Nokia 8, the much-rumoured, oft-leaked, 2017 Android flagship smartphone of HMD Global has been officially unveiled in London. The smartphone is the first product the Finnish startup has developed under the ambit of the Carl Zeiss partnership announced last month. As a result, the big highlight of the Nokia 8 is its cameras – the phone packs dual 13-megapixel rear sensors, and a single shooter of the same resolution on the front.

Nokia 8 price, India launch date, and design

The Nokia 8 will be available “globally” in early September, priced at equivalent of EUR 599 (approximately Rs. 45,000). A HMD Global representative told Gadgets 360 the phone will launch in India in early October, and the Nokia 8 price in India will be known closer to launch.

The unibody Nokia 8 is built out of 6000-series aluminium and it will be available in glossy Polished Copper and Polished Blue colours, as well as matte Tempered Blue and Steel finishes. The Nokia 8 is IP54 rated, which means it is splash-proof.

Juho Sarvikas, Chief Product Officer, HMD Global explained that the Nokia 8 is fitted with an elaborate heat management solution: a copper pipe that runs from the upper right corner of the device to the lower left has liquid evaporating in the middle, and condensing on the edges. A graphite shield enables heat transfer to the aluminium unibody and its eventual dissipation to the air.

Nokia 8 cameras

The Nokia 8 comes with dual 13-megapixel f/2.0 RGB and monochrome sensors at the back, and while that setup has been seen on several other phones, HMD is betting big on (the unfortunately named) “bothies” – the ability to capture images and videos from front and rear cameras at the same time.

Apart from capturing still images from both sensors at the same time and fusing them into a single picture, the Camera app on the Nokia 8 will let you stream these ‘bothies’ as full-HD live videos to Facebook and YouTube. HMD says it worked closely with Qualcomm to enable Dual-Sight video streaming on the Nokia 8, while minimising the thermal impact of the processing required.

HMD is also leveraging its relationship with Nokia to bring some technology from the latter’s 360 VR camera to the Nokia 8. The smartphone comes with high dynamic range microphones, which enables it to record surround sound using Nokia Ozo Audio algorithms. HMD says its software encoding will preserve the virtual surround sound even when users share these videos on social media.

At this stage, Nokia 8’s Dual-Sight streaming and Ozo Audio recording features will be available only via the stock Camera app on the phone and won’t be opened up to third-party apps.

The front camera is the same 13-megapixel RGB shooter seen on the rear, and both front and rear cameras are capable of recording 4K video on their own. The rear camera comes with laser autofocus and dual-tone LED flash.

Nokia 8 specifications and Android O promise

In terms of specifications, the Nokia 8 is a powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 SoC, which powers nearly all other Android flagships of this generation. There is just one variant – with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage, though the phone will release in single SIM and hybrid dual SIM options, depending upon the markets. It comes with support for microSD cards of up to 256GB capacity and a 3090mAh battery.

The Nokia 8 has a 5.3-inch 2K LCD display with Gorilla Glass 5 protection. It features USB 3.1 Type-C connectivity as well as a 3.5mm headphone jack. The phone is just 4.6mm thick at the edges, and 7.9mm thick at the height of its camera module.

It was rumoured that the Nokia 8 might ship with Android O out of the box, and while a HMD Global representative confirmed that the company is in advanced stages of testing Android O build for the Nokia 8, the smartphone will ship with Android 7.1.1 out of the box.

“One of the fastest ways of getting [Android] O will be to get our new flagship,” HMD Global’s Sarvikas added.

Disclosure: HMD Global sponsored the correspondent’s flights and hotel in London for the Nokia 8 launch event.