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Because small phones have a small viewing area, which is a pain in the ass to see, especially as you get older. Which is why I prefer foldables. The more screen real-estate I can fit in my pocket, the better.
people spend more time on their phones than ever before. its substituted sitting in front of a tv, so i guess people want bigger screens the same way they want bigger tvs.
Because every time a manufacturer releases a small phone, nobody buys them.
Well yeah, the people who want a small reliable phone are unlikely to replace them every year for no discernible reason. Cue more articles and comments about how there’s no sale data to support the idea that people want small phones! The odds are stacked against us.
Because apparently people want big phones.
For the last 10-15 years it’s been a boiling frog situation really - .1 or .2" increase every generation until 7" somehow becomes the norm (for a phone, not a tablet, mind you).
I wish there were more small hi-end phones too.
“Why can’t we go back to small phones”
Company releases small phone
“No one” buys it
Company stops making small phones
People complaining why there are no small phones
I want a repairable phone. A phone where I can replace the battery
And screen. And buttons.
I also want something that’s supported more than 3 years so there’s a point to repairing it. Ideally, support should come from the community so it can be infinite as long as someone is willing to do the work.
Based on https://postmarketos.org/install/ the Nokia N900 can run the latest stable release of PostmarketOS.
Nokia N900 was a proper Linux-powered phone released in November 2009.
So yeah, it’s been getting over 15 years of community support so far.
Edit: Fixed typo
Hum… So Fairphone ?
I really wanted to buy the Fairphone 5, but they don’t ship replacement parts to where I live which makes the entire concept pointless.
Forward shipping exists.
Yea, but with the De Minimis rule overturned by the trump administration, importing it to the US is gonna have import fees. And also a lot of fees for each part you import, making the whole “repairability” thing pointless as it cost so much.
OK, so that’s a possibility, but when you start adding a ~$30 fee on top of the cost of the part and shipping from Fairphone you’re looking at about $100 per repair, which stops making sense pretty quickly. You’re better off spending a little more money on a good device that is dust- and moisture-sealed and taking care of it for a few years.
Makes sense. But you can offset part of the shipping from the fact that you can easily do the repair yourself.
Another possibility would be the HMD Skyline. Less repairable than Fairphones, but still far easier than most other smartphones. Only 2 years of updates though.
But starting from 2027, a removable battery will be mandatory for all smartphone in the EU, which mean most, if not all smartphone will switch to removable battery. This may also make repair a lot easier.
I am of two minds on this. I love repairing electronic equipment, it’s what I do for a living, and I buy old tech to fix up all the time.
Replaceable batteries seem like a good thing, in terms of reducing waste for devices that are otherwise still useful… theoretically.
Realistically, the charge management circuitry and the battery chemistry in phones has gotten so good today that most batteries have a useful lifespan that is longer than the useful life of the device. Three years is easily doable for any mid-range phone on the market.
At five years you’re probably going to be disappointed with the battery performance, but how many people are continuing to use a 5-year-old phone? At that point the internal technology has changed substantially and there might even be a new network standard that you want to use, so you’re probably replacing the whole device even if replacing only the battery is an option.
On top of that, giving the user access to the battery means the phone body can’t be fully sealed against moisture and dust, plus the access panel is a big mechanical weakpoint which means the body will be less rigid than a fully enclosed device and thus more prone to breaking when dropped or sat on. Adding those weaknesses back into mobile devices will make them more fragile and (I predict) will lead to more frequent failure and replacement of the entire device, which will offset any waste-saving benefit from the replaceable battery.
Plus, the addional space required to fit in the replaceable battery casing, the removable access panel and the contact points for the battery means either the whole device will have to be bulkier or the battery will have to be smaller (than it would otherwise be with a permanent internal battery).
Replaceable batteries made a lot more sense in 2010 when the batteries were shit (and sometimes still NiCad) and the charge management was basically nonexistent (so the battery cycling wore it out faster). Today it’s weight and bulk, plus fragility that will probably lead to equivalent or increased e-waste.
At five years you’re probably going to be disappointed with the battery performance, but how many people are continuing to use a 5-year-old phone?
My brother has a 6+ years old Iphone, my parents both have a 5 years old Samsung Galaxy Phone (S21 and A51). None of them complains.
On top of that, giving the user access to the battery means the phone body can’t be fully sealed against moisture and dust
Do you think computer waterblocks are sealed using glue? They aren’t. Screws and a good old o-ring are all you need to make a repairable AND waterproof phone. But they don’t want a repairable phone, they want you to buy a new one whenever possible.
plus the access panel is a big mechanical weakpoint which means the body will be less rigid than a fully enclosed device and thus more prone to breaking when dropped or sat on.
I dropped my FP5 multiple time. He never broke. My brother IPhone got a shatered back, and he had to replace the screen once for falling from a distance the FP5 just shrug off.
Plus, the addional space required to fit in the replaceable battery casing, the removable access panel and the contact points for the battery means either the whole device will have to be bulkier or the battery will have to be smaller (than it would otherwise be with a permanent internal battery).
True, but ot also don’t have to be the old pogo pin way. Any currently available battery is a removable battery given it is user accessible and isn’t glued to the board.
Today it’s weight and bulk, plus fragility that will probably lead to equivalent or increased e-waste.
I wonder… What would be the biggest e-waste? A dead battery or a dead battery with a whole perfectly functional phone attached to it?
Because most people use their phone as their main, if not only, device, so a bigger screen is more desirable to consume content.
Well, I can’t speak for everyone else, but I can’t go back because they don’t sell any small phones.
Why can’t we go back to small phones?
I definitely was looking at porn on my 240x320 Nokia screen.
