The CES 2017 is just around the corner – an event that is expected to give birth to the BlackBerry Mercury or rather the DTEK70, the third BB smartphone of 2016.
While little is known about the upcoming BlackBerry Mercury, a series of rumors and leaks have been showing up and in the process giving out details about the handset, which like the DTEK50 and DTEK60, is made in conjunction with Chinese OEM TCL.
In the latest turn of events, you will agree that the BlackBerry Mercury is shaping up as a rare offering, especially when looking at the current trend in the smartphone world. It has previously been hinted that the DTEK70 will come in with the traditional QWERTY keyboard that made BlackBerry such an iconic brand during its heydays, but this doesn’t mean lovers of the trending touchscreen design will not be able to enjoy this phone.
A new leak has surfaced showing off what is to be the BlackBerry Mercury and according to the report, the phone will come in with a 4.6-inch display screen that is touch sensitive and carries a resolution of 1620 x 1080 pixels. This should translate to an aspect ratio of 3:2 alongside a pixel density of 420ppi, meaning you get a very sharp display quality.
The best part of the story is that unlike the rest of 2016’s BlackBerry handsets, the upcoming BlackBerry Mercury will be powered by Android 7.0 Nougat out of the box. From the leaked screenshot, it appears that the DTEK70 will not feature any on-screen soft keys for navigation, something that confirms previous rumors that indeed the phone will feature hardware keys for the same purpose. The keys are expected to be placed just below the screen and right above the QWERTY keyboard of the phone.
As far as specs are concerned, reports are rife that the BlackBerry Mercury will come in with quite decent offerings. There will be a Qualcomm-made Snapdragon 625 SoC under the hood alongside 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage. A fingerprint scanner has been touted alongside a decent 3400mAh battery, which should promise a long-lasting life for the phone, especially when considering the smaller screen size of 4.6 inches.
However, many lovers of compact phones and the physical keyboard might be a little disappointed as reports claim that the BlackBerry Mercury could be a Verizon exclusive phone. Whether it will be sold in other markets or not is still unknown, but more details about this should come in once the phone is announced, possibly at the upcoming CES 2017.