The HTC Bolt will likely be the first phone from the Taiwanese manufacturer to offer Android 7.0 Nougat out of the box. The phone follows the same design language as the HTC 10, but is expected to feature a larger 5.5-inch QHD display. Leaked specs suggest an 18MP camera, 3GB of RAM, 64GB storage along with an microSD card, and a new report from reliable HTC leaker LlabTooFer indicates the phone will be powered by last year’s Snapdragon 810 and not the newer Snapdragon 820 or 821.
Based on leaked renders, it looks like the HTC Bolt will eschew the 3.5mm port for USB-C audio, much like the Moto Z and LeEco Le Max 2. The inclusion of the Snapdragon 810 is perplexing, as it’s already more than a year and a half old at this point.
The SoC not only suffered from thermal issues at launch, but there’s also a possibility that it won’t meet the technical hardware requirements for future versions of Android. The Adreno 330 GPU’s lack of support for OpenGL ES 3.1 is likely why devices powered by the Snapdragon 800 won’t be updated to Nougat, and we may see a similar situation play out with the Snapdragon 810 in a few years’ time.
Considering this is still a rumor, we’ll have to wait for the Bolt to debut to make any conclusions. The phone is slated for an unveil on Sprint in the U.S., with an eventual release planned for select markets in the EMEA region.
