The latest leak from China has indicated ZTE will soon release slightly tweaked versions of the Nubia Z9 Max and Nubia Z9 Mini, which debuted in April 2015.

According to MyDrivers via GizmoChina, leaked pamphlets sourced from the Red Dragon country dubbed the newer models as the Nubia Z9 Max Elite and the Nubia Z9 Mini Elite.

Take a closer look at the said pamphlets here and here.

The Z9 Max Elite will feature a fingerprint sensor on its side-mounted power switch as well as a USB-C connector on its bottom edge. Apparently, ZTE has done their homework on the latest mobile trends. Apart from the two additions, though, the upcoming flagship phablet will be basically identical to its parent device.

The Z9 Max has a 5.5-inch 1080 x 1920 touchscreen display, Qualcomm quad-core Snapdragon 810 chipset clocked at 1.5GHz with the Adreno 430 GPU and a non-removable 2,900 mAh battery. It has support for basic mobile features such as Bluetooth, GPS and Wi-Fi connectivity while having the Android 5.0.2 Lollipop as its built-in OS, as per GSM Arena.

Furthermore, the phablet sports a 16-megapixel rear camera with LED flash, touch focus, autofocus, face detection and panorama while its eight-megapixel front facing unit is more than capable of taking quality selfies and video chats.

In the memory department, the Z9 Max launched half a year ago with 3 GB of RAM and 16 GB of storage space, which can be expanded via the micro-SD slot up to 128 GB.

Meanwhile, the upcoming Z9 Mini Elite will be bulked with up to 3 GB of RAM from the non-Elite version's 2 GB. It will also feature an iris recognition technology, which lets users unlock the handset by simply looking at it. A slew of minor software enhancements is also in the mix. Apart from those, no further additions were mentioned.

Based from detailed GSM Arena listing on the Z9 Mini, fans can expect the following specs to be featured on the Z9 Mini Elite:

  • Five-inch 1080 x 1920 touchscreen display with 441 pixel density
  • Qualcomm's quad-core Snapdragon 615 processor clocked at 1.5GHz with the Adreno 405 GPU
  • 16-megapixel main camera with LED flash, touch focus, autofocus, panorama, and check quality
  • Eight-megapixel 1080p front-facing unit
  • 16 GB expandable storage space up to 128 GB via support for micro-SD
  • Non-removable 2,900 mAh battery

A release date for both upgraded models is yet to be reported, although the Z9 Max Elite and Z9 Mini Elite could launch in China before the year ends as ZTE hinted last week that they will be announcing something new "soon."

Given the Chinese mobile maker's track record for product releases, it's unlikely that the duo of upgraded Nubia Z9s will be available for the wider global market.