Technology

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.

Hum... So Fairphone ?

I think this is correlation, not causation, as this was also when touch screens started being made

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.

I picked the Pixel 8 because:

1. it runs GrapheneOS
2. It was a little smaller than the Pixel 8 Pro

If there was a smaller version available, I would've gotten that instead.

I don’t know which small phones have been released recently but I’ve used an iPhone Mini and decided against it. Not because it’s small but rather because it’s not small enough.

See, I do like a big screen more than a small one. That said, the phone is something I carry in my pocket so there’s a balancing act to be done there. What was really great about the original iPhone’s size was not that it had a small screen. It’s that it was small enough that I could reach all corners of the screen with my thumb.

None of the recent small phones I tried had that advantage. In that case, since there’s no clear usability advantage to the smaller model, I’ll take the larger screen instead.

They always lean a little too hard into making the small one the "budget" phone and end up gimping it into something nobody wants, and yet they still don't make it cost attractive.

Compared to the SomePhone Pro, the SomePhone Mini has:

• 6GB of RAM rather than 8. (I mean, okay, what do I need that much RAM for?)
• 128GB onboard storage rather than 512GB (Those chips are the same footprint so that wasn't done for miniaturization, but I don't store a lot on my phone so ok)
• No SD card slot. (I suppose you could argue that IS for miniaturization but it's still a kick in the pants)
• 1080p display rather than 4k. (fine, the PPI is still finer than my eyes)
• 3100mAh battery instead of 3600 (You know the reduced resolution on the display will probably make up for that anyway)
• No NFC (really?)
• No fast charging (fucking sigh)
• No wireless charging (pegwarmer says what?)
• 5.9 inch 9:21 display (so it's 89% the size of the Pro model anyway?)
• a laptop grade VGA camera (you're actively trying to make this product fail, aren't you?)
• Locked bootloader, locked carrier (because of course)
• $899 instead of $949 MSRP (Okay just stop saying words and drown yourself in the septic tank)

RAM is a horrible indication of phone performance imo.

The A15 chip in the iPhone 3 SE absolutely destroys the Dimensity 6300 chip in the 8GB phone you linked

A lot of people had liked iPhone because for the longest time android phones were not able to compete in the cpu/gpu space especially around the time of the iPhone 11.

Although now at the high end android phones are much closer together in performance so it’s more about what features you care about more between the phones.

The truth is though that it's not an apple-specific thing. On the android side Asus was the last large phone maker to ship modern small phones, and even they have taken over their zenfone line (small phones line) with a large phone for the ZenFone 11.

Based on reports from companies, it sounds like the market is just not there, at least not big enough to warrant the R&D compared to "regular" phones which make them good money.

That, and small phones on the Android side are often nerfed beyond reason, like a bottom-of-the-barrel Mediatek SoC with low RAM and shit storage option instead of the bigger model's Snapdragon and quality storage, or shit cameras, or garbage screen resolution, etc etc.

There is something to be said about the larger variant having more room for better cameras, but outside of that, the nerfing feels almost intentional.

That was discontinued after two iterations. Was going to switch to ios just for their mini range after years of Android, then saw that they got rid of small phones as well. Like, what would I gain by switching ecosystems if I know that the next phone is still going to be huge?

BTW, I settled for an S24, which is considered "small" now but still way too big, but at least Samsung has a decent one handed mode that doesn't hide half of your screen like ios or stock android but instead decreases the whole screen to bearable sizes:

Still feels like the damn clown mask meme, where, after years of increasing phone sizes, they now add a stupid software feature to virtually decrease screen size to remain usable.

The iPhone 13 mini was the perfect size and if Apple would have used that as a base for their new SE instead of the shitty 16e, I would have bought it in a heartbeat. Just give me a thicc 13 mini with a good battery, camera and a new processor.

Because they're fucking stupid.

I can pick up a phone in either hand and type on it using only that hand, and I can play games using both hands at once. If I'm using a bracer, it means I can't do anything else with either hand or use my off hand to interact with it.

The only problem a bracer solves is not having pockets, but even then you still need to wear a bracer.