While the rugged smartwatch space seems to be getting more attention than ever after last year’s Apple Watch Ultra launch, rugged smartphones are still largely overlooked by most consumers and a number of top vendors.
Despite what its final marketing moniker might suggest, the 5G-enabled Nokia XR21 is a pretty major upgrade of the XR20, retaining the MIL-STD-810H level durability of said predecessor while substantially improving… essentially every other aspect and feature.
Although smaller, the 6.49-inch screen is equipped with state-of-the-art 120Hz refresh rate technology this time around. And somehow, the overall more compact, slightly thinner, and slightly lighter XR21 packs a larger 4,800mAh cell promising two days of autonomy between faster 33W charges.
HMD’s newest rugged Nokia phone obviously also comes with a newer and more powerful Snapdragon 695 processor under its hood, as well as an upgraded 64MP primary rear-facing camera paired with a humbler-sounding 8MP secondary ultra-wide-angle shooter.
Just like its predecessor, the Nokia XR21 is guaranteed to receive four years of monthly security updates, which is not something very easily found in the mid-range smartphone market segment. The handset’s three Android OS upgrades promise also sounds similar to what HMD Global advertises for the XR20, but that’s actually “up to three years of OS version upgrades” on a closer look.
So, yeah, that seems like another solid step in the right direction, as is the IP69K water resistance rating. That means the XR21 is protected against high-pressure, high-temperature water jets in addition to good old fashioned immersion, not to mention dust, extreme temperatures in general, and even repeated drops on hard surfaces like concrete from a height of up to 1.8 meters.
In short, this is one of the absolute toughest Android smartphones you can currently buy… in the UK only at a price of £499 in a single 128GB storage configuration with 6 gigs of RAM on deck and a single Midnight Black color (for the time being). There are no words on an official US release in the near future, but if that were to happen, we’d expect a regional recommended price point of around $500. Any (potential) takers?
