Created: 1 July 2025 · Last edited: 28 September 2026

It's the time of year when Sharp tries to impress us with a new smartphone, which they have done by showcasing the Aquos R10. Now, I must admit, there's barely anything that smartphones can do to become better – a slightly better display, a slightly faster processor, a slightly better camera, slightly better speakers and audio delivery. But there can be no more revolutions like the ones we had during the previous decade. There's nothing left to discover. Anyway, don't let me put you off spending a fortune on the next model as soon as it reaches the shelves – the Aquos R10 by DoCoMo (SH-51F), by SoftBank (A501SH), and as a SIM-free model (SH-M31) will help you empty your pockets starting in early July 2025. Let's see what this cutting-edge piece of tech can offer.

The display has always been Sharp's bragging point: the Pro IGZO OLED technology has been made brighter, with 1500-nit full-white brightness and 3000-nit peak brightness, which is more than any Sharp phone has ever had (according to Sharp because who knows better?). Meanwhile, the display technology reduces blue light to reduce eye strain. The Virtual HDR feature is capable of optimising even non-HDR images to achieve HDR-level vividness. The 120 Hz refresh rate has been standard for quite some time now and includes, as typical for a top-range device, the black-frame-insertion trick to give it an effective 240 Hz refresh rate for fast-paced games.

All this is packed into 6.5 inches and a resolution of 1080 x 2340 pixels.

Add Dolby Atmos and full-metal box speakers to the visuals and you get your own pocket-sized cinema. The sound is clear even when playing at low volume thanks to its volume-adjustment capabilities. It gets even better with headphones, they say: 8-way surround sound to enjoy music and videos with realistic sound. I really don't know how they do that – we've all got up to two ears, don't we?

The camera was developed in collaboration with Leica Camera AG and uses a new 1/1.55-inch image sensor. This should be capable of reducing noise in dark areas for beautiful night shots. The Aquos R10 now features the 14ch spectrum sensor, previously found only on the Aquos R9 Pro, that measures surrounding light and allows capturing colours in various environments as close to the real thing as possible. The camera module relies on AI to improve detail and tonal gradation when shooting with zoom or in night mode.

The standard main camera uses a 50.3-megapixel sensor with a lens with an f/1.9 aperture (focal length of 23 mm) with full-pixel PDAF support and optical image stabilisation. Hybrid Image Stabilisation (optical and electronic) is also available but only when shooting video with the standard camera. Video capture is further enhanced using Dolby Vision.

The wide-angle main camera is also 50.3 megapixels but has a lens with an f/2.2 aperture (focal length of 13 mm), PDAF support and electronic image stabilisation.

The front-facing camera uses another 50.3-megapixel sensor with an f/2.2 aperture, PDAF support and electronic image stabilisation for video shooting.

As the Aquos R10 is the smaller brother (* No Aquos R10 Pro in sight as of early December 2025), it relies on a Snapdragon 7+ Gen3 processor, which has two 2.8 GHz + two 2.6 GHz + four 1.9 GHz cores. The amount of RAM is 12 GB LPDDR5X with up to 12 GB virtual memory. The built-in vapour chamber helps dissipate heat faster to keep the device running smoothly even when overloaded with multiple tasks and/or heavy videos and games.

Two storage versions will be available: 256 GB and 512 GB. Storage can be expanded using microSDXC cards with capacities of up to 2 TB.

The Aquos R10 comes with an AI message assistant that will listen to your conversations, take notes, and then show a summary of each call. This feature can also help block nuisance calls. Personally, I'd turn this feature off as soon as I get the phone.

Another AI feature is Glance AI for Aquos. It automatically displays news and trends on the lock screen and also uses your face to generate fashion photos for preview (only available on the SIM-free model).

The Aquos R10 is designed by Miyake Design and built from glass (Corning Gorilla Glass Victus 2 on the back and Corning Gorilla Glass 5 on the display) and an anodised aluminium frame to ensure durability.

It is (no surprise here) waterproof, dust-proof, and shockproof, compliant with MIL-STD-810H.

The Aquos R10 is offered in cashmere white, trench beige, or charcoal black.

Like in recent years, Sharp promise to deliver up to three major OS updates (from the Android 15 it rolls out with) and security updates for 5 years from release.

The Aquos R10 supports the following radio communication frequency bands:

• 5G NR (sub6): n1 / n3 / n5 / n7 / n8 / n28 / n38 / n40 / n41 / n66 / n77 / n78 / n79
• 4G LTE (FDD-LTE): B1 / B2 / B3 / B4 / B5 / B7 / B8 / B12 / B13 / B17 / B18 / B19 / B20 / B21 / B28 / B66
• 4G LTE (TD-LTE): B38 / B39 / B40 / B41 / B42
• 3G W-CDMA: B1 / B2 / B4 / B5 / B8
• 2G GSM: 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 MHz

* Bold frequencies are supported by the Japanese versions only, while underlined frequencies are supported by overseas versions only. Frequencies supported by both Japanese and overseas versions are shown in regular text.

The Aquos R10 comes with support for dual-band GNSS (GPS, GLONASS, BeiDou, Galileo, QZSS (Michibiki)), the latest Wi-Fi standards (a/b/g/n/ac/ax/be), Bluetooth ver. 5.4, Ultra Wideband, and a mobile wallet. Biometric authentication includes, now as standard, face recognition (mask compatible) and fingerprint recognition.

To summarise the improvements over last year's Aquos R9:

• 3000-nit peak brightness over 2000 nit
• MIL-STD-810H over MIL-STD-810G compliance
• 12 GB virtual RAM over 8 GB virtual RAM
• A 512 GB storage variant for the R10
• Colour spectrum sensor to aid the main camera in the R10
• Dolby Atmos-enhanced speakers in the R10
• 24-bit/192kHz Hi-Res & Hi-Res wireless audio support in the R10
• USB Type-C 3.2, Display Port 1.4 in the R10 over USB Type-C in the R9