Jio Phone 2 vs Jio Phone: What's New and Different?

Jio Phone 2, the company's latest 4G VoLTE-enabled feature phone, was announced on Thursday at Reliance Industries Limited's Annual General Meeting (AGM), alongside FTTH service Jio GigaFiber. The upgraded version comes with numerous improvements compared to last year's variant and will be sold in India alongside the original Jio Phone. The smartphone comes with a QWERTY-style keyboard and a larger form factor. Let's have a look at what all differentiates the Jio Phone and Jio Phone 2 in terms of price, specifications, software, design, and more.

Jio Phone 2 vs Jio Phone: Price in India

Jio Phone 2 price in India is set at Rs. 2,999 as part of an introductory offer. Sales for the new smart feature phone will commence from August 15, 2018. While other details haven't been announced, we can expect Jio to take bookings for the Jio Phone 2 on Jio.com and Jio offline stores.

In comparison, the Jio Phone, launched in India last year, is priced at Rs. 1,500. However, the Jio Phone is advertised as being available effectively for free considering the fact that the amount is a refundable security deposit. The feature phone is available across Jio.com and other Jio authorised offline outlets. At the AGM announcement on Thursday, Reliance Jio also announced the new Jio Phone Monsoon Hungama offer that will enable existing feature phone users to exchange their current device with a new Jio Phone at a price of Rs. 501. This offer will be available pan-India starting July 21.

Jio Phone 2 vs Jio Phone: Design

Design is one of the major differentiators between the two phones. The Jio Phone 2 comes with a full-size QWERTY keyboard and 4-way navigation keys that offer a BlackBerry-style appearance. Even the display is larger and the form factor much wider. In comparison, the Jio Phone has a smaller display and a T9-style keypad. Both of them have a dedicated key to trigger the voice assistant.

Jio Phone 2 vs Jio Phone: Software

Both the Jio Phone 2 and Jio Phone run on KaiOS. While most of the apps and functionality on both handsets remain same, the Jio Phone 2 will get apps like YouTube and WhatsApp out-of-the-box. That said, these two apps will also soon be available for the original Jio Phone, starting August 15, possibly through the Jio App Store.

Jio Phone 2 vs Jio Phone: Specifications

In terms of specifications, there seems to be no apparent difference between the Jio Phone 2 and the Jio Phone. Both of them have the same camera combinations, RAM capacity, internal storage, display size and resolution, as well as battery size. We will update this space when additional information becomes available, such as processor and clock speed. The feature phones can of course be expected to have different dimensions and weight.

Is Jio Phone 2 the perfect smart feature phone for the masses? We discussed that on Orbital, our weekly technology podcast, which you can subscribe to via Apple Podcasts or RSS, download the episode, or just hit the play button below.