Dual-screen YotaPhone launching internationally before Christmas

YotaPhone
One screen bad. Two screens good.

Normally when it comes down to it a phone's a phone. Sure they have different screen sizes and some of them are getting a bit bendy, but at the end of the day they mostly look similar and all have a single screen.

But the YotaPhone changes all that. In late 2012 those crazy Russians at Yota Devices decided that one screen just wouldn't cut it, so they made the YotaPhone - which has two.

There's a standard 4.3-inch 720p LCD screen on the front and then for some reason another 4.3-inch e-ink screen on the back - and it's finally about to go global.

Black and white and read all over

What's the e-ink screen for? Well it seems that its main purpose is to allow the YotaPhone to double as an ereader, but in any case it sure will make it stand out from the crowd and being e-ink it shouldn't be too battery hungry.

Crazy dual-screen credentials aside the YotaPhone sounds a bit middle of the road. It runs Android 4.2.2, has a 1.7GHz dual-core processor, 2GB of RAM, a 13MP camera, 32GB of storage and an 1800mAh battery, so it seems to be relying on that second screen to make sales.

There's not been a great deal of news since its launch in 2012, until now that is. If you've been longing for a phone with multiple screens then you won't have much longer to wait, as Yota Devices has confirmed to TechCrunch that the YotaPhone will launch internationally before Christmas.

It's not known what the YotaPhone will retail for, but an earlier report from the Russian site hi-tech.mail.ru pointed to a price of 20,000 rubles, which translates to roughly £381.

James Rogerson

James is a freelance phones, tablets and wearables writer and sub-editor at TechRadar. He has a love for everything ‘smart’, from watches to lights, and can often be found arguing with AI assistants or drowning in the latest apps. James also contributes to 3G.co.uk, 4G.co.uk and 5G.co.uk and has written for T3, Digital Camera World, Clarity Media and others, with work on the web, in print and on TV.