Reviewers Think $860 YotaPhone 2 Boasting Dual Display Is Too Cool

By Kamal Nayan - 03 Dec '14 22:51PM

Yota, after launching YotaPhone last year is making another appearance with its latest YotaPhone 2 smartphone. YotaPhone, apart from sporting a primary LCD display, also equips a secondary e-ink display on the rear.

The first version of the YotaPhone had limited uses for the secondary screen so it couldn't live up to its potential. However, the YotaPhone 2 has been upgraded to make full use of the low-power e-ink screen with full touch functionality.

"Everyone wanted capacitive touch to extend across the full eInk screen, even we saw that in the design! There was a lot of discussion about the best size for the phone. The team has went with a five-inch screen, this felt obvious," said CEO Vlad Martynov in an interview with Forbes. "But the biggest call from the Android community was to mirror the whole Android experience on the eInk display. We call it YotaMirror, and it allows any Android app to run on the low-power display."

The rear e-paper display takes substantially less power. One obvious use of the display could be for reading e-books and interestingly the device also equips a dedicated e-book reader.

"YotaPhone 2 takes the whole concept to the next level," added Martynov. "We've reached 100 hours of reading on a single battery charge, you can run all your basic phone features from the second screen using the 'YotaEnergy' mode, which can increase your phone's endurance three times over, and because we have full touch, those functions work well in bright sunlight in a power-efficient manner."

As of now, the YotaPhone 2 is only available in one color - dark off-black - matching the rear e-ink display.

"We've worked on a clear vision of what a second display can mean for consumers, but we've focused on making this handset a mass-market product. Since the demo units were seen at MWC [Mobile World Congress], we've spent months making sure this is a high-quality product that delivers on our promise," said Martynov.

YotaPhone 2 is currently available in Europe and costs £550 in the UK.