Sony Xperia Z6 Release Date, Specs, Features, Rumors & Everything We Know So Far

The Xperia Z5 has been released - and in 3 different sizes - and now talk has turned to its successor.

The device has barely been out in the wild for a month and tech fans are now turning to the horizon for glimpses of the next Sony phone. However, they will have to wait a little longer this time as Sony has seemed to decide to change its product release timeframe. More on that later.

Since the Xperia Z5 has just come out, information about the Z6 is still sparse right now. And these need to be taken with much caution as nothing has been confirmed and are mostly based on speculation.

With regards to design, it's likely that the upcoming handset may look similar to previous iterations. Although some fans may want a different design for variety, Sony would want to maintain a signature look that will be associated with its flagship phones, and that is a square shape.

"It seems Sony has settled on the 5.2in screen size for its flagship Xperia range so it's unlikely this will change on the Xperia Z6," PC Advisor observed. "The resolution is much harder to predict with the firm sticking to Full HD so far instead of jumping to Quad HD."

Also, the next model will still be waterproofed and may have a 4K display. Naturally, it would be equipped with Snapdragon 820 processor and probably have 3-4Gb or RAM. Storage variants may be 16 GB and 32GB.

"The Sony Xperia Z6 is also expected to have a microSD card, to support USB type C, and to come installed with the Android Marshmallow straight from the box," CrossMap said.

Should there be a new line of Qualcomm Snapdragon chips or another Android OS version months before the Z6 will be released, it's likely that these may be featured in the handset instead. This may likely be the case if the Xperia Z6 will be released in the later part of 2016.

Speaking of release timeframes, Sony Art Director Rikke Gertsen Constein had revealed to Tech Radar that her department is already working on flagship handsets "for the second half of 2016, 2017 and 2018."

"Constein didn't mention anything for the first half of 2016 though - if the established six month cycle was to continue we'd expect Sony to release a new Xperia Z series at MWC in March," the news source noted.

While it's not certain or clear whether Sony indeed is changing its release cycles, it appears that it may be slowing down its flagship phone release to once a year, instead of the two-a-year cycle it had been following since 2013.

Perhaps this could be partly due to the Xperia iterations not having much distinctions from each other, considering that they had been released just 6 months apart. Or that the frenetic production pace could have had a toll on its operational costs and processes. This, however, could give users (and their wallets) enough breathing room to enjoy their devices thoroughly before swapping it for a newer version.

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