BlackBerry Passport launched in India for Rs 49,990

NEW DELHI — BlackBerry today formally announced the launch of its latest smartphone, the BlackBerry Passport, in India for Rs 49,990. The handset was unveiled by the company last week and it made it to the headlines due to its unique square design (like the now outdated LG Optimus Vu).

BlackBerry has said that the phone will be available for pre-booking from Amazon from September 29 (today) till October 10 (next month). Customers who pre-booked the phone will get a gift voucher worth Rs. 5,000 which can be redeemed during future purchases from Amazon. Frequent fliers with Jet Airways would also receive 5000 complimentary miles to their existing JP account.

BlackBerry Passport comes with a 4.5-inch display with a dedicated Qwerty keypad which is completely different from what we have seen from the traditional keypads.

“The BlackBerry Passport takes our iconic keyboard to the next level. The physical keyboard gives you more typing accuracy and leaves you more screen space for viewing. It is also touch-enabled, so you can perform many functions right on the keyboard. It’s responsive to touch so you can scroll web pages, flick to type or slide along the keys to move the cursor. Only BlackBerry can take a perfectly crafted keyboard and make it better,” explained BlackBerry on its product page.

The display has up to 10 finger touch support and is made with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 which would definitely protect it from scratches. Also, this IPS LCD display has a huge 453 ppi pixel density.

Inside the Passport lies the powerful Snapdragon 800 quad-core processor, Adreno 330 GPU, and huge 3 GB RAM for a smooth and lag-free performance. The smartphone also has impressive 32 GB internal storage and an expandable storage slot that can accommodate a micro SD card of up to 64 GB.

For photography enthusiasts, the BlackBerry Passport offers a 13-megapixel rear camera with autofocus and Optical Image Stabilisation features. An LED flash is also in the back panel to assist the rear camera. The front 2-megapixel camera can also capture high-definition images.

In the BlackBerry Passport, there is a non-removable 3450 mAh battery which claims to offer 30 hours of talktime. This single nano SIM-based smartphone offers plenty of connectivity features including 4G compatibility, Bluetooth 4.0, NFC, dual-band WiFi, WiFi Direct, DLNA, WiFi hotspot, and a micro USB 2.0 port.

Besides, it comes with some nifty features like BlackBery Assistant, a Siri-like software. It also comes preloaded with a BlackBerry browser which is said to be much faster than others and can show a full desktop webpage.