HMD could resurrect the classic Nokia Lumia 1020 – but it’s likely to be more tribute than trailblazer
Nokia manufacturer Human Mobile Devices (HMD) may be revisiting the classic Lumia 1020 design for its first quad-camera smartphone, if images shared by GSMArena are anything to go by.
The reportedly leaked images show a slab phone outline with a circular camera island featuring four cutouts, which suggests the image could illustrate HMD’s first quad-camera phone.
The design is evocative of the Nokia Lumia 1020, considered one of the best camera phones of its time when it launched in 2013.
The Lumia 1020 made its mark by shipping with a single 41-megapixel rear camera at a time where phone cameras still lagged significantly behind dedicated point-and-shoot cameras, which gave both Nokia and the now-defunct Windows Phone operating system a welcome profile boost.
For comparison, the contemporaneous iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c were both equipped with an 8MP rear camera, while the Samsung Galaxy S4 managed 13MP.
HMD will have its work cut out if it wants to outdo current phones to the same degree. The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra sports a 200MP wide lens alongside four other specialist lenses, and we predict that the iPhone 16 series will all come with 48MP main shooters.
HMD itself packs a 108MP main sensor into the Skyline, its flagship phone, which would be hard to best while sticking to the company’s low prices.
It’s for this reason we tentatively think a new Lumia 1020-style HMD phone will be more of a tribute than a true successor, adopting design cues from the original without quite the same technical ambition.
A leaked outline doesn’t give us enough information to make any solid predictions, though, so HMD may yet surprise us if this design makes it to market.
The phone is also likely to carry a new name more inline with HMD’s current repertoire, as the leaked silhouette features the HMD logo rather than that of the Nokia sub-brand.
HMD was formed in 2016 when Nokia repurchased its mobile phone business from Microsoft, following the sale of said business in 2014.
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Nokia manufacturer Human Mobile Devices (HMD) may be revisiting the classic Lumia 1020 design for its first quad-camera smartphone, if images shared by GSMArena are anything to go by. The reportedly leaked images show a slab phone outline with a circular camera island featuring four cutouts, which suggests the image…
