Alcatel’s 3V is now launching in the US and UK.

After being announced in February, the 3V can finally be purchased for $150 in the US or £95 in the UK. Keep in mind this is a budget phone, though it has some great specs. It's a big, glossy phone with a long aspect ratio screen at a high resolution. It notably features a 6-inch, 18:9 LCD display with rounded corners and a 2K resolution. The body of the phone, however, is just plastic.

Pocket-lint got a chance to see it in person earlier this year. We found it to be, on the whole, a very promising device for the low end of the market. It's got an 18:9 ratio display, attractive, shiny finish on the back and enough features to keep the consumer entertained. The fact it has a 2K resolution screen in a phone that costs less than £95 is clearly the biggest selling point though. 

Other features include dual cameras on the back (a primary 12-megapixel camera, coupled with a 20-megapixel for depth effects), a quad-core MediaTek processor, 2GB of RAM, 16GB of storage, and a 3,000mAh battery. It’s running Android Oreo and has a fingerprint sensor and headphone jack. It also charges over Micro USB. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to support 802.11ac Wi-Fi.

But, at this price, and with its feature set, the 3V is a very compelling device, and one that has potential to shake things up a little in the bottom end of the market. There are some compromises, like the lack of fast-charging, and very minimal amounts of memory. But in this market, compromises are needed to make phones affordable. Whether they're the right compromises or not is yet to be seen. 

The 3V will go on sale next week at Amazon, followed by Best Buy and Walmart in the US. It’ll be sold unlocked and works on AT&T and T-Mobile. As for the UK, the 3V is available SIM-free Pay-as-you-go at Tesco Mobile or £10 per month on contract.