Spotted by famously eagle-eyed Dutch site LetsGoDigital, Samsung has certified two versions of the Galaxy Note 9 with CMIIT (the China Ministry of Industry and Information Technology). A process which requires making the devices public knowledge.
Much like its secretive Columbia trademarking, the listing doesn’t give away much detail other than the model numbers: ‘SM-N9600’ and ‘SM-N9608’. That said, this is useful information because while the Galaxy Note 9 while the model number ‘SM-N960’, the derivations refer to the different Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 and Samsung Exynos 9810 cores showing Samsung wants the flexibility of selling both models in the country.
Furthermore, we already know a lot about the Galaxy Note 9 and its headline features.
By far the biggest talking point is mounting evidence Samsung will make the Galaxy Note 9 the first mass-market smartphone with an in-display fingerprint reader. This has been a long time coming, with Samsung previously trying to implement the technology in both the Galaxy Note 8 and Galaxy S9 before running out of time.
In addition, the Galaxy Note 9 is expected to have the biggest smartphone battery Samsung has ever fitted into one of its flagship smartphones. This would represent a significant turnaround for the company, which has been extremely conservative with the battery capacities of its flagship smartphones ever since the Galaxy Note 7 debacle.
Lastly, Samsung will bring the Galaxy S9’s clever dual aperture rear camera to the Galaxy Note 9, though an additional upgrade its woeful front facing camera is also tipped according to my sources.
Will these upgrades be enough for Samsung to fight off Apple’s upcoming, supersized iPhone X? If Samsung can keep in touch with Apple’s widely expected price cuts, it has a chance…
