Technology

How many times is this going to be regurgitated? The question has been well and truly answered.

We don’t buy them.

Why can't we go back to small phones?

The iPhone SE is dead,

Is there any chance that you chose to lock yourself into a very small walled garden with a vendor who might make decisions about product that you might not agree with?

Apple is the only one making iOS phones, and Apple doesn't seem interested in small devices anymore, so that door is shut.

Right. You stick yourself in that garden, you are gambling that the vendor is going to come out with the product that you want.

There are still a few niche companies working on smaller devices, like Unihertz, but those phones almost always have low-end hardware and limited software support.

Well, size is kind of a constraint on what hardware you can put in the thing.

If what you mean by "limited software support" is "apps are going to be optimized for the bulk of users and will probably feel small if the great bulk of users are using larger screens", well...I mean, yeah.

The iPhone 3 SE you have:

4.7-inch (diagonal) widescreen LCD Multi‑Touch display with IPS technology

1334-by-750-pixel resolution at 326 ppi

Memory 4 GB LPDDR4X RAM

https://www.gsmarena.com/results.php3?nYearMin=2022&nRamMin=8000&fDisplayInchesMax=5.5

Let's grab one from that list:

https://www.gsmarena.com/ulefone_armor_mini_20t_pro-13298.php

Size 4.7 inches, 53.3 cm2 (~63.1% screen-to-body ratio)

Same screen size as your phone.

Resolution 720 x 1600 pixels, 20:9 ratio (~373 ppi density)

30 pixels narrower, but 266 pixels taller than your phone.

8GB RAM

Twice the memory of your phone.

Can buy online in the US:

https://www.amazon.com/Ulefone-Armor-Mini-20T-Pro/dp/B0DJ74TQXT

And it was released October 2024, so it's pretty new.

Now, you may not be able to get an iOS phone that fits your hardware wants, but them's the breaks when you go with a platform that has only a single vendor making hardware for it.

people spend a third of their lives on those things. And while cumbersome, a big screen simply is better for media consumption

only way I see smaller phones make a comeback is if we change our habits or if a new technology comes along

People don't buy them for the price they'll buy bigger phones. That's it. That's the whole story.

They have to make the phone cost $300 less to sell in meaningful numbers. Why do that when they could just not make them at all and sell fewer models at higher prices?

Here's what I want, roughly in order of priority:

1. long term OS support
2. repairable
3. privacy friendly
4. small

I currently have a Pixel 8:

1. 7 years software support, maybe more
2. 6/10 on ifixit score; not great, but better than many
3. supports GrapheneOS
4. on the smaller end of "normal" today

A community-supported Linux phone would be awesome, since I'd get 1 and 3 by default and 2 by convention, but they don't meet my minimum needs from a phone: reliable basic feature support. Hopefully we get there by the time my Pixel dies.

Consumers just aren’t that interested in a product that’s visibly cheaper and worse than what everyone else is carrying. And that is what a smaller phone signals.

Phones are a status purchase; they all do basically the same things, but most people gravitate towards higher end phones because they offer all the fancy features. Flagship phones are all large, so that’s what you see in the marketing. Just like you’ll never see a car company put its cheapest base model on a car catalog cover.

A smaller phone tends to cut corners; it’s not just smaller, but also functionally worse. While the price might be appealing, the potential customer also knows that using said phone will mean a worse experience, and might even get them ridiculed because they got ‘the cheap one’.

So we can absolutely go back to small phones - we just don’t want to. Smaller, cheaper, worse products just don’t appeal to a status-conscious buyer. If phone manufacturers offered the same specs at different sizes, that might change. But any savvy tech buyer knows a smaller phone is worse than the bigger one.

Back in the pre-smartphone days, size was a thing companies could compete on since customers wanted small, light, distinctive designs in premium materials. Like the Motorola Razr V3. These days, that just doesn’t work.

This author should’ve spent digging into the iPhone 12 / 13 mini, and how it was received in Apple communities a few years ago.

That experiment really showed that the small phone demographic is passionate and vocal, but small (no pun intended). Those phones sold well when the small-phone-fans ran out to buy them, but the sales numbers cooled off quick.

Given that Apple is working on a lightweight 17 “air” phone, my guess is that they learned screen size is too important for too many people, but they’re going to see if they can strike a middle ground with weight / pocket fit.

Yes please. I really dislike iOS, but I use the iPhone 13 Mini for work and it's the perfect form factor. I desperately want an Android phone that's the same size, but I'm rocking a Flip which is the best I can do for small form factor right now.

there is one option.

well and a couple others that are also made by Unihertz depending on your needs/wants

more companies making them would be cool but the general consensus I'm reading here is that there are 0 and that is incorrect.

Answering single handed on me iPhone 12 mini on latest iOS 😇

It is a great small phone!

Because most people don't buy them?

It's like asking "Man, why don't they make slider phones anymore?" (and I loved my slider phone).

I don’t want a small phone, I just want a normal phone that I can use in one of my normal sized hands. I have an iPhone 13 Mini right now and it’s pretty ideal but I know they’ll go end of life one day and there’s nothing to replace it right now.