Forget the bezel, the Sprint-bound Sharp Aquos Crystal doesn’t have one (Updated)

By Andy Boxall Published October 27, 2014

Read our full Sharp Aquos Crystal review.

Japanese network Softbank announced the arrival of two new Sharp Aquos smartphones earlier this week, both of which boast amazing bezel-less displays, and the good news is one will be coming to Sprint in the near future. The two phones are the Aquos Crystal and Aquos Crystal X, and it’s the former which will hit Softbank-owned Sprint.

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Updated on 08-19-2014 by Andy Boxall: Sprint has confirmed the Aquos Crystal will be out soon, and that it will also be sold through Boost and Virgin too. We’ve also added in new images of the phone.

When we talk about a screen’s bezel, we’re referring to the area surrounding the display not made up by screen itself. These days it can be slim, look at the LG G3 for example, but it’s still noticeable, particularly on aging hardware like the iPhone 5/iPhone 5S. The Aquos Crystal shows just how amazing a phone looks with an edge-to-edge – or frameless, as Sharp describes it – screen.

The phone measures 131mm long, and 67mm wide, but it houses a 5-inch, 720p display. Here are a few comparison measurements from other 5-inch phones, proving how compact the Aquos Crystal really is. Sony’s Xperia Z1 measures 74mm wide, the HTC One M8 is 70mm, which matches the Samsung Galaxy S4. Only the Huawei Ascend P7 gets anywhere close at 68.8mm, but it’s 140mm long, thanks to the large section above the screen, which the Aquos Crystal also forgoes.

Related: Read our review of the Huawei Ascend P7

It’s not only aesthetically pleasing either, because the smaller the overall size of the phone, the easier it is to use with one hand, even with a large display. It also makes it more suitable for those of us with small hands.

Otherwise, the Aquos Crystal is a solid mid-range device. It’s powered by a 1.2GHz quad-core Snapdragon processor, along with 1.5GB of RAM, and there’s 8GB of internal memory. Luckily, a MicroSD card slot will let you boost this. On the rear of the device is an 8-megapixel camera, while the selfie cam has only 1.2 megapixels.

The operating system is Android 4.4 KitKat, and Harman Kardon has been brought in to tweak the audio system with Clari-Fi and LiveStage technologies, plus the Aquos Crystal will connect to 4G networks. Softbank’s press release says the phone will go on sale August 29, but Sprint hasn’t given a final date for its release in America. In addition to Sprint, the Aquos Crystal will also be sold through Virgin Mobile and Boost Mobile.

Softbank also announced the Crystal X, which has a larger 5.5-inch, 1080p frameless screen, and is powered by a 2.3GHz Snapdragon processor and 2GB of RAM, while the camera has 13 megapixels. There’s no indication the Crystal X will be coming to America.

Article originally published on 08-18-2014

Former Senior Mobile Writer

Andy has written about mobile technology for almost a decade. From 2G to 5G and smartphone to smartwatch, Andy knows tech.

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