Amazon Smartphone Images and Details Leak Ahead of June Launch

Last weekend the Wall Street Journal reported that Amazon was planning to release its first smartphone in June, with an innovative 3D interface and focus on Amazon products and services.

On Tuesday the first images of what the smartphone will look like were released by BGR, along with a host of additional details about the smartphone.

Amazon has long been thought to have been working on a smartphone to complement its Kindle ereader and tablet products and it is expected to finally unveil its first smartphone in June, after years of development.

The phone, which is pictured in a protective case to stop those without authorisation seeing the final design of the smartphone, will have a 4.7in screen with a HD resolution.

this is slightly smaller and lower resolution that the 5in screens seen on 2014's flagship smartphones so far, the Galaxy S5 from Samsung and the HTC One (M8). It will however be the same as the reported screen size of the iPhone 6 which is currently in development at Apple.

The Amazon smartphone will likely come with 2GB of RAM and a Snapdragon chip from Qualcomm, putting it on a par with the best from Samsung and HTC.

The phone is just one of at least two smartphones which Amazon will launch in 2014, with another budget device said to be in the works for later in 2014, which will come with much lower specs but a very competitive price.

3D interface

Amazon will once again look to take Google's Android software and completely redesign it as it has already done on the Kindle Fire range of tablets. This is done so as to promote Amazon's own app stores, film and music stores as well of course as its book store.

The new interface will also reportedly feature a number of 3D effects which will be created by group of four special infrared cameras.

According to BGR, in addition to the typical rear and front-facing cameras "the device houses an additional four front-facing cameras that work with other sensors to facilitate the software's 3D effects. One source tells us these four cameras, which are situated in each of the four corners on the face of the phone, are low-power infrared cameras."

Further details about the 3D interface were obtained by sources speaking to TechCrunch, who said that the head-tracking capabilities would be limited to just a few gestures, such as tilting the smartphone left or right to see additional menus. The sources said the effects are similar to those seen on iOS 7:

"It's FireOS with extreme 3D parallax effects, similar to those found on iOS but greatly exaggerated. The screen itself is not 3D, but rather simulates a 3D effect."

BGR adds that the 3D effect will allow you to move the phone while using the maps application to "change the view of various objects on the screen."

The big questions remaining about the Amazon smartphone is its name and its price. The phone has the internal codename Duke at Amazon, but there is no indication of what it will be called once launched - though the words Kindle and Fire are likely to be used somewhere we would bet.

Amazon has not commented on whether or not it plans on launching a smartphone or smartphones in the near future, but considering the glut of leaks happening at the moment, it would be a major surprise if we didn't see one before the end of the year - and likely much sooner than that.

Sadly, just like almost every Amazon product, the Amazon smartphone is likely to be available in the US only at launch, just like its recently launched Fire TV set-top box.