BlackBerry launches Q5, a QWERTY phone running BB10, targetted at countries like India

BlackBerry has announced a new phone at its BlackBerry Live event. The handset – dubbed the Q5 – is a mid-end smartphone with a touchscreen and a full QWERTY keyboard. The handset is aimed towards emerging markets. It will be available in red, white, black and pink colour options.

The BlackBerry Q5 features a classic BlackBerry keyboard with discrete keys that has been re-engineered and designed to help you type fast, accurately and with the least amount of effort. Plus with Instant Action shortcuts you can type to perform tasks faster. The BlackBerry Q5 smartphone gives you the best of both worlds - a classic QWERTY keyboard for optimized communications and a 3.1-inch touchscreen for all the rest.

The BlackBerry Q5 is a hybrid touch-and-type handset

The new BlackBerry Q5 smartphone will be available in selected markets in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia (including the Asia Pacific region), and Latin America, with expected availability beginning in July.

According to earlier rumours, the display of the Q5 is said have a resolution of 720 x 720 pixels. That makes it a Q10 twin as far as display is concerned. On the back will be a 5 megapixel camera along with what looks like an LED flash. Even though there’s no mention of the resolution of the front-facing camera, it is quite evident from leaked pictures that there will be one. The Q5 is said to have 2GB of RAM, 8GB of internal storage and a non-removable 1800 mAh battery.

Going by the leaked pictures, the BlackBerry Q5 seems to have a very glossy finish. The glossy back and front look like fingerprint magnets and there’s very little to distinguish it from older BlackBerry staples such as phones in the Curve series in terms of form factor. All the colour variants of the phone will come with high-gloss finish, which is sure to have polarised opinion. The traditional BlackBerry QWERTY pad is present as ever and the keys are laid out in an island fashion a la notebook keyboards.

BlackBerry has also announced at the event that its operating system – BlackBerry 10 – now has more than 1,20,000 apps. This is quite a figure for such a young operating system. BB10 was launched back in January with great fanfare alongside the BlackBerry flagship device – the Z10.