We’re still months away from getting to the next burst of 2018 flagship phones, but a report from Bloomberg this afternoon says one of the biggest of those phones may come sooner than expected. The Galaxy Note 9 is on track to be announced on August 9th, two weeks earlier than the Note 8 was announced last year, according to the report. Samsung reportedly intends to release the phone by the end of August.
If that happens, it’d give Samsung more of a head start against this year’s iPhones. Last year, the Note 8 only went on sale after the iPhone 8 and X had been announced in September, which could have depressed sales by losing would-be buyers to Apple’s new tech. Supposedly, Samsung had actually be hoping to announce the Note 9 even sooner this year, but a report earlier this week said that it was delayed from July due to last-minute design changes.
Bloomberg reports that Samsung plans to highlight an upgraded camera in the Note 9. That likely means the Note 9 will get the same dual-aperture trick that the Galaxy S9 picked up earlier this year, which was supposed to help the phone better expose for bright environments. The phone is also supposed to come with a new Qualcomm processor, presumably the Snapdragon 845, in some markets, which only makes sense for a 2018 Android flagship.
As always with these things, Bloomberg says it was warned that plans could still shift around the announcement date. But it’s easy enough to believe: Samsung announced new Note models near the beginning or middle of August in the past, so this is more of a move back to its previous release schedule.
