Although flagship chipsets continue to improve over the years, vapour chambers have only been able to control temperatures from hot to warm. For 2026, phone brands are hoping that improved active air cooling fans could be the solution, and iQOO could the largest one for early 2026.
Largest active air cooling fan?
According to Digital Chat Station, the iQOO 15 Ultra is set to launch before the Chinese New Year (17 February 2026). More importantly, it’s going to feature an “upgraded air cooling fan” and shoulder buttons. As a reminder, iQOO does have external active air cooling fans that attach to iQOO smartphones to deliver superior heat dissipation.
Although the tipster didn’t clarify whether it’s another external fan, rumours suggest that this upgraded air cooling fan could be built directly into the phone. It wouldn’t be the first to do so either, as Honor has already announced that its upcoming Honor Win and Honor Win RT smartphones will feature an active air cooling fan under the camera module. Typically, this is where smartphone chipsets are located, so the design makes sense.
Top-tier hardware for early 2026
There is no iQOO 13 Ultra to directly compare this phone to. However, the iQOO 15 Ultra should feature the latest hardware now available. It’s expected to come with a Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 chipset, up to 16GB of LPDDR5X RAM, and up to 1TB of internal storage. It should also share the same display as the iQOO 15, which is a 6.85-inch OLED screen with a 144Hz refresh rate, 1440×3168 resolution, and 6000 nits peak brightness.
As for cameras, expect it to have the same 50MP main camera and 50MP ultra-wide camera. The iQOO 15’s also featured a 50MP periscope telephoto, but the Ultra could get an upgraded one with higher (than 3x) optical zoom. Of course, iQOO could also choose to keep the same camera since it had to make space for a built-in active air cooling fan.
We’re not sure which is the case yet, so that’s something worth looking forward to when the iQOO 15 Ultra launches in January 2026. It’s probably going to be quite pricey for an iQOO smartphone, but would you be interested in getting one? Let us know in the comments below, and stay tuned to TechNave for more updates about it.
