Nubia has officially launched the NaviX Ultra in China, pairing flagship-grade hardware with an AI assistant built around ByteDance's Doubao Mobile Assistant. The company is calling it the "world's first AI intelligent smartphone," built around a dedicated AI button and agentic AI features that go well beyond a typical voice assistant.
Nubia NaviX Ultra Features a Dedicated AI Button and Dual Fingerprint Scanners
The Nubia NaviX Ultra is the brand's follow-up to the M153, the first-generation "beanbag" phone that sold out quickly after launch last December, before several major Chinese apps restricted what its Doubao Mobile Assistant could actually do inside their apps.
This time around, Nubia is shipping the consumer version of the assistant, with what it says are improvements to interaction, personal memory, task execution and privacy controls.
The Nubia NaviX Ultra's highlight feature is a dedicated, orange-accented AI button that doubles as a fingerprint sensor, which is something Nubia calls an industry first. It works alongside Seed's full-duplex voice model, letting users interrupt the assistant mid-response rather than waiting for it to finish speaking.
Nubia claims the phone's voice recognition delivers a 48% higher wake-up rate in noisy environments like subways, along with a 21% improvement in sentence accuracy compared to rival devices.
The assistant also supports more than ten regional dialects, including Cantonese and Minnan and can be triggered through voice proximity, over-the-air activation, or earphone taps.
Notably, the fingerprint sensor built into the AI button isn't the phone's only biometric reader, as the NaviX Ultra actually ships with two separate fingerprint scanners. A standard Goodix ultrasonic sensor sits under the display and handles routine tasks like unlocking the phone and authorising payments, much like on any other flagship.
The second scanner, tucked into the side-mounted AI button itself, exists specifically to verify the user the moment they invoke the AI assistant. Nubia and Goodix say the idea is to remove a step from the process. This way, rather than unlocking the phone with the in-display sensor and then separately triggering the AI button, a single press authenticates you and starts the chat at the same time.
Beyond voice commands, the assistant can read and act on whatever's on-screen, recognise objects through the camera and follow along during video calls to understand what's being shown.
Nubia says it can handle multi-step tasks, like booking a ride through Cao Cao Mobility or checking a schedule in Lark, from a single spoken instruction, claiming an end-to-end success rate of over 80% for single-sentence, cross-app requests.
Other software features include Smart Call for automated call handling, priority notifications, and Lark Notes integration for transcribing and summarising recordings.
On the privacy front, Nubia says the NaviX Ultra is the first phone to complete official registration for an intelligent agent large model with Chinese regulators. It's also backed by lock-screen permission controls and what the company describes as international security certifications.
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Nubia NaviX Ultra Display, Camera and Performance
The Nubia NaviX Ultra runs on the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset, paired with 12 GB or 16 GB of LPDDR5X RAM and up to 1 TB of UFS 4.1 storage. It ships with Android 16 under Nubia's Nebula AIOS 2.
The 6.78-inch LTPO 2.0 OLED display supports a 1.5K resolution with an adaptive refresh rate up to 144 Hz. This panel also features 100% DCI-P3 colour coverage and a peak brightness of 4,500 nits, along with both DC and 2,160 Hz PWM dimming.
For cameras, the rear setup includes a 200 MP primary sensor with OIS, a 50 MP ultra-wide lens and a 64 MP periscope telephoto lens, also with OIS. A 32 MP front camera handles selfies.
Despite measuring just 7.62mm thick, the NaviX Ultra packs a 7,100mAh fifth-generation battery, which is a notably large capacity for a phone this slim. It supports 90W wired charging and 50W wireless charging, with cooling handled by Nubia's Galaxy Cooling System, built around a 7,100mm² vapor chamber.
Other Nubia NaviX Ultraspecs include Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6.0, NFC, dual speakers with DTS:X Ultra support, and dual X-axis linear motors.
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Nubia NaviX Ultra Price and Availability
The Nubia NaviX Ultra is available in China starting today in three variants:
- 12 GB + 512 GB: 5,999 Chinese yuan (approximately Rs 85,500)
- 16 GB + 512 GB: 6,499 Chinese yuan (approximately Rs 93,000)
- 16 GB + 1 TB: 7,499 Chinese yuan (approximately Rs 1,07,000)
The phone comes in Dream, Blue, Black and White colourways and is already on sale through ZTE's online store. Nubia claims that it has crossed 100 million Chinese yuan in sales within the first second of going live. As of now, there's no word yet on a global release.
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