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Sony's first 5G phone may be a souped-up Xperia 1

You may have to make do with LTE with the Xperia 10's sequel.

Sony appears ready to leap into 5G smartphones, although you might not want to rush to the store if you have one of the company's recent handsets. XDA's Max Weinbach has shared what looks to be leaked images and specs for Sony's headline phones in 2020, the Xperia 1 II and Xperia 10 II. The 1 II would, as the name implies, be a tuned version of Sony's 6.5-inch 4K flagship with 5G for low- and mid-band networks (Engadget's parent Verizon would currently be ruled out), a speedier Snapdragon 865 processor and, curiously, a motion blur feature that promises "90Hz equivalent" visuals. It's not a true 90Hz display, then, but that might not be a bad thing when a 4K OLED at that refresh speed would likely slaughter your battery.

There would be other welcome tweaks, including a larger 4,000mAh battery (up from 3,300mAh), a 3X rear zoom lens instead of 2X, 8GB of RAM and 256GB of built-in storage. And yes, you'd still see a 3.5mm headphone jack.

The Xperia 10 II, on the other hand, would be squarely aimed at the mid-range buyers. The 6-inch phone would stick to LTE as its fastest data option and would continue to use the Xperia 10's 2,520 x 1,080 OLED screen, although there would be some useful performance upgrades like a Snapdragon 665 chip and 4GB of RAM. You could also expect three cameras on the back (8MP ultra-wide, 12MP standard and an 8MP 2X zoom) and 128GB of internal storage.

The leaks don't mention release dates, although you could hear about both phones very quickly when the date on their system clocks conveniently mentions February 24th, around when Mobile World Congress 2020 was due to start before it was cancelled. There's a good possibility you'll see these Xperia updates available in the US as unlocked models at some point, although history suggests you may have to wait a while.