The Oppo R5 currently holds the title of "world's thinnest smartphone" at 4.85mm but that may not last long since the announcement of the Vivo X5 Max is drawing near. It will start a war of decimal points by coming in at 4.75mm thick.
The company is teasing the device by revealing how its impressively slender body was constructed and how it's better than the R5. Leaked photos show someone actually measuring the X5 Max with a caliper, confirming its 4.75mm claim.
Confirming the 4.75mm claim of the Vivo X5 Max with a caliper
How did Vivo achieve this thickness? According to the company it moved 90% of the internals (some 786 components) along the sides, instead of having the sandwiched between the screen and the back. This will make for one interesting teardown.
Anyway, the Oppo R5 had to drop the 3.5mm audio jack (which is about a millimeter and a half thinner than the phone itself) and use a microUSB to 3.5mm convertor like in the good old days. There's also no memory slot – two things Vivo says it will not compromise on with the X5 Max.
Vivo X5 Max teaser images
The upcoming phone will keep its 3.5mm audio jack, the memory slot and according to TENAA specs will have a 5.5" 1080p screen, 1.7GHz octa-core chipset (MediaTek chipset), run Android 4.4 KitKat with 2GB of RAM and pack a slightly bulging 13MP main camera plus a flush 5MP front-facing camera.
The Vivo X5 Max is expected to be announced next month and we may see the even thinner Vivo Xplay 5S come out of hiding along with it.
Vivo teases 4.75mm thick X5 Play, explains how it got so thin