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- Update 2022-05-20: Updated requirements and link to Smallandroidphone
Dear mobile phone vendors,
Here is a list of features I wish for my personal mobile:
- Hardware (ordered from most important to less important)
- 5" high-resolution display
- Yes, that small!
- front side is covered almost 100 percent display (and a notch) in
order to reduce physical dimensions
- Yes, that small!
- good to very good backside camera (f1.7 or better)
- physical switch for silencing phone
- physical button for voice recording for capturing ideas
- GPS
- Bluetooth
- decent LTE and WiFi connectivity
- good SAR value
- good grip (haptics) of back-side material
- on average, running 1.5 days on battery
- compromise between weight/dimensions and run-time
- Quick charging
- >=4GB RAM
- >=64GB internal storage or expendable via SD card
- dual-SIM
- independent of expendable SD card
- 200-300€ target retail price
- Audio jack
- Decent audio speakers that work for low-noise environments without hurting my ears
- 5" high-resolution display
- Software
- Android One
+ project
Treble
- no bloatware
- direct and "endless" updates from Google
- Android One
+ project
Treble
Following things are not on my list - in purpose:
- USB-C: Micro-USB is fine as well
- 8" mega-display: go, get a tablet instead
- Infrared LED
- FM receiver
- NFC is only nice-to-have
- front camera is not necessary to me
I hope that this inspires you since I can't find matching phones on the current market.
Update 2022-05-20
This article did age well from my current point of view. If I would write that list again, I would only change few things.
I might probably go with "up to 6 inch display" if the front side is as large as the display.
Quick charging is not that important to me as long as I'm able to charge only during the night and not being forced to charge during the day. Charging slowly during the night also prevents battery wear in the long run.
NFC gained some momentum with my FIDO2 authentication token from SoloKeys. So far, I do not use that option on the mobile phone (mostly because of lack of support from services) but I'd prefer to do so in future.
2022-05-20: Smallandroidphone
Eric Migicovsky started a petitition for a small-form-factor Android phone that has a very large overlap with my wishlist above. If you want to express your desire for a reasonable sized mobile phone, you might as well sign his petition just like I did.
He defined the price range from 700-800 US$ which I would translate to "up to 800€" from my experience. If I look at the average smartphone price so far, I calculate with 7.91€ per month. A 800€-phone would have to last over eight years to be able to compete. This is even too optimistic for a Fairphone which sets the standard here.