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Want a phone with no ports or proper buttons? That'll be $1,300, please
- Meizu announced a crowdfunding campaign for the Meizu Zero, the first smartphone without ports or mechanical buttons.
- The Indiegogo campaign looks to raise at least $100,000.
- The Meizu Zero is available for $1,299 on Indiegogo.
Meizu surprised just about everyone when it announced the Meizu Zero, the first smartphone without ports, speaker holes, or mechanical buttons. It’s now been a week since the announcement, and Meizu surprised everyone yet again with a crowdfunding campaign for its port-less smartphone.
Meizu’s goal is to raise $100,000 on Indiegogo. This is a fixed goal, which means the company will receive the funds only if it’s able to meet its goal. With 31 days left, the crowdfunding campaign already raised $18,587 at the time of this writing.
Meizu offers 100 engineer units of the Meizu Zero for $1,299. There was also a single “pioneering unit” for $2,999, but it’s currently sold out.
That money gets you a smartphone with a 5.99-inch AMOLED display, “screen sound” technology that could be similar to piezoelectric speakers, a 20-megapixel front camera, a 20MP+12MP rear camera pairing, and a Snapdragon 845 processor.
More importantly, $1,299 also gets you one of the more future-facing smartphones out there. The Meizu Zero ditches USB-C or any sort of wired charging in favor of 18-watt wireless charging. The phone also ditches a physical SIM card slot in favor of eSIM.
The Meizu Zero doesn’t stop there — it also ditches the headphone jack, microSD card slot, and proper physical volume and power buttons. In regards to the buttons, the phone uses strong haptic feedback to simulate button presses. This is similar to how the HTC U12 Plus approached physical buttons, though the buttons on the phone were criticized for being hard to use.
As with all crowdfunding campaigns, it’s smart to be a little wary — there’s always a chance that the phone won’t ship and you’ll be out of at least $1,299. Also, we don’t know what band support looks like for the Meizu Zero. With that said, Meizu is a legitimate smartphone manufacturer with a long history of making and selling products.
You can check out the Meizu Zero’s Indiegogo campaign at the link below. If the campaign meets its goal, backers should receive the phone in April.