Waterproof smartphones are the new best thing, and Sony has hit a home run with the Xperia M2 Aqua, available exclusively through Vodacom.

Next to a shattered screen, water damage is the second most common repair request for smartphones. That’s why it makes sense to have a waterproof phone – and no manufacturer is pioneering this feature better than Sony with its Xperia range.

The Sony Xperia M2 Aqua is aimed right at the heart of the market for waterproof smartphones. Vodacom will be partnering with Sony for the launch of the M2 Aqua, which will be available exclusively to its customers.

The M2 Aqua can be immersed in up to 1.5 meters of water for 30 minutes. Which is great news if your phone happens to slip out of your pocket into the pool, but it also opens up the door to other possibilities – like underwater photography, made all the easier by the dedicated camera button. The M2 Aqua has a 8MP rear-facing camera and a 1.2MP front-facing, and comes with a suite of nifty photo-editing apps from Xperia.

Waterproofing aside, what are some of the other stand-out features of the mid-level Xperia M2 Aqua smartphone?

It has a 4.8-inch display, runs on Android KitKat, and comes with 8GB internal storage. It is powered by a Snapdragon 400 processor with quad-core 1.2 GHz chips, and has 1GB RAM. The 2300mAh battery should last you a full 24 hours.

All in all, very decent specs – but when you are buying a Sony smartphone, remember that you also get the best of Sony’s entertainment technology.

As part of the exclusive deal between Sony Mobile and Vodafone, when you purchase an Xperia M2 Aqua it comes loaded with three Hollywood mega-hits from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment: The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Captain Phillipsand Ghostbusters – plus it comes with the first season of The Blacklist.