Sony is killing off its flagship smartphone series

The Xperia Z-series has never been a big sales generator, and considering the laughable state of Sony’s mobile business, it’s no surprise that the company has decided to kill off the series. Sony confirmed as much on Wednesday when it announced that last year’s Xperia Z5 will be the last Z-series smartphone that it releases. All of the company’s future smartphones will be released through the X-series, with the Xperia X Performance replacing the Xperia Z6 as Sony’s flagship smartphone for this year. The company has also decided to put more focus on releasing smartphones with superior battery life and camera performance.

As suspected, the new Sony Xperia X Performance will replace the Xperia Z6. A comment on Sony Mobile DACH’s Facebook page confirmed as much yesterday (even though it was later redacted), but a Sony spokesperson has confirmed to Android Authority this morning that the Xperia Z5 will indeed be the last generation of the Xperia Z series. The spokesperson also hinted – although wouldn’t confirm outright – that the more entry-level Xperia XA is also the replacement for the Xperia M4 Aqua‘s successor, which we had previously expected to see announced at MWC 2016. From what we’re being told, Sony is really tightening up its product portfolio and putting everything under the X umbrella with its new focus on battery life, camera performance and design. I questioned Sony’s reasons for abandoning water-resistancy and was told that it simply wasn’t a feature that consumers made buying decisions on. When I mentioned Samsung reintroducing an IP rating on the Galaxy series, I was informed that Sony has still done internal testing on the X series water-resistancy and that the new X series can still withstand splashes and short submersions. However, Sony won’t be seeking an IP rating or advertising the fact, having removed the waterproof flaps from the X range.