Microsoft had a budget smartphone with thin bezels in development in 2014

Microsoft worked in 2014 on a budget smartphone with thin screen bezels on the sides and top. It was about the Lumia 435, which did come out, but in a different form. A prototype of the thin-edged version has now surfaced.

Windows Central managed to obtain a copy of the prototype. It would be a device with the code name Vela and it should have been the Lumia 435. Microsoft released that device at the beginning of 2015, but that was a completely different smartphone than the prototype that can be seen now, with much thicker screen edges.

The released model has a 4″ screen with 800×480 pixels, but the prototype has a 5″ screen with 1280×720 pixels. The Snapdragon 200-soc is the same. Furthermore, the prototype contains a 5-megapixel camera on the back and a front camera that shoots pictures in 1280×720 pixels. The budget device has 1GB of RAM and 4GB of storage memory, which can be expanded with a micro-SD card. The phone runs on Windows Phone 8.1.

According to Windows Central, the dimensions of the device are 126.7×67.8×9.3mm. Combined with a 5″ display with a 16:9 ratio, this means that the prototype has a screen-to-body ratio of 80 percent. That’s almost equal to the Xiaomi Mi Mix 2 and only slightly less than the Galaxy S8 , which has a relative screen size of 83 percent.

Lumia 435 prototype. Photos: Windows Central.

Because the screen edge at the top is so small, Microsoft incorporated the front camera in the ‘chin’ of the device. Xiaomi also does that in the Mi Mix and Mi Mix 2, which have virtually no screen bezel at the top. In 2014 there were almost no devices with such thin screen edges. Only this year, such screens are becoming a trend.

It is not clear why Microsoft did not develop the prototype further. This week, the company announced that developing new hardware for Windows 10 Mobile is no longer the focus. This seems to exclude the arrival of new Windows smartphones.