In summary
- HMD has announced the Skyline smartphone, the first Android phone to feature Qi2 wireless charging.
- The Skyline also features a replaceable battery, a 144Hz OLED display and a flexible rear camera system.
- The phone will cost £399.99 (~$520) in the UK, but there’s no US pricing information yet.
We’ve seen a fair few HMD Skyline leaks in recent months, suggesting a smartphone with a design vaguely reminiscent of classic Lumia phones. Now, the Finnish brand has fully unveiled the new Android phone.
Perhaps the most notable thing about the HMD Skyline is that it appears to be the first Android phone to feature Qi2 wireless charging support. This standard allows for magnetic wireless charging, similar to Apple’s MagSafe charging, which allows for faster, more efficient, and cooler wireless charging. More specifically, the new phone supports 15W wireless charging, along with 5W reverse wireless charging.
Don’t care for wireless charging? You can also opt to juice up the 4,600mAh battery via 33W wired charging. What’s more, HMD says the battery is replaceable, with a promotional video suggesting the back cover pops off using something that looks like a SIM tray eject tool.
The phone also stands out thanks to its hardware design, with a squared-off body and rounded corners reminiscent of phones like the Nokia Lumia 920. The company adds that the device is “designed to be repaired,” thanks to a partnership with iFixit. Another notable hardware addition is a remappable button on the left side, which allows you to launch apps and more with a double-tap or press-and-hold.
HMD Skyline: Will it take on the Pixel 8a?
The rest of the HMD Skyline’s specs reveal an upper-mid-range phone. There’s a 6.55-inch 144Hz OLED display (FHD+, 1000 nits peak brightness), a mid-range Snapdragon 7s Gen 2 chipset, either 8GB or 12GB of RAM, and either 128GB or 256GB of storage. The phone also has a microSD card slot, allowing for up to 512GB of additional space.
HMD’s new phone is also the most impressive camera phone the company has produced in a long time – on paper, at least. That rear camera bump houses a 108MP main camera with OIS, a 13MP ultra-wide lens, and a 50MP 2x telephoto shooter (up to 4x). We also have a 50MP selfie camera with autofocus and 4K support.
The HMD Skyline comes equipped with a so-called “Balance Interface” skin on top of Android 14. The company says that this skin offers a Detox mode, presumably a variant on Digital Wellbeing, and “more chill” system sounds (e.g. alarms, ringtones, notification alerts). The former mode is listed as coming soon. Unfortunately, those expecting a stellar update policy will have to make do with two OS updates and three years of security patches. That’s a real shame when phones from Samsung and Google have five to seven years of updates.
Other notable features include Gorilla Glass 3 on the front (tempered glass on the back), Bluetooth 5.2, an IP54 rating, NFC, a side-mounted fingerprint scanner and Wi-Fi 6E.
The HMD Skyline is currently listed on the company’s UK and US websites. The US site doesn’t list pricing, but the 8GB/128GB model is available for £399.99 in the UK, while the 12GB/256GB variant costs £499.99.
That makes the phone at least £100 cheaper than the Pixel 8a. HMD’s device offers advantages such as Qi2 charging, faster wired charging, a bigger battery, a telephoto camera and storage expansion. However, Google’s device offers great image processing, good water resistance, a longer update policy and a brighter display. Either way, we’re glad to see HMD offering more than just low-end phones again.