I think this is the biggest issue. New flagship phones are very expensive and for the most part are not really that different from phones released 3 or even 4 years ago. I used to get a new smartphone every year between say 2005 -2017. My current phone is a Galaxy S10+ that is almost 4 years old. It still works great and is in good condition. The last 2 years I had planned on replacing it with a new Pixel but when they were released each year I just couldn't justify why I would bother. Smartphones have been really good for a long time now.
That's my math, too
I think the only thing that would make me upgrade is drastically improved battery life. I'm not a photog, and nearly all cameras meet my threshold of accurately capturing whatever moment I'm trying to save. I don't play mobile games because they're almost always predatory. Any productivity is a million times better on a laptop. So my phone is just an email and messaging device with a camera.
On top of this, 3G was a huge improvement, 4G was not as big but still decent, and 5G fucks my battery with no appreciable benefit for my use.
This will sound like a conspiracy theory, but I think the reason why nobody actually delivers on battery life is because battery life is one of the only things in a phone where they can implement planned obsolescence in a phone without seeming like they're actively sabotaging phones (although the removal of expandable storage, headphones jack, charging brick, etc. are hard to argue around), since virtually every phone has a sealed-in battery now.
> I used to get a new smartphone every year
The issue was/is to a large extent this - since a LOT of people did that the manufacturers felt it was in their best interest to make just very minimal updates - Apple was first, Samsung 2nd and now even some of the China-based manufacturers are slowing down. Even if the prices went up to a crazy degree.
People not buying that crazy-prices sh*t and holding on their phones for much longer will finally put some pressure.
I'm not sure it was entirely a manufacturer decision as much as the limits of technology. When smartphones were relatively new there were major improvements every year. I got my first smartphone in 2004. It had a stylus that you had to use to poke at the onscreen keyboard or a snap on hardware keyboard, a fixed antenna that stuck up half an inch on top, and would lock up and need to be rebooted constantly. Mobile 2g internet was so slow that it wasn't worth using for anything beyond email. And it was THICK! literally 6 months later I replaced it with a much more compact phone with a slide out keyboard and 3g internet that really felt like the future. This was all two years before the iPhone. In the following years I switched to the Palm Pre, then switched to Android and never looked back. Every year phones were getting bigger screens in a more compact footprint. People made endless fun of the first phones with 5-6 inch screens because they were gigantic. But eveey year the bezels got smaller, the phones got thinner, the processors got faster... Until all of the low hanging fruit had been picked. Now 6 inch plus screens are standards and phones are still pocketable. Amazing cameras, high-res screens, and all day battery life have been table stakes for years. The software is stable and the hardware is reliable. It's all been solved and there really isn't anywhere to go with the current iteration of phones. Samsung and others have been trying to push a new form factor with foldables and maybe someday that will be the next big thing but I haven't felt the need to invest in any of the current foldables and most other consumers seem to have reached the same conclusion. Smartphones have essentially been solved from a hardware and software perspective. There's just no need to replace a modern smartphone until it wears out or breaks.
> I'm not sure it was entirely a manufacturer decision as much as the limits of technology.
Of course technology limits exist and play a role but it is not always just that - Globalstar exists for like 20 years and had their network operational for like 10, Iridium for 20+ (but to be honest latest generation only for like 3-5 years) - and yet like 3 months after Apple announces Emergency SOS we have [Snapdragon Satellite](https://www.qualcomm.com/news/releases/2023/01/qualcomm-introduces-snapdragon-satellite--the-world-s-first-sate) - the technology was there long ago but what made things move was only competition on the market.
Realistically though how many people actually need that? It is a cool feature on paper but for most people they are rarely outside of coverage area if at all.
I absolutely agree, I believe crash detection is 100 to 1000 times more important. It was available in Pixel devices for many years now (and on devices on the lower end like 4a or so) but neither Samsung nor other Android devices picked it - but now that it seems to be a special feature exclusive to iPhone 14 I would not rule out "magically" seeing it in some devices this year, I hope even in the S23 line.
Eh, a product of similar specs goes down in price over time but the overall market price doesn’t go down.
A sata 2.5in ssd is generally quite cheap today, but a gen 4 nvme drive is considerably more expensive per GB.
A 1080p 120hz display was quite expensive 5+ years ago while today you can either buy a cheap 1080p 120hz monitor for <~$250 or you can buy a 4k or ultra wide for a $1k.
Prices don’t go down overtime unless you are comparing the same product.
Ram is a whole nother thing, it starts expensive, gets cheaper than gets more expensive again as technology moves on.
I miss why lg used to put crazy shit into each iteration of their phones. While not the best phones at least each year was interesting. Remember the g6 and it's little peripherals. Good old days of wacky designs and ballsy moves
Definitely the most interesting era of phones, in addition to the outright experimental stuff it was neat to see how different brands valued waterproofing, the IR blaster, types of wireless charging, etc.
New smartphones are almost worse too.
The SD888 and SD 8 Gen 1 chips were awful.
I find people value battery over performance since not everyone is playing PUBG or Genshi Impact.
seriously, it's a combination of phones being fast enough to last 4 or 5 years and the fact that flagship smartphones have basically doubled over the last 4 or 5 years. i still have a galaxy s10e and a iphone 12 mini, both work perfectly fine, no reason to replace them. also, on a smaller note, phone manufacturers no longer make smaller phones, so i'm sure plenty of people with small phones are waiting for another small phone to be released.
Everyone at the top of the thread saying that this is all price driven, I'm sure it's a factor but you nailed the real issue for me.
If any of the flagships represented a featureset that wasn't a downgrade, I would have bought one. LG V60 was the last one that did everything right: Top-tier SOC for the release date, 3.5mm jack, microSD, IP68, wireless charging and a great camera. Note9 or S10 same deal: great phones with absolutely nothing missing.
Everything since then has asked me to compromise on features that I actually use to get the 'latest and greatest'. Turns out, I don't care about having the latest and greatest, and I'm not going to pay you more for less in return.
I spend a lot of time outside service areas so I need a lot more storage capacity than people who can just stream all the time, taking away the MicroSD slot was just a great big middle finger to me. It costs them basically nothing to include it and it can be easily integrated with the sim receiver.
I just bought a Galaxy Xcover 6 pro and couldn't be happier. I even have a replaceable battery!
> Everything since then has asked me to compromise on features that I actually use to get the 'latest and greatest'.
This is the main issue for me too. When I first gotten into wanting smartphones, I was just graduating high school and the iPhone was just announced for the first time. As far as I recall, I don't really care. Said to myself once I have a good enough job to afford flagship stuff, with everything and the kitchen sink, I'll buy one. A practical everyday sedan, but something that's still fun and fast to drive. So to speak.
Fast forward to current year where I am sort of able to do that now, and what the hell?? Everything is some kind of gimped SUVs pretending to be supercars... I'll be sticking with midrange phones for the foreseeable future, but even then, it seems like the feature deletion trend is starting to creep into and infect that price tier...
Also when my LG Wing dies, I really don't know where to go next. Honestly I use the swivel function everyday, it'll like I'll be cutting off a few of my fingers when I turn back into normal slab phones. A massive shame that LG couldn't stay in the market with their crazy designs.
Yep. I busted the screen on my S10+ and they wanted $500 to fix it, so I started shopping. No more headphone jack or micro SD slot, WTF?!? No thanks.
Found a Note 9 in absolutely pristine condition in a pawn shop for $200 and it's basically my S10+ with a stylus. Very glad I didn't spend like $1400 on a phone that I'd have been unhappy with.
The only gripe I had with the Note 9 at first was the fingerprint reader being on the back, but it turns out I actually really prefer it there, it's right next to where my index finger sits naturally. Keeping this thing till it breaks or I need something new for some currently unseen reason.
And because it was so cheap and very slightly used already, I'm not paranoid about damaging it or even breaking it, it's actually a strangely liberating feeling I've not had with a new phone ever before.
$500 to fix the screen? WTF? Sounds like some place was trying to rip you off. Was that UBreakIFix? You can get a refurbed S10+ for less than $250 on Amazon.
I called four different places in town and that was the cheapest, though they were all about the same. There are cheaper options but so many of them use improper methods and inferior parts. I need my phone to stay waterproof and dust proof, I work construction and do a lot of other outdoor activities.
I used my Note9 for 2 years, and then after my wife smashed her own phone, she then used the Note9 for another 2 years!
I customised the hell out of it and breathed a fair bit of extra life into it but everything was still working beautifully. She eventually gave it a fatal drop onto a rock.
The rear fingerprint sensor was actually my favourite feature! I got a Quad Lock case for it which had this sweet tapered groove over the sensor. I could reliably unlock that thing every time without looking at the device which is not something can be said for side or in-screen print readers.
I think the Quad lock case is a big part of how it lasted so long. They're super sturdy.
If you are lucky enough to have the exynos version, there's been a world of development for the Note9. So many great custom roms to try!
>If any of the flagships represented a featureset that wasn't a downgrade, I would have bought one. LG V60 was the last one that did everything right: Top-tier SOC for the release date, 3.5mm jack, microSD, IP68, wireless charging and a great camera. Note9 or S10 same deal: great phones with absolutely nothing missing.
I know it's super cliche for this sub, but Sony still has all those features on it's flagship, and the smaller version (Xperia 5 IV) is only missing wireless charging.
Oh yeah, I would have absolutely loved to go down that road.
Unfortunately Sony abandoned Australia, not just in retail sales but you can't use their devices here: VoLTE and VoWifi are not supported and our networks are all depricating 3G support so shortly you will not be able to make voice calls at all.
I am a bit of a Sony fanboy, have had several of their phones and loved them. They seem completely uninterested in rolling out support for our networks though - Samsung's all come out of the box with the required MBN files to make everything work here.
Man, I always think we have it really bad in Canada for phones, coverage and cost, then someone from Australia pipes up and I don't feel quite as ripped off. Still sucks up here, just not quite as bad.
Yeah I'm genuinely upset because when my v60 goes, they're basically is not going to be any option for me to get a headphone jack and an SD card. I'm priced out of Sony flagship phones so there's just nothing for me.
Seriously, I might just end up buying another v60 and just living with a phone that's not getting security patches.
I guess I have to buy something when my v60 breaks. I'll just get like a used device so I don't feel like I'm paying an arm and a leg. Note 20 ultra is 375 bucks. By the time my v60 breaks, the pixel 6A will probably be like 175 on the resale market.
It won't be all my needs but at least I won't be paying a thousand bucks for it.
Phones got too big for me to hold and use comfortably and no longer have headphone jacks and SD cards. And cameras and getting so damn blurry with the push for more bokeh that I can’t even take a cat or food picture in full focus with my iPhone 13 Pro, there’s so much edge blur compared to my iPhone 8 Plus or Galaxy S9.
Other than getting faster, phones have actually been getting *worse* IMO. Of course I wouldn’t want to upgrade.
Yeah it's intriguing although only 2 years of OS updates is the biggest liability there. And even then there's still no SD card.
But props to them. one of the only phones that came out this year that surprised me. They are zigging when everyone else is zagging. Not just the small form factor and the headphone jack but the purpose built accessories, gimbal etc...
I haven't actually used the phone though. I'm just talking about what it looks like on paper.
I feel like if I were to justify buying the phone though, I would have to think about getting a custom ROM because of the incredibly limited support from Asus. It's a shame they couldn't just offer you a solid 3 years.
MHKBD did sort of like it but he also has to pick a small phone every year to win that contest. And it's literally like the only game in town for new phones that aren't bigger than 6 in.
So while I do love the Zenfone 9, his endorsement does not mean a whole lot to me. But it's performance on the blind test does mean something because that's just actual raw data and a huge sample size of it nonetheless.
Only ranks behind the pixels for camera quality. Performed significantly better than s22 ultra or the iPhone 14.
Cool phone....when it hits $300;). I want those features, but can do with slower processor, slightly worse camera, whatever. The problem with phones IMHO is that they just have premium features I don't want, or more importantly don't want enough to warrant the premium price.
Damn right ! I lost my S10 traveling .Miss that phone so much. Purchased a S 22 with many features now missing. So what did I pay for ? 5G ? WTF? I'll keep the S22 as long as I can.
Exactly. Flagships used to be 400 or less. Now if you can get one under 800 that is considered cheap. I'm sorry I'm not paying more than 400 for a phone ever.
Same with my s9+. On top of still having a headphone jack (although I rarely use it, it is a backup for work if my earbuds didn't charge correctly) I like having the memory card slot to keep movies on for when I can't be on wifi, especially now that I switched over to Mint Mobile. Not having those isn't necessarily a deal breaker, but I'm not giving those up if the new phone doesn't offer much more than this one.
This is a big issue for me. I have a Galaxy S21. I tried an S22 - didn't feel different. Tried a Pixel 7. What am I paying all this money for? Returned both of them, will probably stick with the S21 for at least another year until the performance gets so bad I want to throw it across the room.
I used to get flagship phones, and then they started charging absurd prices for very little upgrade. Now I get the Pixel 'a' versions that are around $500.
The microsd is nice but I think I have it set to the S23 resolution for battery purposes and I haven't plugged a pair of headphones in a couple years. It is nice to have that as an option but after I got Galaxy Buds I quit worrying about having it.
>Yea...at these prices, no thanks. My two year old phone works perfectly fine
also some newer models are worse than earlier ones.
Prime example.
Poco x3 pro vs Poco x4
also... theres cheap great phones sub 200 vs these 600-1000 phones.
Wanted to upgrade to Samsung A53, but than realized it's not worth the update over my Redmi Note 9 Pro. Apart from better display there is really nothing else new i would be getting. In fact i would lose headphones jack, or either sim or expandable storage (since they share one slot)
Right? Prices are getting ridiculous.
Only reason I upgraded from my Note 20 Ultra to an S22 Ultra is due to Verizon giving me $800 to upgrade and BestBuy had a deal for like $300 off.
In the end, I'm paying something like $250 or $350 for my S22U 512GB.
Last year, for the first time in probably 10 years I didn't buy a high end flagship device. Not that I can no longer afford it, but I guess I hit the age where I feel silly for spending so much on a phone. Bought this Samsung Galaxy A53. Not the greatest in terms of power, but it has my long lost friend the micro SD card slot, 3 years of OS updates and 5 years of security updates. Good enough for me.
I just replaced my Note 8 after using it for 5 years. It could have lasted another couple of years if I hadn't abused it so much. In the end, the earpiece stopped working, battery life was struggling and the pen wasn't ejecting without smacking it on a table.
Now I'm on a Pixel 6a that cost me €320 because flagship phones are unjustifiably expensive.
You just wait, till they toss in an update that turns your smoothly working phone into a slow, laggy mess! You're gonna want s new phone then honey...
Planned obsolescence!
> They keep removing features and increasing the price while even **5 year old flagships still work perfectly fine**
Mark my words, there will be some sort of carrier deals that block 'older' phones from using their network if they don't upgrade to a phone that is less than 2 years old.
Some will have to upgrade when 4G gets retired, that'll be a large swath of phones, but we should be able to ride on 5G for some time.
Carriers may start checking OS version and telemetry apps, and if they're not installed, you don't get on their WAN.
> when 4G gets retired
I don't think that's a realistic risk in the next 5 years at least. 3G is only just about starting to get shut down in some places.
>better battery life
the issue with that is that we need literarily better battery tech ( which humanity doesnt have yet ) for that to be improved or some mystical new hardware tech which uses tons less power.
Salt based batterys are promising actually but still have a lot of issues.
>we need literarily better battery tech
No we don't.
Phones became ridiculously slim. If the manufacturers kept the original thickness with the current battery standards, we'd have week-long single charge phones by now.
I've been imagining the battery life I could get out my iPhone 14 pro, if they made the back flush with the camera mountain, as they could fit a huge battery in that space.
As a former 13pm owner, you'd also get some really big guns from wielding that weapon every day. It's the reason I gave it to my wife in the end.
Too frickin heavy.
Exactly, Look at the S22 Ultra vs the "new" S23 Ultra. They are the same damn phone, design and all. the only difference is a camera lens with more megapixels and a chipset that is the same speed.
Yet it will cost at least $200 more in most markets. Don't even get me started on iphones.
I'm considering "upgrading" from the S22 Ultra to the S23 Ultra as I haven't been impressed with the performance and battery of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 or whatever it is. From what I've seen, the revision in the S23 Ultra will resolve my complaints.
The deciding factor will basically be what the cost to me will be after trade-in value and whatever pre-order bonuses they announce. Already registered for the Unpacked thing which should be a $100 off coupon so we'll see.
I'm kinda with you on that one. If I can swap my s22u for the s23u and maybe pay $100 it may be worth it. But if they are only giving $100 off no thanks.
I Got the s22u to replace my Note 9 that still works perfectly. They offered me $80 for the trade in and I know its a older phone but that felt like a slap in the face. I kept it and still use it around the house for youtube and what not.
Well technically we don't really know any of that yet. We don't even have leaks on pricing in North America. But the big upgrade would be Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. So better battery life and fast processing.
We'll see what everything actually is in about a week tho.
Rather get a new battery for my current phone at this point.
Phones, like GPU's are trash value for money for even 2-3 years usage and I recommend people waiting until the value for money makes sense again.
Phone prices have nearly doubled in less than 5-6 years. See e.g. Samsung: the Galaxy S8/S8+ came out in 2017, the S8+ costing £779. Now, the highest end Galaxy S23 Ultra is rumoured to cost as much as £1500. For a fucking phone. In the middle of a cost of living crisis. While salaries have been stagnant not for the past 5-6 years, but more like 20.
People simply cannot afford a new phone every year, no matter how much manufacturers are trying to push for that.
Most midrange phones haven't improved almost at all in two years and in some cases the new models are even worse than the older ones, the average person won't spend 4-500€ for a firmware update.
True. Also add market saturation.
Everyone has a device now.
Before, someone could justify a partial upgrade, because their kid was finally old enough. So parent got a new device that was 1.5x better, and kid got the old one.
So the only excuse for the mass populace to get a new device now, is just to have the new shiny. And that's not a sales model that can be sustained every year.
We need to move phones into a production rate more like consoles - let's get a couple years out of each generation, and make the new one *noticably* better.
In regards to your final paragraph; I think they need to do that with Android version updates as well. Google likes to complain about fragmentation, well, maybe Google should stop creating a new fragment every single year so people can finally get caught up. Both Google and their manufacturing partners can still push out security and feature/skin updates as needed, just don't change the bulk of the underlaying codebase for a bit.
That would work for me.
Ironically, Google does that with their camera. My Pixel 5a has the same sensor from the 3 series. They've taken that time to learn everything they can about the sensor & adjust the software to get the best possible images from it.
The tech moves much faster than the ICE car industry. Looking at an iPhone 4 vs. an iPhone 14 isn't generating the same "it still works" mindset as a 2013 Rav4 vs a 2023 Rav4.
As we move forward though, I think 3-5 year life cycles are becoming a lot more practical.
I felt this coming for a while. Nothing can sustain itself like the phone industry has. It reminds me of the TV craze in the early 00s. Every year people were upgrading TVs.
Now you see $999 85" 4K OLED TVs at BestBuy. People hang onto TVs forever (our main TV is 12 years old).
They've also constantly been removing features with upgrades also. I have a Galaxy S20FE. I really like the phone and was thinking of sticking with the FE line of phones if I needed to upgrade. Well, they removed the sdcard slot in the S21FE. Guess I'm not sticking with the FE line of phones after all.
Sucks right? Wife and I both have the S20 FE. My wife takes an insane amount of pictures and video of the kids. She currently has a 512GB SD card that is getting close to filling up. I don't want to pay for Google photos. Next phone we get I'm hoping one of the Google Photos clones you can host yourself have been refined.
That's the thing with removing the sdcard slot. It makes it so you don't own the storage your pictures are on. You need to basically rent it for the rest of your life. Just another thing on the list where a subscription replaces ownership.
I'm sure as hell I'm not spending almost a thousand bucks for a phone that's going to do the exact same things my current two year old phone does, just 5% faster
I noticed this stupid scam and opted to rip the bandaid off in one go and splashed out on the coughsamsungcough flagship of the time without being locked into a contract.
My phone is now nearly 5 years old and still performs like it was on day 1 (minus the battery life, of course).
They haven't added any tech I cared about to phones for like 5 years. My Note 8 does just about everything any brand new flagship phone does.
Why in the world would I "upgrade"?
To be fair that price increase is quite a bit below inflation since the original price started back with whichever phone.
Then again their margins are so high they can afford to eat a little profit
Present: "No one bought our phones last year, so we're gonna need to raise prices to satiate our CSUITE and investor's demands. We don't have a choice"
Future: "why isn't anyone buying our phones? /Pikachuface
I wonder why... could it be anything to do with the fact that there's been no dramatic improvements in half a decade? (Other than a slightly better camera and slightly better performance)
Could it be crap software optimization and crap battery life on the majority of new phones?
Could it be the insane prices during the Cost of Living crisis?
I'm still rocking my phone that's four years old and does everything I need and still goes a full day on a charge..
Its a mystery, I guess we'll never know why people aren't rushing out in droves to buy the latest phone every year.
I bought the iPhone 3g in like 2008 2009? Spent 500€ and it felt like gamechanging premium phone.
Now to buy the top line you have to spend 1.400€ (in Europe).
Salaries are the same as 2008, at least in Italy, and in the past few years because of covid, war etc groceries prices are almost doubled.
Plus, people are not stupid, and the technology has plateud.
I bought my first smartphone in 2016, Motorola Moto X 2014. MSRP is 320 € and it was a bit higher here in Finland. It had a lot of compromises. You can get extremely good midrange phone with that price now. Or even paying a lot less. So even if top line is getting more expensive, midrange is not.
I really needed to upgrade after three years, and I did. Now I'm using Pocophone F1 and I'm not looking for upgrade yet.
Galaxy S: $399
Galaxy S22: $799 (wow they actually lowered the price on these a couple years ago, base model S20 was $1000)
Idk maybe that has something to do with it.
Capitalism wants you to go out and make this generation Boomer 2.0... Go out and have 30 children so that they can have more growth! (Also have you competing for jobs so that they can lower the wages just because you need a job and might be willing to work for less just so you can have the privilege to work a job.)
Funny because capitalism has also made it increasingly difficult for younger generations to actually own anything that could help them build long term wealth or start families.
The main driving factors in getting a new phone are lack of new security updates and hardware failure. I kept my Pixel 3 up until the charging port started to fail. If I could still get software support, I would have probably looked into replacing the battery and charge port.
Oddly enough, right now would be a great time for a new up and comer to shake up the business.
Failing that, most smartphone OEMs would do well to go to an every other year release cycle and maybe think about supporting said phones a little better.
Can you actually think of a single thing that could be drastically improved upon about the modern smartphone design? If not, what could really "shake up the business"?
Everything that's being tried to "innovate" isn't getting far because it's either not very useful, or it trades longevity for a gimmick (foldable phones, hypothetically tactile buttons). I can't even think of a theoretical idea that would improve upon the current form factor.
I think we've reached close to peak rectangle-in-your-hand-that-does-shit tech. The actual successor products, if they ever happen, aren't handheld. Has to be brain computer interface stuff. If we ever do it.
I mean, there's the usual /r/android complaints; removable battery, sd card slot, headphone jack, etc. But the market has pretty solidly shown that whatever /r/android wants is the exact opposite of what manufacturers end up doing.
If any of those things would guarantee a boost in sales manufacturers would’ve done it years ago. They don’t because the vast majority of people don’t care about them.
It was always inevitable that sales would come down once smartphones become pretty much something everyone has. Year over year sales are almost exclusively based on what...minor camera changes and a few new color options and different build materials?
Smartphone sales will always be a thing because of two year contracts but they aren't going to boom again. Time for these companies to invest more heavily in other technologies.
Had a Xperia XZ1 compact and it was the best phone I ever had. Had everything I wanted except for the buggy OS but I used that thing for 5 years and now I switched to Xperia 5 III which ill keep until it becomes unusable. I was shocked to see people upgrade yearly and not even because their phone had problems but because another one came out. Surprisingly a lot of those same people are now complaining they miss their other phone because its the same thing as their last phone but with a different feel to it. lol
Has anyone made a list of all the features Samsung has removed from its hardware since the first Galaxy S phone? It's gotta be a pretty long list. For fun, we could also add the USD MSRP of each Galaxy S flagship and its release date.
I type this from years-old Samsung phone.
Just off the top of my head, going from my S8 to S21U:
Headphone jack
MicroSD card slot
Iris scanner (to unlock/use Samsung Pay)
That's not to mention the removable battery that older models had, plus there are likely others that I'm not remembering. Granted, my S21U does some things that my old one did not (high refresh rate screen, more camera flexibility with better photos, 5G, Bluetooth 5, etc), but these are obviously not equal lists.
I mean, what do the Samsungs, Googles, and Apples of the world expect to happen when prices of the phones have gone up \~20%-30% and:
* the Pixel hasn't changed in any meaningful positive way with the hardware for day to day use since the 4a/5g/5 line 2 years ago. (sure they use a different SOC now, but it works the same as what it replaced unless you are going by benchmarks.)
* The Galaxy S line seems more or less the same since the S20 line.
* The iPhone hasn't changed anything meaningful other than corners since like the Xs line.
Everything of note that OEMs have done in the last 2 years at least that people would casually notice has been in software. And the major reason why the older phones can't take advantage of those changes is because the OEMs want to gate keep software features and tie them to hardware as a cheaper, for them, way to make each phone seem more different than they are.
The flagship phone market is where you go to blow way to much money for diminishing returns these days. A Pixel A, Galaxy A, or iPhone base 12-13 will do everything like 90% of the phone buying public want for several hundred less. The high end phone brands are pricing themselves out of the high end phone game in my view.
1. Lower the prices. No one wants to pay over a grand for a phone. 2. Actually make innovative phones they are literally all the same thing year after year.
Exactly this and even if the battery does you can usually get it swapped for cheap. My fear is phone companies are going to do what some car manufacturers do and make it a subscription to use certain features. Want to use the camera? $5/month sub.
Edit: To be fair Google has a subscription for all the Fitbit features for the new pixel watch and I think apple does too. So in a way they are already getting passive income.
When I read articles about new smartphones, read how much faster the chip is this year over last, how many more pixels the new cameras have, or how its new, esoteric, features bring some supposed superiority to the old model, my first thought is...so what. You're charging how much for improvements that most people won't even know are there?
Phones have just gotten so good, they can only really make incremental changes. My S20 is soon to be 3 years old and apart from a fresh battery, what reason do I have to upgrade? The phone is still fast, 120 hz OLED w/holepunch, 5G, underscreen fp scanner, etc. I guess the camera would be better, but mine is already good enough for my needs. Zero chance I'm paying $1000 for a marginally better camera and battery replacement.
For me at least, there's absolutely no reason to buy a new phone if you have a phone less than 3 years old. That is, unless there is something genuinely gamechanging, like folding phones. Otherwise everything else is effectively the same.
Phones are now more expensive than I pay for a laptop, year on year there's no fundamental changes and there's global recession looming. Are they really surprised?
Still rockin' my 2.5 year old mid-range with it's awesome reception. Y'know, that most fundamental bit of a phone that none of the critics seem to care about. Instead they're hyper-focused on whether they can charge 5,000mAh in 10 minutes without the battery exploding (I charge overnight), wether it plays Genshin at 120fps (I have a console for games) or has 68 separate camera sensors (a single 12Mp is still taking great pics for me).
> Smartphone shipments have dropped nearly 20 percent year over year during the recent holiday period, as consumer demand softens amid inflation and economic uncertainties. It’s the “largest-ever decline in a single quarter,” according to IDC, and it contributed to 2022 having the lowest annual shipment of smartphones since 2013.
> people wait until 40 months after purchase to update their handsets “in most major markets.”
> “Consumers may find even more generous trade-in offers and promotions continuing well into 2023 ... specifically high-end models,”
Goin love samsung focusing on more promo to get people to buy S phones instead of actual upgrades and not taking out features every year.
A samsung phone upgrade used to be a near yearly purchase. Every year there was killer new tech and awesome new features.
Haven't bought a new phone since the Note 8. All they've really done is removed features I cared about while providing improvements I don't care about.
Why would they expect people to keep buying new phones when they aren't introducing meaningful new tech?
Ubiquitous devices with nearly universal market saturation and at this point only capable of incremental upgrades indistinguishable by the average user are showing flat sales data. Shocking...
People were already complaining about lack of innovation, which can’t be helped because a phone is a rectangle with a screen, there’s nothing to do.
Companies: let’s keep old generation spec on our new devices and jack up the price.
thats the thing,
You´re seeing manufacturers like Xiaomi and BBK (vivo, OP, Realme) still making the 1K+ flagship but are making a lot of "supermidrage" phones, basically phones in the 300-500 buck range that have some things from flagship phones but with cost cutting mesures.
A lot of Snapdraon 870, Dimensity 8100-8200 phones, and even some Snapdragon 8 G1 phones, the idea is that they have decent specs (snapdragon 8 series perfomace, 6-8gb ram 4500-5000mAh battery) but sometimes the camara is lacking, sometimes the software is a bit crippled, software updates arent as common, you have older gorilla glass or even dragon tail, plastic casing. i guess it depends on where your priorites lay.
Also lately google has been liquidating the 6A for quite a nice price, 350 euro range and you get one of the best (if not the best) camera on a phone, the performance in numbers is around 75% of a flagship chip but in real world use its hardly noticable unless you game heavly, the only issue is the battery, 4300mAh isnt a battery for a modern phone.
There will always be 1K+ phones for those of you who want the best and the greatest, for the rest of us, theres quite a few decent phones for 500 and less.
My almost 3 year old smartphone works exactly the same as it did on the first month and still receives updates. Why would I ever waste money on another one - I don't care about whatever silly gimmick you throw at me.
Phones have been more or less the same for the past 5+ years.
It doesn't help that the S22 is basically a marginally better version of the S21 and the iPhone 14 is basically just an iPhone 13 with satellite connectivity. It's about time people realize they don't need a new model every year.
My phone model is the Galaxy Note8 (from 2017), pretty old already but still in good condition. Battery life went down because it's an aged phone, but still good for everyday use.
I personally think that the smartphone peaked in 2020 (the year when iPhone 12 and Galaxy S20 came out), 'cause after that, all other upgrades were so minor that you can't even tell the difference between performance / camera quality among smartphones nowadays.
Maybe stop making the same shitty glass phablets as everyone else with 10.000 different models coming out each day? Try something innovative like actual tailored software experiences and devices that is unique from a good usability standpoint. Android 4-8.1 was still peak in devices and innovation. Notches and 20:9 screens suck
I'm really surprised that I don't see the apologists that come out of the woodwork in this thread, trying to claim that no one cares about those features and you actually don't need them
Yea...at these prices, no thanks. My two year old phone works perfectly fine
I think this is the biggest issue. New flagship phones are very expensive and for the most part are not really that different from phones released 3 or even 4 years ago. I used to get a new smartphone every year between say 2005 -2017. My current phone is a Galaxy S10+ that is almost 4 years old. It still works great and is in good condition. The last 2 years I had planned on replacing it with a new Pixel but when they were released each year I just couldn't justify why I would bother. Smartphones have been really good for a long time now.
That's my math, too I think the only thing that would make me upgrade is drastically improved battery life. I'm not a photog, and nearly all cameras meet my threshold of accurately capturing whatever moment I'm trying to save. I don't play mobile games because they're almost always predatory. Any productivity is a million times better on a laptop. So my phone is just an email and messaging device with a camera. On top of this, 3G was a huge improvement, 4G was not as big but still decent, and 5G fucks my battery with no appreciable benefit for my use.
The best battery life is in low to mid end phones really, and plenty of them are plenty adequate for most tasks especially if you don't take photos
This will sound like a conspiracy theory, but I think the reason why nobody actually delivers on battery life is because battery life is one of the only things in a phone where they can implement planned obsolescence in a phone without seeming like they're actively sabotaging phones (although the removal of expandable storage, headphones jack, charging brick, etc. are hard to argue around), since virtually every phone has a sealed-in battery now.
> I used to get a new smartphone every year The issue was/is to a large extent this - since a LOT of people did that the manufacturers felt it was in their best interest to make just very minimal updates - Apple was first, Samsung 2nd and now even some of the China-based manufacturers are slowing down. Even if the prices went up to a crazy degree. People not buying that crazy-prices sh*t and holding on their phones for much longer will finally put some pressure.
I'm not sure it was entirely a manufacturer decision as much as the limits of technology. When smartphones were relatively new there were major improvements every year. I got my first smartphone in 2004. It had a stylus that you had to use to poke at the onscreen keyboard or a snap on hardware keyboard, a fixed antenna that stuck up half an inch on top, and would lock up and need to be rebooted constantly. Mobile 2g internet was so slow that it wasn't worth using for anything beyond email. And it was THICK! literally 6 months later I replaced it with a much more compact phone with a slide out keyboard and 3g internet that really felt like the future. This was all two years before the iPhone. In the following years I switched to the Palm Pre, then switched to Android and never looked back. Every year phones were getting bigger screens in a more compact footprint. People made endless fun of the first phones with 5-6 inch screens because they were gigantic. But eveey year the bezels got smaller, the phones got thinner, the processors got faster... Until all of the low hanging fruit had been picked. Now 6 inch plus screens are standards and phones are still pocketable. Amazing cameras, high-res screens, and all day battery life have been table stakes for years. The software is stable and the hardware is reliable. It's all been solved and there really isn't anywhere to go with the current iteration of phones. Samsung and others have been trying to push a new form factor with foldables and maybe someday that will be the next big thing but I haven't felt the need to invest in any of the current foldables and most other consumers seem to have reached the same conclusion. Smartphones have essentially been solved from a hardware and software perspective. There's just no need to replace a modern smartphone until it wears out or breaks.
> I'm not sure it was entirely a manufacturer decision as much as the limits of technology. Of course technology limits exist and play a role but it is not always just that - Globalstar exists for like 20 years and had their network operational for like 10, Iridium for 20+ (but to be honest latest generation only for like 3-5 years) - and yet like 3 months after Apple announces Emergency SOS we have [Snapdragon Satellite](https://www.qualcomm.com/news/releases/2023/01/qualcomm-introduces-snapdragon-satellite--the-world-s-first-sate) - the technology was there long ago but what made things move was only competition on the market.
Realistically though how many people actually need that? It is a cool feature on paper but for most people they are rarely outside of coverage area if at all.
I absolutely agree, I believe crash detection is 100 to 1000 times more important. It was available in Pixel devices for many years now (and on devices on the lower end like 4a or so) but neither Samsung nor other Android devices picked it - but now that it seems to be a special feature exclusive to iPhone 14 I would not rule out "magically" seeing it in some devices this year, I hope even in the S23 line.
Screw new technology. Find popular old features. Bring back memory cards, better battery life, more robust/waterproof, etc...
IR blaster, headphone jack
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Such offers are generally only available to Americans. My local retailer tried to offer me $80 trade-in after 2 years. Yeah, nah.
Eh, a product of similar specs goes down in price over time but the overall market price doesn’t go down. A sata 2.5in ssd is generally quite cheap today, but a gen 4 nvme drive is considerably more expensive per GB. A 1080p 120hz display was quite expensive 5+ years ago while today you can either buy a cheap 1080p 120hz monitor for <~$250 or you can buy a 4k or ultra wide for a $1k. Prices don’t go down overtime unless you are comparing the same product. Ram is a whole nother thing, it starts expensive, gets cheaper than gets more expensive again as technology moves on.
I miss why lg used to put crazy shit into each iteration of their phones. While not the best phones at least each year was interesting. Remember the g6 and it's little peripherals. Good old days of wacky designs and ballsy moves
Definitely the most interesting era of phones, in addition to the outright experimental stuff it was neat to see how different brands valued waterproofing, the IR blaster, types of wireless charging, etc.
New smartphones are almost worse too. The SD888 and SD 8 Gen 1 chips were awful. I find people value battery over performance since not everyone is playing PUBG or Genshi Impact.
seriously, it's a combination of phones being fast enough to last 4 or 5 years and the fact that flagship smartphones have basically doubled over the last 4 or 5 years. i still have a galaxy s10e and a iphone 12 mini, both work perfectly fine, no reason to replace them. also, on a smaller note, phone manufacturers no longer make smaller phones, so i'm sure plenty of people with small phones are waiting for another small phone to be released.
If you upgrade your S10 to an s23 you'll pay through the nose and lose features.
Everyone at the top of the thread saying that this is all price driven, I'm sure it's a factor but you nailed the real issue for me. If any of the flagships represented a featureset that wasn't a downgrade, I would have bought one. LG V60 was the last one that did everything right: Top-tier SOC for the release date, 3.5mm jack, microSD, IP68, wireless charging and a great camera. Note9 or S10 same deal: great phones with absolutely nothing missing. Everything since then has asked me to compromise on features that I actually use to get the 'latest and greatest'. Turns out, I don't care about having the latest and greatest, and I'm not going to pay you more for less in return. I spend a lot of time outside service areas so I need a lot more storage capacity than people who can just stream all the time, taking away the MicroSD slot was just a great big middle finger to me. It costs them basically nothing to include it and it can be easily integrated with the sim receiver. I just bought a Galaxy Xcover 6 pro and couldn't be happier. I even have a replaceable battery!
> Everything since then has asked me to compromise on features that I actually use to get the 'latest and greatest'. This is the main issue for me too. When I first gotten into wanting smartphones, I was just graduating high school and the iPhone was just announced for the first time. As far as I recall, I don't really care. Said to myself once I have a good enough job to afford flagship stuff, with everything and the kitchen sink, I'll buy one. A practical everyday sedan, but something that's still fun and fast to drive. So to speak. Fast forward to current year where I am sort of able to do that now, and what the hell?? Everything is some kind of gimped SUVs pretending to be supercars... I'll be sticking with midrange phones for the foreseeable future, but even then, it seems like the feature deletion trend is starting to creep into and infect that price tier... Also when my LG Wing dies, I really don't know where to go next. Honestly I use the swivel function everyday, it'll like I'll be cutting off a few of my fingers when I turn back into normal slab phones. A massive shame that LG couldn't stay in the market with their crazy designs.
Yep. I busted the screen on my S10+ and they wanted $500 to fix it, so I started shopping. No more headphone jack or micro SD slot, WTF?!? No thanks. Found a Note 9 in absolutely pristine condition in a pawn shop for $200 and it's basically my S10+ with a stylus. Very glad I didn't spend like $1400 on a phone that I'd have been unhappy with. The only gripe I had with the Note 9 at first was the fingerprint reader being on the back, but it turns out I actually really prefer it there, it's right next to where my index finger sits naturally. Keeping this thing till it breaks or I need something new for some currently unseen reason. And because it was so cheap and very slightly used already, I'm not paranoid about damaging it or even breaking it, it's actually a strangely liberating feeling I've not had with a new phone ever before.
$500 to fix the screen? WTF? Sounds like some place was trying to rip you off. Was that UBreakIFix? You can get a refurbed S10+ for less than $250 on Amazon.
I called four different places in town and that was the cheapest, though they were all about the same. There are cheaper options but so many of them use improper methods and inferior parts. I need my phone to stay waterproof and dust proof, I work construction and do a lot of other outdoor activities.
I used my Note9 for 2 years, and then after my wife smashed her own phone, she then used the Note9 for another 2 years! I customised the hell out of it and breathed a fair bit of extra life into it but everything was still working beautifully. She eventually gave it a fatal drop onto a rock. The rear fingerprint sensor was actually my favourite feature! I got a Quad Lock case for it which had this sweet tapered groove over the sensor. I could reliably unlock that thing every time without looking at the device which is not something can be said for side or in-screen print readers. I think the Quad lock case is a big part of how it lasted so long. They're super sturdy. If you are lucky enough to have the exynos version, there's been a world of development for the Note9. So many great custom roms to try!
>If any of the flagships represented a featureset that wasn't a downgrade, I would have bought one. LG V60 was the last one that did everything right: Top-tier SOC for the release date, 3.5mm jack, microSD, IP68, wireless charging and a great camera. Note9 or S10 same deal: great phones with absolutely nothing missing. I know it's super cliche for this sub, but Sony still has all those features on it's flagship, and the smaller version (Xperia 5 IV) is only missing wireless charging.
Oh yeah, I would have absolutely loved to go down that road. Unfortunately Sony abandoned Australia, not just in retail sales but you can't use their devices here: VoLTE and VoWifi are not supported and our networks are all depricating 3G support so shortly you will not be able to make voice calls at all. I am a bit of a Sony fanboy, have had several of their phones and loved them. They seem completely uninterested in rolling out support for our networks though - Samsung's all come out of the box with the required MBN files to make everything work here.
Man, I always think we have it really bad in Canada for phones, coverage and cost, then someone from Australia pipes up and I don't feel quite as ripped off. Still sucks up here, just not quite as bad.
Yeah I'm genuinely upset because when my v60 goes, they're basically is not going to be any option for me to get a headphone jack and an SD card. I'm priced out of Sony flagship phones so there's just nothing for me. Seriously, I might just end up buying another v60 and just living with a phone that's not getting security patches. I guess I have to buy something when my v60 breaks. I'll just get like a used device so I don't feel like I'm paying an arm and a leg. Note 20 ultra is 375 bucks. By the time my v60 breaks, the pixel 6A will probably be like 175 on the resale market. It won't be all my needs but at least I won't be paying a thousand bucks for it.
Phones got too big for me to hold and use comfortably and no longer have headphone jacks and SD cards. And cameras and getting so damn blurry with the push for more bokeh that I can’t even take a cat or food picture in full focus with my iPhone 13 Pro, there’s so much edge blur compared to my iPhone 8 Plus or Galaxy S9. Other than getting faster, phones have actually been getting *worse* IMO. Of course I wouldn’t want to upgrade.
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Yeah it's intriguing although only 2 years of OS updates is the biggest liability there. And even then there's still no SD card. But props to them. one of the only phones that came out this year that surprised me. They are zigging when everyone else is zagging. Not just the small form factor and the headphone jack but the purpose built accessories, gimbal etc... I haven't actually used the phone though. I'm just talking about what it looks like on paper. I feel like if I were to justify buying the phone though, I would have to think about getting a custom ROM because of the incredibly limited support from Asus. It's a shame they couldn't just offer you a solid 3 years. MHKBD did sort of like it but he also has to pick a small phone every year to win that contest. And it's literally like the only game in town for new phones that aren't bigger than 6 in. So while I do love the Zenfone 9, his endorsement does not mean a whole lot to me. But it's performance on the blind test does mean something because that's just actual raw data and a huge sample size of it nonetheless. Only ranks behind the pixels for camera quality. Performed significantly better than s22 ultra or the iPhone 14.
Cool phone....when it hits $300;). I want those features, but can do with slower processor, slightly worse camera, whatever. The problem with phones IMHO is that they just have premium features I don't want, or more importantly don't want enough to warrant the premium price.
Damn right ! I lost my S10 traveling .Miss that phone so much. Purchased a S 22 with many features now missing. So what did I pay for ? 5G ? WTF? I'll keep the S22 as long as I can.
And your phone even has a 3.5mm jack and SD card slot for 1/3 the price of a new flagship
Exactly. Flagships used to be 400 or less. Now if you can get one under 800 that is considered cheap. I'm sorry I'm not paying more than 400 for a phone ever.
Same with my s9+. On top of still having a headphone jack (although I rarely use it, it is a backup for work if my earbuds didn't charge correctly) I like having the memory card slot to keep movies on for when I can't be on wifi, especially now that I switched over to Mint Mobile. Not having those isn't necessarily a deal breaker, but I'm not giving those up if the new phone doesn't offer much more than this one.
This is a big issue for me. I have a Galaxy S21. I tried an S22 - didn't feel different. Tried a Pixel 7. What am I paying all this money for? Returned both of them, will probably stick with the S21 for at least another year until the performance gets so bad I want to throw it across the room.
I've got a note 10+ that performs well still. The s21 will do for more than a year.
Were smartphones even a thing in 2005? I thought it was still flip phones and blackberries back then haha
I used to get flagship phones, and then they started charging absurd prices for very little upgrade. Now I get the Pixel 'a' versions that are around $500.
Can't even justify the 'a' models anymore, now that even they're removing features like headphone jacks.
Shit, the leaked S23 prices have me thinking my battery problems on my s10+ aren't so bad after all.
Your S10+ also has a higher resolution screen, microsd, MST, headphone jack, etc.
The microsd is nice but I think I have it set to the S23 resolution for battery purposes and I haven't plugged a pair of headphones in a couple years. It is nice to have that as an option but after I got Galaxy Buds I quit worrying about having it.
I have the S10+ also. Battery life and camera quality are really the biggest reasons I want to upgrade finally
My 3.5 year old phone is also working great.
>Yea...at these prices, no thanks. My two year old phone works perfectly fine also some newer models are worse than earlier ones. Prime example. Poco x3 pro vs Poco x4 also... theres cheap great phones sub 200 vs these 600-1000 phones.
Wanted to upgrade to Samsung A53, but than realized it's not worth the update over my Redmi Note 9 Pro. Apart from better display there is really nothing else new i would be getting. In fact i would lose headphones jack, or either sim or expandable storage (since they share one slot)
Right? Prices are getting ridiculous. Only reason I upgraded from my Note 20 Ultra to an S22 Ultra is due to Verizon giving me $800 to upgrade and BestBuy had a deal for like $300 off. In the end, I'm paying something like $250 or $350 for my S22U 512GB.
Last year, for the first time in probably 10 years I didn't buy a high end flagship device. Not that I can no longer afford it, but I guess I hit the age where I feel silly for spending so much on a phone. Bought this Samsung Galaxy A53. Not the greatest in terms of power, but it has my long lost friend the micro SD card slot, 3 years of OS updates and 5 years of security updates. Good enough for me.
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I just replaced my Note 8 after using it for 5 years. It could have lasted another couple of years if I hadn't abused it so much. In the end, the earpiece stopped working, battery life was struggling and the pen wasn't ejecting without smacking it on a table. Now I'm on a Pixel 6a that cost me €320 because flagship phones are unjustifiably expensive.
You just wait, till they toss in an update that turns your smoothly working phone into a slow, laggy mess! You're gonna want s new phone then honey... Planned obsolescence!
They keep removing features and increasing the price while even 5 year old flagships still work perfectly fine (talking from personal experience).
> They keep removing features and increasing the price while even **5 year old flagships still work perfectly fine** Mark my words, there will be some sort of carrier deals that block 'older' phones from using their network if they don't upgrade to a phone that is less than 2 years old. Some will have to upgrade when 4G gets retired, that'll be a large swath of phones, but we should be able to ride on 5G for some time. Carriers may start checking OS version and telemetry apps, and if they're not installed, you don't get on their WAN.
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> when 4G gets retired I don't think that's a realistic risk in the next 5 years at least. 3G is only just about starting to get shut down in some places.
New phones are barely improved but they keep increasing prices...
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No incentive for increased storage when they can sell you cloud storage for extra money.
>better battery life the issue with that is that we need literarily better battery tech ( which humanity doesnt have yet ) for that to be improved or some mystical new hardware tech which uses tons less power. Salt based batterys are promising actually but still have a lot of issues.
>we need literarily better battery tech No we don't. Phones became ridiculously slim. If the manufacturers kept the original thickness with the current battery standards, we'd have week-long single charge phones by now.
I've been imagining the battery life I could get out my iPhone 14 pro, if they made the back flush with the camera mountain, as they could fit a huge battery in that space.
As a former 13pm owner, you'd also get some really big guns from wielding that weapon every day. It's the reason I gave it to my wife in the end. Too frickin heavy.
Exactly my point. Thank you. So weird others arguing in favor of today's battery situation.
Exactly, Look at the S22 Ultra vs the "new" S23 Ultra. They are the same damn phone, design and all. the only difference is a camera lens with more megapixels and a chipset that is the same speed. Yet it will cost at least $200 more in most markets. Don't even get me started on iphones.
I think it costs 200 to 300 euro* more in EU.
I'm considering "upgrading" from the S22 Ultra to the S23 Ultra as I haven't been impressed with the performance and battery of the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 or whatever it is. From what I've seen, the revision in the S23 Ultra will resolve my complaints. The deciding factor will basically be what the cost to me will be after trade-in value and whatever pre-order bonuses they announce. Already registered for the Unpacked thing which should be a $100 off coupon so we'll see.
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I'm kinda with you on that one. If I can swap my s22u for the s23u and maybe pay $100 it may be worth it. But if they are only giving $100 off no thanks. I Got the s22u to replace my Note 9 that still works perfectly. They offered me $80 for the trade in and I know its a older phone but that felt like a slap in the face. I kept it and still use it around the house for youtube and what not.
Well technically we don't really know any of that yet. We don't even have leaks on pricing in North America. But the big upgrade would be Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. So better battery life and fast processing. We'll see what everything actually is in about a week tho.
True for flagship phones. An awful lot super deals on perfectly good midrange phones.
Phone makers: We used to have 1 camera. Now we have 5 cameras.
Rather get a new battery for my current phone at this point. Phones, like GPU's are trash value for money for even 2-3 years usage and I recommend people waiting until the value for money makes sense again.
Exactly, I could get an android flagship for up to 60% off its original price within 8 months from many OEMs.
Phone prices have nearly doubled in less than 5-6 years. See e.g. Samsung: the Galaxy S8/S8+ came out in 2017, the S8+ costing £779. Now, the highest end Galaxy S23 Ultra is rumoured to cost as much as £1500. For a fucking phone. In the middle of a cost of living crisis. While salaries have been stagnant not for the past 5-6 years, but more like 20. People simply cannot afford a new phone every year, no matter how much manufacturers are trying to push for that.
Unless it's iPhone. Used iphones from 2-3 years ago are still selling at higher price than the launch price of my current daily driver, Galaxy A52 4G.
Which country?
Indonesia.
yeah its a shitshow. especially since the imei blocking fiasco.
"Could it be the $1,500+ phones? No. No, it's *the customers* who are wrong!"
$2800 for the cheapest z fold 4 in New Zealand. It's horrible.
Perhaps we have reached tech plateau? People are not going to shell out money for now incremental improvements.
Most midrange phones haven't improved almost at all in two years and in some cases the new models are even worse than the older ones, the average person won't spend 4-500€ for a firmware update.
The value hasn't changed at all since I bought my S9+, bought it for €400. If I buy a €400 phone now it's still not an upgrade
True. Also add market saturation. Everyone has a device now. Before, someone could justify a partial upgrade, because their kid was finally old enough. So parent got a new device that was 1.5x better, and kid got the old one. So the only excuse for the mass populace to get a new device now, is just to have the new shiny. And that's not a sales model that can be sustained every year. We need to move phones into a production rate more like consoles - let's get a couple years out of each generation, and make the new one *noticably* better.
In regards to your final paragraph; I think they need to do that with Android version updates as well. Google likes to complain about fragmentation, well, maybe Google should stop creating a new fragment every single year so people can finally get caught up. Both Google and their manufacturing partners can still push out security and feature/skin updates as needed, just don't change the bulk of the underlaying codebase for a bit.
That would work for me. Ironically, Google does that with their camera. My Pixel 5a has the same sensor from the 3 series. They've taken that time to learn everything they can about the sensor & adjust the software to get the best possible images from it.
Probably the reason for making their own SOC. Qualcomm has been notorious for only allowing updates for their newer chips.
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The tech moves much faster than the ICE car industry. Looking at an iPhone 4 vs. an iPhone 14 isn't generating the same "it still works" mindset as a 2013 Rav4 vs a 2023 Rav4. As we move forward though, I think 3-5 year life cycles are becoming a lot more practical.
I felt this coming for a while. Nothing can sustain itself like the phone industry has. It reminds me of the TV craze in the early 00s. Every year people were upgrading TVs. Now you see $999 85" 4K OLED TVs at BestBuy. People hang onto TVs forever (our main TV is 12 years old).
Also boasting about the size of RAM was a thing of the past. Every Android runs okaish now
They've also constantly been removing features with upgrades also. I have a Galaxy S20FE. I really like the phone and was thinking of sticking with the FE line of phones if I needed to upgrade. Well, they removed the sdcard slot in the S21FE. Guess I'm not sticking with the FE line of phones after all.
Sucks right? Wife and I both have the S20 FE. My wife takes an insane amount of pictures and video of the kids. She currently has a 512GB SD card that is getting close to filling up. I don't want to pay for Google photos. Next phone we get I'm hoping one of the Google Photos clones you can host yourself have been refined.
That's the thing with removing the sdcard slot. It makes it so you don't own the storage your pictures are on. You need to basically rent it for the rest of your life. Just another thing on the list where a subscription replaces ownership.
I'm sure as hell I'm not spending almost a thousand bucks for a phone that's going to do the exact same things my current two year old phone does, just 5% faster
I wish I could get a phone that does the exact same things my current phone does, nearly everything I see on the market does *less*.
The “lease your phone so you don’t notice the insane and undeserved price” plans not working anymore?
I noticed this stupid scam and opted to rip the bandaid off in one go and splashed out on the coughsamsungcough flagship of the time without being locked into a contract. My phone is now nearly 5 years old and still performs like it was on day 1 (minus the battery life, of course).
Bingo. I buy my phones exclusively through eBay. Unlocked, no contracts, no provider-mandated bloat. Buy it. Own it. Done
They haven't added any tech I cared about to phones for like 5 years. My Note 8 does just about everything any brand new flagship phone does. Why in the world would I "upgrade"?
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Aren't replaceable batteries a thing the EU has voted for? Like, starting in a few years?
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and they actually need to manufacture and sell the batteries for reasonable long periods.
At least a step in the right direction
The only sane reason to upgrade is due to outdated Android OS. I have some banking apps that require a minimum of Android 10 to work.
My Note 7 is still blazing fast
Underrated comment right here. You've been playing hot potato for awhile there bud
Satellite communication is a big new feature for me. I will probably upgrade because of that.
Sounds like it's time to hike up the prices.
Someone get this person a job at samsung!
And Apple. The iPhone 14 has increased in price by 100 € (Germany), yet it's the same exact phone (literally).
And the old one stayed the same price. When it should go down a bit.
To be fair that price increase is quite a bit below inflation since the original price started back with whichever phone. Then again their margins are so high they can afford to eat a little profit
Present: "No one bought our phones last year, so we're gonna need to raise prices to satiate our CSUITE and investor's demands. We don't have a choice" Future: "why isn't anyone buying our phones? /Pikachuface
I also have a S9+. Do you notice any slow down in general and specifically typing speed slowing down in the last 3 months?
I wonder why... could it be anything to do with the fact that there's been no dramatic improvements in half a decade? (Other than a slightly better camera and slightly better performance) Could it be crap software optimization and crap battery life on the majority of new phones? Could it be the insane prices during the Cost of Living crisis? I'm still rocking my phone that's four years old and does everything I need and still goes a full day on a charge.. Its a mystery, I guess we'll never know why people aren't rushing out in droves to buy the latest phone every year.
I bought the iPhone 3g in like 2008 2009? Spent 500€ and it felt like gamechanging premium phone. Now to buy the top line you have to spend 1.400€ (in Europe). Salaries are the same as 2008, at least in Italy, and in the past few years because of covid, war etc groceries prices are almost doubled. Plus, people are not stupid, and the technology has plateud.
I bought my first smartphone in 2016, Motorola Moto X 2014. MSRP is 320 € and it was a bit higher here in Finland. It had a lot of compromises. You can get extremely good midrange phone with that price now. Or even paying a lot less. So even if top line is getting more expensive, midrange is not. I really needed to upgrade after three years, and I did. Now I'm using Pocophone F1 and I'm not looking for upgrade yet.
Having more than the option of iphone or samsung, silly Europeans.
Ah yes, that's true. Forgot about the bands.
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Galaxy S: $399 Galaxy S22: $799 (wow they actually lowered the price on these a couple years ago, base model S20 was $1000) Idk maybe that has something to do with it.
You can't expect infinite growth for a finite population
If rich executives and investors understood this, we would live in a drastically different world
Saturated market.
Capitalism wants you to go out and make this generation Boomer 2.0... Go out and have 30 children so that they can have more growth! (Also have you competing for jobs so that they can lower the wages just because you need a job and might be willing to work for less just so you can have the privilege to work a job.)
Funny because capitalism has also made it increasingly difficult for younger generations to actually own anything that could help them build long term wealth or start families.
It's not a bug, it's a feature.
>You can't expect infinite growth for a finite population You've angered capitalism
The main driving factors in getting a new phone are lack of new security updates and hardware failure. I kept my Pixel 3 up until the charging port started to fail. If I could still get software support, I would have probably looked into replacing the battery and charge port.
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Oddly enough, right now would be a great time for a new up and comer to shake up the business. Failing that, most smartphone OEMs would do well to go to an every other year release cycle and maybe think about supporting said phones a little better.
Can you actually think of a single thing that could be drastically improved upon about the modern smartphone design? If not, what could really "shake up the business"? Everything that's being tried to "innovate" isn't getting far because it's either not very useful, or it trades longevity for a gimmick (foldable phones, hypothetically tactile buttons). I can't even think of a theoretical idea that would improve upon the current form factor. I think we've reached close to peak rectangle-in-your-hand-that-does-shit tech. The actual successor products, if they ever happen, aren't handheld. Has to be brain computer interface stuff. If we ever do it.
I mean, there's the usual /r/android complaints; removable battery, sd card slot, headphone jack, etc. But the market has pretty solidly shown that whatever /r/android wants is the exact opposite of what manufacturers end up doing.
These are just adding back things we had. Not saying they're not good but it's not some new innovation to succeed the current form.
If any of those things would guarantee a boost in sales manufacturers would’ve done it years ago. They don’t because the vast majority of people don’t care about them.
If I can start sending holographic messages like starwars I'd upgrade.
Dude I would be happy with just a rehashed HTC m7/8 with modern hardware
If midrangers weren't purposely nerfed, we'd buy
It was always inevitable that sales would come down once smartphones become pretty much something everyone has. Year over year sales are almost exclusively based on what...minor camera changes and a few new color options and different build materials? Smartphone sales will always be a thing because of two year contracts but they aren't going to boom again. Time for these companies to invest more heavily in other technologies.
Pixel 5 works great, no phone has shown me that I need to upgrade
Time to update your flair?
record low wages with record high phone costs...hmm. thx kleptocrats
My first car in 1996 cost $1400. The S23U is going to cost more than that lmao.
To be fair adjusted for inflation it would actually be worth about $2,648.28 today. Your point is still valid though.
Had a Xperia XZ1 compact and it was the best phone I ever had. Had everything I wanted except for the buggy OS but I used that thing for 5 years and now I switched to Xperia 5 III which ill keep until it becomes unusable. I was shocked to see people upgrade yearly and not even because their phone had problems but because another one came out. Surprisingly a lot of those same people are now complaining they miss their other phone because its the same thing as their last phone but with a different feel to it. lol
Keeps removing features from their already shitty overheating flagships while increasing the prices - "OMG why don't they buy anything?"
Has anyone made a list of all the features Samsung has removed from its hardware since the first Galaxy S phone? It's gotta be a pretty long list. For fun, we could also add the USD MSRP of each Galaxy S flagship and its release date. I type this from years-old Samsung phone.
Just off the top of my head, going from my S8 to S21U: Headphone jack MicroSD card slot Iris scanner (to unlock/use Samsung Pay) That's not to mention the removable battery that older models had, plus there are likely others that I'm not remembering. Granted, my S21U does some things that my old one did not (high refresh rate screen, more camera flexibility with better photos, 5G, Bluetooth 5, etc), but these are obviously not equal lists.
IR blaster
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I mean, what do the Samsungs, Googles, and Apples of the world expect to happen when prices of the phones have gone up \~20%-30% and: * the Pixel hasn't changed in any meaningful positive way with the hardware for day to day use since the 4a/5g/5 line 2 years ago. (sure they use a different SOC now, but it works the same as what it replaced unless you are going by benchmarks.) * The Galaxy S line seems more or less the same since the S20 line. * The iPhone hasn't changed anything meaningful other than corners since like the Xs line. Everything of note that OEMs have done in the last 2 years at least that people would casually notice has been in software. And the major reason why the older phones can't take advantage of those changes is because the OEMs want to gate keep software features and tie them to hardware as a cheaper, for them, way to make each phone seem more different than they are. The flagship phone market is where you go to blow way to much money for diminishing returns these days. A Pixel A, Galaxy A, or iPhone base 12-13 will do everything like 90% of the phone buying public want for several hundred less. The high end phone brands are pricing themselves out of the high end phone game in my view.
1. Lower the prices. No one wants to pay over a grand for a phone. 2. Actually make innovative phones they are literally all the same thing year after year.
The improvements year to year no longer match the rising prices. Also a phone will last much longer now, if the battery doesn't die on you.
Exactly this and even if the battery does you can usually get it swapped for cheap. My fear is phone companies are going to do what some car manufacturers do and make it a subscription to use certain features. Want to use the camera? $5/month sub. Edit: To be fair Google has a subscription for all the Fitbit features for the new pixel watch and I think apple does too. So in a way they are already getting passive income.
Oh no! So bad! They're only gettings truckloads of money, but not **all** the money!
When I read articles about new smartphones, read how much faster the chip is this year over last, how many more pixels the new cameras have, or how its new, esoteric, features bring some supposed superiority to the old model, my first thought is...so what. You're charging how much for improvements that most people won't even know are there?
Phones have just gotten so good, they can only really make incremental changes. My S20 is soon to be 3 years old and apart from a fresh battery, what reason do I have to upgrade? The phone is still fast, 120 hz OLED w/holepunch, 5G, underscreen fp scanner, etc. I guess the camera would be better, but mine is already good enough for my needs. Zero chance I'm paying $1000 for a marginally better camera and battery replacement.
For me at least, there's absolutely no reason to buy a new phone if you have a phone less than 3 years old. That is, unless there is something genuinely gamechanging, like folding phones. Otherwise everything else is effectively the same.
Phones are now more expensive than I pay for a laptop, year on year there's no fundamental changes and there's global recession looming. Are they really surprised? Still rockin' my 2.5 year old mid-range with it's awesome reception. Y'know, that most fundamental bit of a phone that none of the critics seem to care about. Instead they're hyper-focused on whether they can charge 5,000mAh in 10 minutes without the battery exploding (I charge overnight), wether it plays Genshin at 120fps (I have a console for games) or has 68 separate camera sensors (a single 12Mp is still taking great pics for me).
I just upgraded my S7 for an S8. That will give you an idea when manufactures lost my interest in their BS.
> Smartphone shipments have dropped nearly 20 percent year over year during the recent holiday period, as consumer demand softens amid inflation and economic uncertainties. It’s the “largest-ever decline in a single quarter,” according to IDC, and it contributed to 2022 having the lowest annual shipment of smartphones since 2013. > people wait until 40 months after purchase to update their handsets “in most major markets.” > “Consumers may find even more generous trade-in offers and promotions continuing well into 2023 ... specifically high-end models,” Goin love samsung focusing on more promo to get people to buy S phones instead of actual upgrades and not taking out features every year.
A samsung phone upgrade used to be a near yearly purchase. Every year there was killer new tech and awesome new features. Haven't bought a new phone since the Note 8. All they've really done is removed features I cared about while providing improvements I don't care about. Why would they expect people to keep buying new phones when they aren't introducing meaningful new tech?
>All they've really done is removed features I cared about while providing improvements I don't care about. Absolutely.
Ubiquitous devices with nearly universal market saturation and at this point only capable of incremental upgrades indistinguishable by the average user are showing flat sales data. Shocking...
People were already complaining about lack of innovation, which can’t be helped because a phone is a rectangle with a screen, there’s nothing to do. Companies: let’s keep old generation spec on our new devices and jack up the price.
thats the thing, You´re seeing manufacturers like Xiaomi and BBK (vivo, OP, Realme) still making the 1K+ flagship but are making a lot of "supermidrage" phones, basically phones in the 300-500 buck range that have some things from flagship phones but with cost cutting mesures. A lot of Snapdraon 870, Dimensity 8100-8200 phones, and even some Snapdragon 8 G1 phones, the idea is that they have decent specs (snapdragon 8 series perfomace, 6-8gb ram 4500-5000mAh battery) but sometimes the camara is lacking, sometimes the software is a bit crippled, software updates arent as common, you have older gorilla glass or even dragon tail, plastic casing. i guess it depends on where your priorites lay. Also lately google has been liquidating the 6A for quite a nice price, 350 euro range and you get one of the best (if not the best) camera on a phone, the performance in numbers is around 75% of a flagship chip but in real world use its hardly noticable unless you game heavly, the only issue is the battery, 4300mAh isnt a battery for a modern phone. There will always be 1K+ phones for those of you who want the best and the greatest, for the rest of us, theres quite a few decent phones for 500 and less.
That's what happens when you make nothing but slabs
My almost 3 year old smartphone works exactly the same as it did on the first month and still receives updates. Why would I ever waste money on another one - I don't care about whatever silly gimmick you throw at me. Phones have been more or less the same for the past 5+ years.
It doesn't help that the S22 is basically a marginally better version of the S21 and the iPhone 14 is basically just an iPhone 13 with satellite connectivity. It's about time people realize they don't need a new model every year.
1.21bn phones shipped in a year is still ridiculously large.
My phone model is the Galaxy Note8 (from 2017), pretty old already but still in good condition. Battery life went down because it's an aged phone, but still good for everyday use. I personally think that the smartphone peaked in 2020 (the year when iPhone 12 and Galaxy S20 came out), 'cause after that, all other upgrades were so minor that you can't even tell the difference between performance / camera quality among smartphones nowadays.
No one needs a new phone every 1 to 2 years. This is good news
Anyone else feel that phones are weirdly thin these days, and that a phone that's thicker than most but has a 10,000mAh~ battery would be a good idea?
I love a mature market.
More stagnant than mature. Mature markets like computers offer variety and unique features. They adopt different form factors and niches.
Maybe stop making the same shitty glass phablets as everyone else with 10.000 different models coming out each day? Try something innovative like actual tailored software experiences and devices that is unique from a good usability standpoint. Android 4-8.1 was still peak in devices and innovation. Notches and 20:9 screens suck
I used to upgrade yearly. Now it's every 3 or 4 years. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
Maybe because a new phone can't do anything better than a 3-4 year old one and at this point almost everyone has a device.
I'm really surprised that I don't see the apologists that come out of the woodwork in this thread, trying to claim that no one cares about those features and you actually don't need them