Infrared sensors have been there in phones for clicking photos and now given the global health crisis, the technology has got a new use. Huawei sub-brand Honor has put the infrared function to novel use in their Honor Play 4 Pro smartphone for detecting temperature. The phone’s IR camera can check the body temperature by pointing it towards the forehead, just like the non-contact thermal temperature readers do. According to Honor, the feature works with any objects, animals, and of course humans.
No physical contact is required to gauge the temperature of the person and the accuracy of the feature will only be known once it lands in the users’ hands. For now, Honor has released a short video clip demonstrating the body temperature measurement feature. The brand posted a video on Weibo which shows it in action.
In the video, the phone camera is pointed towards a person or animal and the user interface shows temperature reading. The complete method of operating this function or the time for which the camera needs to be pointed at a person is not made clear by Honor. The Honor Play 4 series phones have been released today power-packed with features.
The flagship-grade device, Honor Play 4 Pro in fact comes in two versions, one of which has the infrared temperature sensor function. This sensor is placed right below the camera modules. The 5G capable phone is powered by a Kirin 990 (clocked at 2.86 GHz), Mali-G76GPU, and Da Vinci NPU for AI functions.
Honor Play 4 Pro with an infrared temperature sensor will come in 8GB and 128GB UFS 3.0 storage version. Pre-orders for this phone and the other variants will start today and the Play 4 Pro will be on sale from June 9 in China. The Play 4 Pro IR sensor variant is priced at 2999 CNY ($420).
