Sony Xperia X hands-on: A closer look

Introduction

Sony invited us over to Tokyo to give us a glimpse of the upcoming Xperia X - the pioneer in the company's new lineup that puts an end to 6 generations of Xperia Z flagships.

The Xperia X is not a direct successor to the Z5, mind you, this is a burden the Xperia X Performance will have to deal with. Instead, it ushers in Sony's new design language, which let's face it, does build upon the fundamentals of the old one.

The Xperia X also introduces us to most of the flagship's hardware, while still letting it keep exclusivity on some features - IP68 certification and top-class chipset in particular.

Sony Xperia X at a glance:

• Form factor: metal body, 2.5D glass rounded bevel screen
• Screen: 5" Triluminos display, 1080p resolution (441ppi)
• Camera: 23MP/1080p with 1/2.3" sensor, f/2.0, Predictive Hybrid AF; 13MP selfie camera
• Chipset: Snapdragon 650 (2x A72 + 4x A53 cores); 3GB of RAM
• Storage: 32GB, expandable with microSD cards
• OS: Android 6.0 Marshmallow
• Audio: stereo speakers, Hi-Res audio, DSEE HX, LDAC
• Battery: 2,620mAh

The Xperia X does get the top-spec camera of its bigger brother (or should we say wiser, as they're both 5-inchers) - that means 23MP maximum resolution, phase detection autofocus, and a f/2.0 aperture lens. What it misses out on is 4K video recording, which is inexplicably missing from the Xperia X Performance spec sheet, too.

We already got a chance to handle the Sony Xperia X a couple of months ago at MWC, so this time, we'll approach our hands-on with a focus on the camera department. We figured we'd spend the few precious moments we had with the phone on the important stuff.