Phones

ZTE Grand Memo smartphone's huge screen is designed for small hands

BARCELONA—China’s ZTE debuted a smartphone with a 5.7-inch screen dubbed the Grand Memo at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona Monday. It’s a follow up to its 5-inch Grand S smartphone that the company introduced at CES last month.

For those with small hands, ZTE offers Mi-POP, a small set of controls that appear on the screen whenever is most comfortable for users. The back, home, menu and customizable buttons fall under the user’s thumb for easy navigation. There’s also a single-handed keyboard and a smaller dial pad.

At nearly six inches, the phone might be hard for small handed users, but ZTE offers Mi-POP that features a small set of controls whenever most comfortable for users.

The phone runs Android Jelly Bean and includes a 3200 mAh battery, more than double the capacity of that in the iPhone 5, which sports a screen almost two inches smaller. The ZTE phone also has a 13 megapixel camera.

Chinese smartphone makers are blurring the lines between smartphones and tablets. ZTE’s Grand Memo at 5.7 inches joins Huawei’s Ascend Mate at 6.1 inches.