Nokia's new XR20 wants to be the next indestructible phone

If a Nokia 3310 were hit by a car, it would be the car that would be damaged. At least that's what the mythology -- and the numerous memes -- would claim about Nokia's classic phone from 2000. And Nokia's latest launch, the XR20, is hoping to recapture some of that magic with the company boasting that it's among the most hard-wearing smartphones around. 

Unlike the original 3310, the XR20 is a proper smartphone, running Android 11 and boasting a large 6.67-inch display covered in Gorilla Glass Victus, the toughest glass Corning makes. It's built to "military standard MIL-STD-810H" which basically makes it extremely resistant to drops and bumps. Naturally, it's IP68 rated against water and dust. All in all, a pretty burly-sounding bit of kit. 

Of course it's still a phone with a big ol' screen, so don't expect it to survive a 10,000 foot free-fall onto solid concrete, but it should be able to survive pinging off your bike's handlebars and hitting the deck when you're careering down a mountainside. Needless to say, we're keen to get hold of a model (or two) to see just how hard-wearing these things are. Tests I'm keen to do include trapping it between Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's biceps, being stepped on by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson wearing sensible shoes and being thrown against the wall by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in frustration as he loses yet another round of classic Snake. Mr. Johnson, please get in touch. 

Nokia says the phone is aimed at rough-and-tumble outdoor types (mountaineers, cyclists, cross-country runners, etc.) as well as people who just want a phone that can put up with whatever life throws at it and keep on chugging when lesser phones would crumble and end up in landfill. It's a good philosophy, and Nokia backs it up further by providing three years of software updates and an additional year of security updates to keep it safe and up-to-date for longer. Even better, Nokia offers a free screen replacement if it does happen to break in the first year of use, and it's promising to plant 50 trees for every XR20 sold. 

Other specs include a dual rear camera, a Qualcomm Snapdragon 480 5G processor with 4 or 8GB of RAM and 64 or 128GB of storage. All of which sounds pretty lower midrange, but it's really the durability elements that have pushed the price up to its $550 starting point. It'll go on sale in the US and UK on 24 August, with prices in the UK starting at £399. 

Nokia also unveiled the C30, a whopping 6.8-inch phone with a massive 6,000-mAh battery and a low price of only £99 in the UK. It's joined by another classic reissue, the Nokia 6310, a 2G-only feature phone with a UK price of £50. Wider availability of these two handsets isn't known at the time of publication, but we will update this when we hear more.