Zinwa Q27 prototype brings classic BlackBerry style to a modern Android phone

The Zinwa Q27 is an upcoming smartphone that’s designed to look like a classic BlackBerry device, complete with a QWERTY keyboard. Made by a small team that got its start by replacing the insides of actual BlackBerry phones, the Q27 is Zinwa’s first phone featuring entirely brand new components: It has an AMOLED display, MediaTek Dimensity 7300 processor, and Android 16 software.

While the Zinwa Q27 isn’t expected to be available until the second quarter of 2026 at the earliest, Zinwa unveiled specs earlier this year. And now the company is showing off some early prototypes to give us a better idea of what the phone will look like.

A short video and a set of pictures released on Discord and Reddit (1)(2) show a phone that certainly looks like a BlackBerry… at least until you zoom in on the “tool belt” above the keyboard.

The keyboard itself has all the keys you’d expect including letter, number, Alt, Shift, and symbol buttons plus delete, space bar, and enter keys. It should enable a reasonably good thumb typing experience.

But the strip of special function keys above the keyboard include arrow keys pointed left and right (presumably back and forward), a square (which is typically used for “recents” in Android), and a triangle (your guess is as good as mine – but my guess is “home”). This differs from a typical BlackBerry layout that includes buttons for answering and ending phone calls, plus home and back buttons.

Zinwa has also placed a small square in the center of the tool belt that will most likely feature an optical fingerprint sensor for reading fingerprints and/or functioning as a tiny touchpad, allowing you to move an on-screen cursor.

The sides of the phone appear to have a metal frame, while the back is covered by a glossy, rounded sheet of plastic, which also gives the phone a bit of a retro feel, although it’s unclear whether that was the intention.

In terms of specs, the phone’s features are expected to include:

• Display: 3.92 inch, 1080 x 1240 pixel AMOLED display
• Processor: MediaTek Dimensity 7300 (4 x Cortex-A78 + 4 x Cortex-A55 + Mali-G615 MC2 GPU)
• RAM: 12GB LPDDR5
• Storage: 256GB UFS 3.1 + microSD card reader
• Cameras: 50MP rear / 16MP front
• Battery: 3500 or 4000 mAh
• Charging: 33W
• Audio: Stereo speakers
• Wireless: WiFi 6E, BT 5.4, 4G LTE + 5G dual SIM (eSIM + nano SIM)

Not a Blackberry, but here’s the prototype of Zinwa’s upcoming new phone
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