The demand in the US is “extremely high”

Jun 1, 2017 08:18 GMT  ·  By

TCL released the BlackBerry KEYone yesterday and it seems that the smartphone has seen a strong adoption in the US. The company has revealed that demand for the BlackBerry KEYone is “extremely high” and has even managed to hold the “#1 Best Seller” label in the Amazon USA store for unlocked phones.

BlackBerry KEYone is sold out on Best Buy’s website, as the retailer recommends customers to call local Best Buy stores to see if they still have the phone in stock. The smartphone has been a high demand in Canada, where it became the highest pre-ordered BlackBerry ever at Rogers.

TCL stated, “Demand has been extremely high, and it’s encouraging to see this level of excitement and momentum around our BlackBerry smartphone launch. We understand customers are facing issues with stock outs when trying to purchase their KEYone.”

The company added, “We’re working closely with our retail partners, ensuring additional stock is available ASAP so they can fulfill customer orders.”

BlackBerry offers the KEYone in two unlocked variants in the US, one that’s optimized for GSM networks and the other that’s suitable for CDMA networks, including Verizon. The phone carries a price tag of about $549.99 in the US.

BlackBerry KEYone comes with 3GB of RAM and Snapdragon 625 SoC

The smartphone features a 4.5-inch IPS LCD screen with 1620 x 1080 pixel resolution and 3:2 aspect ratio. It also comes with 3GB of RAM and runs Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 625 SoC clocked at 2.0GHz, together with a 64-bit Adreno 506 graphics processing unit.

The battery capacity reaches 3,505mAh with Quick Charge 3.0, while internal storage is set at 32GB, which can be expanded to 2TB using a microSD card. Moreover, the KEYone comes with a 12MP Sony IMX378 sensor with 4K recording on the back and an 8MP camera with 4K recording in the front.

The phone’s most appealing feature is the physical QWERTY keyboard, which provides multiple actions and comes with a fingerprint scanner embedded in the space bar.