HTC U Ultra, U Play Launched in India: Price, Release Date, Specifications, and More

HTC India on Tuesday launched its latest flagship smartphone in the country, the U Ultra. Priced at Rs. 59,990 (MOP), the smartphone will be available from March 6 in Blue, Black, Pink, and White colour variants. HTC also launched the U Play alongside, priced at Rs. 39,990 (MOP), and it will be available from mid-March in Blue, Black, Pink, and White colour variants.  

The biggest highlight of the HTC U Ultra (seen above) and HTC U Play (seen below) is the Sense Companion feature, an AI-based system that learns the user's daily patterns to provide usage recommendations and friendly advice. On the U Ultra, the Sense Companion will display important alerts and notifications on the second ‘ticker-style’ display, which is called the Priority Screen. Both smartphones come bundled with HTC USonic earphones, which analyse the shape of the user's inner ears with a "sonar-like pulse" to adapt to you. HTC is also boasting of the "liquid surface" curved glass construction.

HTC U Ultra, U Play First Impressions

HTC has launched the U Ultra and the U Play in their dual-SIM (Nano) variants in India, and both smartphones support expandable storage in a hybrid dual-SIM card configuration. HTC is also bundling 1-year insurance that covers liquid damage and any physical damage to the phone. Buyers with Standard Chartered credit or debit cards will also be eligible for 7.5 percent cashback if they purchase either smartphone between March 6 and May 31.

The HTC U Ultra runs Android 7.0 Nougat with Sense UI customisation on top.The smartphone sports a 5.7-inch QHD (1440x2560 pixels) Super LCD display, apart from a secondary 2-inch display with 1040x160 pixels resolution. It is powered by a quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 821 chipset coupled with 4GB of RAM.

The U Ultra has been launched in India in its 64GB inbuilt storage variant, with the company choosing to forego the 128GB model. The storage is expandable via microSD card (up to 2TB). The 64GB variant's display is protected by Gorilla Glass 5, unlike the 128GB variant, which sports a display protected by Sapphire glass.

As for optics, the HTC U Ultra comes with a 12-UltraPixel rear camera with 1.55-micron pixels, a BSI sensor, laser + phase detection autofocus, optical image stabilisation, an f/2.8 aperture, and dual-tone LED flash. At the front, HTC U Ultra sports a 16-megapixel camera with an UltraPixel mode, and a BSI sensor. Other specifications on the HTC U Ultra include 4G LTE with VoLTE, GPS/ A-GPS, Bluetooth v4.2, Wi-Fi 802.11ac, NFC, DLNA, Miracast, HTC Connect, and USB 3.1 Type-C connectivity options.

The HTC U Ultra bears a fingerprint sensor on the Home Button, HTC BoomSound Hi-Fi edition stereo speakers, Hi-Res Audio support, as well as 3D Audio recording support with 4 microphones. It is powered by a 3000mAh battery with Quick Charge 3.0. It's rated to deliver up to 26 hours of talk-time and up to 13 days of standby time.

As for the HTC U Play, the Taiwanese company has launched the 4GB RAM + 64GB storage variant in India. The smartphone sports a 5.2-inch full-HD (1080x1920 pixels) Super LCD display with Gorilla Glass. It is powered by an octa-core MediaTek Helio P10 SoC. Its 16-megapixel rear camera comes with a BSI sensor, optical image stabilisation, PDAF, an f/2.0 aperture, and dual-tone LED flash. The front camera sports a 16-megapixel sensor with an UltraPixel mode, a BSI sensor, an f/2.0 aperture with a 28mm focal length.

Just like the HTC U Ultra, the U Play's inbuilt storage is expandable via microSD card (up to 2TB). HTC U Play connectivity options include 4G LTE with VoLTE, GPS/ A-GPS, Bluetooth v4.2, Wi-Fi 802.11ac, NFC, DLNA, Miracast, HTC Connect, and USB 2.0 Type-C. The new HTC smartphone sports an accelerometer, ambient light sensor, digital compass, and gyroscope, weighs in at 145 grams, and measures 145.99x72.9x7.99mm. It bears a fingerprint sensor on the Home Button. HTC U Play is powered by a 2500mAh battery with fast charging support (5V/2A) that's rated to deliver up to 15.21 hours of talk-time and up to 427.54 hours of standby time.