The existence of a new hero handset from HTC has been circulating for a while and new images claiming to be that device have now surfaced. 

Coming from a familiar source (@stagueve) we now have a fresh picture of the HTC Aero, or HTC One A9 as it might be called. 

It looks practically identical to the iPhone 6 alongside, offering the same metal design, flattened back and plastic breaks to maintain wireless connectivity.

There's single camera towards the top of the Aero, with flash and mic hole. We can't tell much from the front at all, but it appears to have softly rounded edges like the iPhone.

Saying that the HTC Aero looks like the iPhone 6 might not be completely fair. The HTC One M7 was one of the first devices to appear using this style of zero-gap construction, fusing metal and plastic to allow a high quality of build without losing a connection. 

HTC followed that design with something similar in the One M8 and the M9, both of which have full metal bodies with that small plastic break. In fact, it was Apple who stepped closer to HTC's design with the iPhone 6.

But here we see an HTC phone that isn't curved across the back. From what we can tell, it's flat, so it looks a lot more like a metal version of HTC's Desire handsets - like the Desire 820, for example.

That also means it's the spitting image of the iPhone 6. 

There's little else we can deduce from these pictures, but it will reportedly be launching in late October for a November availability and be powered by a MediaTek Helios X20 chipset. 

You can read up on all the HTC Aero/HTC One A9 rumours right here.

READ: HTC Aero: Everything we know about HTC's next hero handset