ZTE announces Nubia Prague S with an all-metal design and eye scanner

ZTE has announced the Nubia Prague S earlier today, a slight upgrade on the My Prague model launched in August last year. While not a direct successor, the Prague S does come with ZTE’s new eye scanner and touch-sensitive edges, found on the Nubia Z9 and Axon Elite.

Starting with the internals, the Nubia Prague S packs Qualcomm’s octa-core Snapdragon 615 processor and 3GB of RAM, along with 64GB of internal storage. The RAM and storage are another upgrade over the My Prague, which offers 2GB/16GB or 3GB/32GB options.

Externally, the Nubia Prague S sports a 5.2-inch full HD display with 2.5D glass. It is an all-metal device, and the sides are touch sensitive. Just swiping or tapping the side of the phone will perform actions such as opening apps, taking photos, or even adjusting the screen brightness. We played with the feature on the Nubia Z9, and found it fun and intuitive.

On the front, there is an 8-megapixel front camera and an eye scanner, capable of unlocking the smartphone simply by looking at the front camera. This and the touch-sensitive edges make the Nubia Prague S an intriguing device, since they’re one of the few devices offering both features. However, in our review of the Axon Elite, we found the eye scanner far too unreliable for everyday use.

Other features on the Nubia Prague S include a 13-megapixel rear camera, 2,200mAh battery, dual-SIM, LTE, and WiFi ac support. The phone runs on Android 5.0.2, the older version of Lollipop, and ZTE has not gave official word on when it will be updated to Android 6.0 Marshmallow.

The Nubia Prague S comes in silver or rose gold, and sales will start in China for $365 or $380, depending on the cellular option. There is no information on regional availability, but news that the Nubia Z9 is coming to the U.S. later this year gives us some hope that the Nubia Prague S might arrive in America someday.