The big news out of MWC 2019 has been folding phones, but they’re so last week. Nubia Alpha is the next big thing, because it’s your phone, your smartwatch, AND a stylish bit of jewelry!
The Nubia Alpha is a flexible phone, not a foldable one. It’s a 4″ screen that wraps around your wrist, so it’s basically a really big smartwatch or a somewhat smaller phone, depending on how you consider it. But think about it like this: you can easily text, check your email, make calls, etc, like you’re Dick Tracy, and you won’t have to squint or scream at Siri like you do on an Apple Watch.
The Alpha comes in both black and gold, and runs a Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear chip. So it won’t be quite as fast a flagship Samsung, but certainly for the purposes of having a phone you can wear while out and about it can hold its own! They’ve thrown 1GB of RAM and 8GB of storage in, plus 1-2 days of battery life depending on use. Oh, and it comes with a camera so you can take weirdly angled selfies. And while it’s going to be inevitable, please only take weirdly angled photos of people with their consent, and don’t try to use it for anything creepy. This is why we can’t have nice things.
In any case, if you’re intrigued by the smartwatch smartphone watchphone, it will be available in eSIM and Bluetooth flavors. Presumably, the eSIM version is what you’ll want to choose if your goal is to leave your main phone behind, but in either case look for the Alpha later this year for 449-649 Euros (roughly $500-$740 USD, though we’ll see how that plays out when it actually ships).
