The rugged Armor 29 phone prototype boasts solid specs for this class of smartphone, but its weight could be a burden in your pocket.
During the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), held from January 7th to 10th in Las Vegas, I checked out some of the upcoming smartphones.
Major brands like Samsung typically don’t showcase their devices at this event, but you can discover new smartphones from lesser-known brands, including rugged phone makers.
Doogee, for example, showed off a prototype of the cheapest foldable in the world, which I found to be just too buggy to show off to potential customers even as a prototype.
When looking at the smartphones of another rugged phone maker, UleFone, I came across one that has the most powerful chipset in its class and is likely among the heaviest smartphones on the market.
The heavy rugged phone
The Armor 29 Series has a whooping 21200 mAh battery, which its representatives claim can last two weeks. To put that into perspective, the smartphone’s battery capacity is nearly six times larger than that of the iPhone 16 (3561 mAh). This huge battery is the reason for the Armor 29’s extra weight.
Curious about the weight, I checked the UleFone smartphone catalog, but it wasn’t listed among the other specs. I then asked a company representative about it.
He didn’t disclose it in the company’s booth or later in the email, saying that the phone isn’t yet released and that "weight should be confirmed later." To me, the company not wanting to reveal this particular aspect of its product when all the others are listed confirmed that the smartphone is indeed too heavy.
Based on the weight of my smartphone, which is slightly less than 200 grams, I would say that the Armor 29 Series weighs slightly less than 1 kilogram (2 pounds). Such a weight would make it among the most heavy smartphones on the market.
Information on the web shows that the heaviest smartphones in the world are also rugged phones, such as Hotwav’s R5, which weighs nearly 1kg, and Doogee’s S100 Pro, which weighs nearly one pound.
Powerful chipset
Aside from the weight, the Armor 29 packs some solid specs. It has 16GB of RAM, and its top configuration comes with MediaTek’s Dimensity 9300 system on a chip, which, according to UleFone’s representative, is the fastest in the world in such a rugged phone.
It also has a triple main camera system, including a 64MP night vision camera, and AMOLED display with a 120 Hz refresh rate, and a thermal Imaging camera.
In addition, the 5G-supporting Android device has a fingerprint sensor and 120W fast charging, which is essential for a smartphone with such a large battery.
Among the Armor 29’s distinguishing features are a really bright LED light and warning light, which can be used in case of an accident.
There are more phones in the UleFone’s rugged smartphone line, such as the Armor 28, which has similar specs and a half the size (10 600 mAh) battery. The company calls the latter world’s highest thermal imaging resolution rugged phone.
According to Ulefone’s representative, the top version with MediaTek’s Dimensity 9300 of both of these smartphones should cost around $1000 on Amazon. Meanwhile, a version of Mediatek’s Dimensity 7300, a less powerful chipset, is set to retail around $600 - $700.
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