Just two days until Samsung officially unveils the new Note 10 family and we now have proof of a 5G variant thanks to Evan Blass. The renowned leaker has posted what appears to be an official press image of the 5G Galaxy Note 10+ on his Twitter page.
Not much is known about the 5G variant other than that it shares the same centered single hole-punch display and has an S-Pen. Whether or not the 5G Note 10 + will be available in South Africa remains to be seen as the 5G S10 is not currently available here due to lack of 5G infrastructure and availability. Based on the upside-down placement of the handset in this image – the same as the placement of the non-5G variant seen in other official-looking renders – it appears that the 5G handset will not include a 3.5mm headphone jack, making the S10 series the final Samsung flagship handset to carry the legacy port.
This appears to have been confirmed earlier this month when Roland Quandt tweeted a series of images of the USB-C to 3.5mm dongle which is expected to be included in the Note 10 box.
The removal of the 3.5mm headphone jack, a smaller battery and display, and no ToF sensor makes the standard Note 10 a harder sell than last year’s Note 9 which has a larger battery, larger battery and a 3.5mm headphone jack (admittedly it only has a dual-camera setup compared to the triple-camera setup found on the Note 10).
Other than the cosmetic changes – including two previously unseen colourways – both the Note 10 and Note 10+ appear to be iterative updates of the Note 9 which doesn’t bode well for the company’s sales prospects. With an ever-shrinking flagship market and news of a fifty-six percent drop in operating profits, Samsung needs the new Note to be a best-seller or it risks opening the door for Huawei’s Mate 30 series, which is expected to launch later this year, to overtake the Note as the new must-have device for power users.
The Galaxy Note 10 series has a starting price of US $949 (R14 158,99) for the 256GB Note 10, while the more powerful 256GB Note 10+ starts at US $1099 (R16 396,97).
Catch the Unpacked livestream on Samsung South Africa’s site or stay tuned to reframed as we bring you live coverage from the event.
