Created: 4 January 2012 · Last edited: 25 October 2026

Introduced at the end of 2011, the SH7218T is a revamped version of the SH7218U, which Sharp China launched in March 2011 for China Unicom. The SH7218T was subsequently introduced for China Telecom, with updated hardware and Android 2.3.

On the outside, there's little to help tell apart one from the other. The SH7218T has the same flip-open 180-degree swivel display that is typical of your high-end Japanese keitai garaho, especially those made by Sharp. The display measures 3.4 inches diagonally and has pixel-packed resolution of 854 × 480. It's touchscreen and is built using Sharp's Mobile ASV technology that is capable of reproducing up to 16 million colours. And also features Sharp's anti-peeping protection which, when switched on, draws a choice of patterns on the display that makes it clearly visible only for whoever is looking straight at it; others see the blurry pattern.

On the back of the display is a small 1.4-inch OLED screen that has a resolution of 192 × 64 pixels and shows information such as the time, incoming and missed calls, and unread messages. When there are no notifications to show, the brand name "SHARP" appears instead.

So far, there's nothing different. Even the same colours are available: black, white, or pink. OK, pink was only offered for the SH7228U, which has a Memory LCD on the outside, but still...

What is different is the processor: now an 800 MHz Qualcomm MSM7627T, upgraded from the 600 MHz Qualcomm MSM7227. The amount of installed RAM remains the same at 512 MB and so does onboard storage memory: 512 MB (only 95 MB available to the user). The latter can be expanded using microSD cards of up to 32 GB.

Supported radio frequencies differ, too: while the SH7218U is offered by China Unicom and therefore supported GSM and WCDMA, the SH7218T is adapted for China Telecom's CDMA network. It supports CDMA2000 1x and EV-DO Rev. A on the 800 and 1900 MHz bands, but has no GSM radio.

Well, that's it, the rest is the same:

The rear camera is the same 8-megapixel CMOS with autofocus and face/smile detection. The front-facing camera is 0.3 MP.

Near-range connectivity methods include Wi-Fi 802.11b/g, Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR and DLNA.

There's a 3.5 mm headphone jack, microUSB 2.0, and GPS with A-GPS support.

The SH7218T runs Android 2.3 with version 2.0 of Sharp China's proprietary Dim Sum user interface also known as Tapas OS. The interface was designed specifically for Sharp's Chinese-market smartphones and gives the phone a more distinctive appearance than stock Android.

The battery has a capacity of 960 mAh, the same as on the SH7218U and SH7228U. It weighs 142 grams and measures 110.7 × 50.2 × 17.2 mm.