Verizon brought out its first 4G smartphone without a premium price on Monday by confirming the existence of the Pantech Breakout. The Android 2.3 phone still reaches the full 5-12Mbps real speeds of the LTE network and can even create a 10-device Wi-Fi hotspot. At just $100 on contract and with a rebate, however, it costs just a third the price of other 4G phones on the network.
The Breakout is also one of the smallest 4G phones and isn’t significantly stepped back from the LG Revolution, Samsung Droid Charge, or other rivals. It uses a four-inch, 480×800 LCD and an unspecified but likely single-core 1GHz processor. Most of the slight cost savings come from a five-megapixel back camera, a VGA front camera, and the use of a 8GB microSDHC card for the brunt of storage.
Pantech makes some customizations to Android, including the addition of Swype’s keyboard.
Stores should start carrying the Breakout on September 22.
