Sony is bringing back its high-end Xperia 1 line for the fourth time. Most of the time, the Xperia 1 IV is the same as the Xperia 1 III and the phones that came before it. The phone’s best features are its strong camera, its light hardware, and its focus on entertainment. This time, though, the Xperia 1 IV takes a more robust approach to attracting content creators. It has a new variable focal length periscope zoom camera, live streaming support for gaming and video, and a bunch of features from the ultra-premium, super-niche Xperia Pro-I that help Sony Alpha cameras work.
Specifications
- Display: 6.5-inch 4K OLED (3840 x 1644)
- Refresh rate: Adaptive 120Hz
- Rear cameras: 12MP main (f/1.7), 12MP ultrawide (f/2.2), 12MP 3.5 – 5.2x optical telephoto (f/2.3 – 2.8)
- Front camera: 12MP
- Chipset: Snapdragon 8 Gen 1
- RAM: 12GB
- Storage: 256GB/512GB, expandable with microSD up to 1TB
- Battery: 5,000 mAh
- Charging: 30W wired/15W wireless
- Water/dust resistance: IP68/IP65
- Size: 6.5 x 2.8 x 0.32 inches (165 x 71 x 8.2 mm)
- Weight: 6.5 ounces (185 grams)
Where to get Sony Xperia 1 IV smartphone?
With a Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 processor, 12GB RAM, and either 256GB UFS storage in Europe or 512GB UFS storage in the US, the phone also has a strong performance. But anyone who knows a little bit about top smartphones will know that you can get phones with similar or even better specs for much less money. Sony’s value proposition is instead based on its exclusive Camera Pro, Video Pro, and new Music Pro apps. These apps were all made to help content makers get more out of the hardware of the phone than they could on other smartphones. In the same way, Sony is one of the few companies that still sells high-end phones with a 3.5mm headphone jack and a microSD card spot.
The Xperia display is just as sharp as the Galaxy S22 Ultra and iPhone 13 Pro Max, and it has a color temperature that is somewhere in the middle of those two. This made both the darker, more dramatic scenes and the brighter action scenes in the Uncharted movie look great. The Xperia 1 IV has a good-sized 5,000 mAh battery, but the battery life dropped by 22% after two hours of watching YouTube over Wi-Fi. That uses more power than other phones I’ve tried with this method, like the Honor Magic4 Pro, which only lost 10% of its charge in two and a half hours.