BlackBerry has teamed up with Optiemus, its Indian manufacturing partner, to produce the new Evolve line of smartphones, which includes the BlackBerry Evolve and the BlackBerry Evolve X. Both phones share tall screens with 18:9 aspect ratios, and both also have massive batteries. The Evolve line will ship running Android 8.1 Oreo.
Unlike BlackBerry’s last foray into the marketplace with the Key2, the Evolve line won’t have a physical QWERTY keyboard. For security, both phones offer fingerprint sensors on the back, along with a face-unlock feature. Both phones also sport 4000 mAh batteries, charge via USB-C, and are compatible with wireless charging.
The Evolve will be available exclusively through Amazon India towards the end of August for about $365, while the beefier Evolve X will be offered mid-September for about $510. For the extra bucks, users get an extra 2GB of RAM, for 6GB in total, over the standard Evolve’s 4GB. Both come with optional cashback offers from different Indian carriers and banks. Right now, Optiemus hasn’t confirmed availability beyond India anytime in the near future.
