The Sony Xperia 1 III revealed as being not that repairable in teardown video

Sony has released the Xperia 1 III in China, but we are still none the wiser about when the company plans to bring the handset to other markets. MediaMarkt briefly listed it and the Xperia 5 III on its website with August shipping dates, but it has since pulled these for some reason. Nonetheless, PBKreviews was able to get his hands on one and has taken it apart.

As the teardown video below shows, Sony relies on a lot of glue when assembling the Xperia 1 III. Unsurprisingly, Sony also uses plenty of screws, including a dozen just to remove the plastic mid-plate from the device's chassis. Thankfully, these are Phillips screws rather than proprietary ones. Still, Sony has used more screws than some laptop manufacturers do to hide the Xperia 1 III's internals away.

Additionally, Sony has integrated the device's three rear-facing cameras within its motherboard, an unusual decision in our opinion. There are no battery pull tabs though either, so but PBKreviews had to use used isopropyl alcohol to dissolve any loosen adhesive before prying the battery away. By contrast, you do not need to remove all the Xperia 1 III's components before you can disconnect its display cable, which is a plus.

Overall, it is easy to see why PBKreviews awarded the Xperia 1 III a 6/10 for repairability. Hopefully, the Xperia 5 III is more repairable and that Sony releases both outside of China soon.

Purchase the Sony Xperia 1 II on Amazon