY 599 which is approximately $94 - to boast this feature, making it the cheapest smartphone around to offer a fingerprint scanner.
The ZTE Blade A1 looks compact and measures 142 x 70.2 x 8.9 mm (5.59 x 2.76 x 0.35 inches). The handset's design is reminiscent of the iPhone 5c from Apple and it has a glossy plastic body.
The smartphone sports a 5-inch HD screen with a resolution of 1,080 x 720 pixels. Under the hood, the device houses a quad-core MediaTek MT6735 processor, which is clocked at 1.3GHz and is paired with 2 GB of RAM. The smartphone has 16 GB of on-board storage, which is expandable, and is fueled by a 2,800 mAh battery.
The Blade A1 also has a 13MP primary camera and an 8MP selfie snapper. The device will come with Android 5.1 Lollipop out of the box with ZTE's MiFavor 3.2 UI on top.
The much-touted fingerprint sensor on the ZTE Blade A1 is the same one used on the Axon phone and is able to unlock the device in just 0.3 seconds, courtesy of its 360-unlocking technology.
The Blade A1 is set to go on sale in China from Dec. 11 and will be available from JD.com. The retailer is already accepting preorders for the handset, which will come in five hues: Cool Blue, Vibrant Yellow, Dream Green, Smart White and Space Grey.
Whether the ZTE Blade A1 will be released by the company in other parts of the world remains unknown.
