Sony Xperia 1 IV launch live blog: see the new camera phone heavyweight debut

Like the Xperia 1 alternatives, the Xperia 5 and 10 phones don’t usually bring big feature jumps between generations, but hopefully what’s new with the Xperia 1 IV, will also be passed down to these handsets, at least to a certain degree. 

We probably won’t see the Xperia 1 IV on its own though, as its predecessors have come with siblings: the Xperia 5 and Xperia 10.

The Xperia 5 IV would be similar to the 1 IV, with many of the same specs, but with a smaller screen and a slightly lower price.

Then the Xperia 10 IV would be a budget version of it, with a much lower price and reduced specs too. While the Xperia 1 series is designed for content creators, the 10 phones are for people who just want to enjoy streaming that content.

Sony’s previous phones haven’t often had giant spec increases between them – I first tested the Xperia 1 and it doesn’t feel that different to the Xperia 1 III.

So don’t expect the Xperia 1 IV to feature any wild improvements. We won’t see three 108MP rear cameras or an 8K display or a stylus or anything like that, probably at least.

Instead, expect a few tweaks and upgrades. Perhaps we’ll see some changes to the way the camera app, or a few minor upgrades in the display and processor areas.

So what do we expect from the Sony Xperia 1 IV launch? Well, the main thing we’re expecting is… the Xperia 1 IV.

This is the company’s top-end phone that’ll likely cost over $1,000 / £1,000 / equivalent. It’ll likely have a mid-sized 4K screen, three rear cameras, a top-end chipset and a side-mounted fingerprint scanner.

These phones generally don’t have huge upgrades each time, but slight tweaks.

We’re particularly fond of the modes for photography and videography – Sony takes lots of the tech from its Alpha cameras and adds them here, and also lets you plug in the phone to one of those cameras as a secondary monitor.

Why did Sony choose to host the Xperia 1 IV launch so early!? Right now it’s 6am where I am, which is just too early to think straight.

Thankfully I made notes yesterday about what to focus each of these posts on, so I’m not having to totally make stuff up off the top of my head.