From feature phones to smartphones: Why has the design of mobile phones become so monotonous?

What new tricks can be played in mobile phone appearance design?

Some time ago, OPPO released the Reno14 series, which focuses on appearance, feel, and imaging. The Sun and Moonlight version combines photochromic and thermochromic coating technologies to create a thermosensitive color-changing body that can present extremely different visual effects at different temperatures. The new Realme Neo7 Turbo offers a transparent body version. The third-generation Nothing Phone, targeting the overseas market, retains the transparent design and also features a dot matrix screen.

(Image source: OPPO)

Suddenly, it seems that mobile phone manufacturers are competing again in terms of appearance design. However, these designs give the editors of Lei Technology a sense of retro. After all, as early as the end of 2020, the OPPO Reno5 Pro+ used an electrochromic back cover. Although thermosensitive color change improves the appearance, it still follows the same pattern.

The transparent body is a technology demonstrated by LG as early as 2009. The Xiaomi 8 Transparent Exploration Edition released by Xiaomi in 2018 also adopted a transparent back cover design, which is already 7 years ago. The gaming phone manufacturer Red Magic has launched transparent versions for multiple generations of products. As for the dot matrix screen design, the ROG Gaming Phone 9 also has it. The idea of adding a screen to the back of the phone is quite common. All major manufacturers' small folding phones have a secondary screen on the back. Even the Meizu Pro 7 in 2017 added a secondary screen to the back.

Mobile phone manufacturers keep trying different things, but the appearance of mobile phones seems to be going in circles and there is still no cross - era change. Looking back at the development history of the mobile phone industry, the appearance design was more innovative in the feature phone era.

Is mobile phone design regressing from feature phones to smartphones?

In the feature phone era, mobile phone designs were diverse. Classic styles such as straight - bar, slide - up, flip, and side - slide models were very eye - catching. Leading manufacturers like Nokia, Sony Ericsson, and Motorola created a series of products with appearances that can still be considered legendary today.

For example, the Nokia N - Gage phone launched in 2003 pioneered the horizontal holding style and was also known as the world's first dedicated gaming mobile terminal. However, due to the limited game lineup and high price, this phone had no advantage over the Nintendo GBA handheld console, and its sales were lower than Nokia's expected target.

(Image source: Screenshot from Xianyu)

The Nokia 7280, also known as the "Lipstick Phone", which was launched in 2005, is more like a work of art than a mobile phone. Its long and delicate appearance design still makes it a favorite collectible among digital enthusiasts even 20 years later.

(Image source: Screenshot from Xianyu)

When it comes to appearance design, the editors of Lei Technology's favorite is the Motorola AURA R1. This phone was released in November 2008. The regular version was priced at nearly 8,000 yuan at that time, and the gold - inlaid and diamond - studded version was priced as high as 20,000 yuan. Its rotatable phone cover, delicate color scheme, and texture made it the dream phone of many people.

Even today, the fully functional Motorola AURA R1 still sells for over 1,000 yuan on the second - hand platform, and some models in better condition are priced as high as around 3,000 yuan.

(Image source: Screenshot from Xianyu)

After the mobile phone industry entered the smartphone era, the appearance design gradually became more similar, and there was even a phenomenon where major manufacturers collectively copied Apple. The development trend of smartphone products is to reduce the frame width on the front of the body and increase the screen - to - body ratio. BlackBerry, the only one that persisted in equipping smartphones with physical keyboards, was eliminated by the market. Sony, which refused to use irregular - shaped screens, may not be able to sustain its mobile phone business for long. The main changes on the back of the body are reflected in the phone lens module. The current mainstream designs include three categories: matrix, circular, and vertical strip. After trying various materials such as metal, ceramic, and plastic for the body material, glass has become the main choice, and vegan leather and ceramic are often used in high - end mobile phones.

During the development of smartphones, designs such as curved screens, notch screens, teardrop screens, and punch - hole screens have emerged, but these designs have not changed the fundamental form of the mobile phone, which always remains in a straight - bar state. Even after market testing, the flagship models of domestic leading mobile phone manufacturers have almost unanimously chosen the circular design for the back. Although the standard and Pro versions of Xiaomi phones adhere to the upper - left matrix module, the Ultra version follows the industry trend and also uses a circular design.

The biggest change in smartphone appearance design is the folding - screen phones led by Huawei and Samsung. All major Android manufacturers have followed suit and launched products in different forms such as large - folding and small - folding. Huawei has gone a step further and created four major product lines: large - folding, small - folding, wide - folding, and triple - folding.

(Image source: Filmed by Lei Technology)

The high price and trade - offs in configuration have made it impossible for folding - screen phones to replace straight - bar flagship phones. Large - folding phones make compromises in terms of thinness and lightness, and are inferior to straight - bar flagship phones in terms of battery life, heat dissipation, and imaging. Needless to say, compared with straight - bar flagship phones at the same price, small - folding phones lag behind in almost every aspect except for appearance.

After several years of development, folding - screen phones have also gradually become more similar. The large - folding phones in the folded state are becoming more and more similar to straight - bar phones. The OPPO Find N/N2 design, which was widely praised by Lei Technology, was eventually abandoned by manufacturers.

Nowadays, the designs are becoming more and more similar, so it's difficult to tell which manufacturer a phone belongs to just by looking at the back. In the early years, netizens used to discuss the plagiarism and similar appearance of mobile phones, but now we are almost used to it. However, for consumers, this change may not be a bad thing.

The convergence of appearance is because users need "interaction efficiency"

In the feature phone era, mobile phone designs were diverse, while in the smartphone era, there is a trend of convergence. The reason is simple. Smartphones pursue information interaction efficiency and user experience more.

In the feature phone era, mobile phones had weak performance and few functions. They generally did not support the free installation of third - party applications and were difficult to handle complex tasks. The main use scenarios were making calls and sending text messages. As for gaming phones, Sony Ericsson and Nokia launched some products, but limited by the game lineup and chip performance, they basically did not achieve good results.

Feature phones did not need to display a large amount of information on the screen, so the requirements for the screen were relatively low. Mobile phone manufacturers only needed to keep a small screen for displaying information, and they could freely design other aspects. Whether it's the Nokia 7280 or the Motorola AURA R1, their delicate and unique appearance designs hardly improved the product's practicality.

Smartphones can provide many services such as audio - visual, gaming, social networking, and office work, and most of these services require the screen as an interaction window, so the screen is extremely important. The so - called small - screen flagship phones in the perception of domestic Android manufacturers and consumers also have a screen size of about 6.3 inches, while the screens of feature phones at that time generally did not exceed 3.5 inches.

(Image source: Filmed by Lei Technology)

In terms of information interaction, a rectangle is definitely the most suitable shape. If a circular shape like the Motorola AURA R1 is used, the screen utilization rate will inevitably be greatly reduced. The proportion of the body has also evolved according to users' usage habits. In the early days, to ensure no black bars when watching videos, many phones used a 16:9 ratio, but large - screen phones with this ratio were too wide and inconvenient for one - handed operation. Now the screen size ratio of mobile phones is basically between 19:9 and 21:9.

Appearance also promotes the development of mobile phone design, but it is not as important as efficiency and user experience. Take the curved screen as an example. Initially, manufacturers used curved screen designs for flagship phones to improve the visual effect, but now they are gradually returning to straight - screen designs with lower accidental touch rates. The same goes for the under - screen camera, which once caused a trend but lost out in terms of self - shooting ability and was not widely adopted by mobile phone manufacturers.

(Image source: Xiaomi)

The feature phone era was the infancy of the mobile phone industry. Due to the limited use of products, it was difficult to make a big difference in user experience, so manufacturers could only focus on appearance and attract consumers with more delicate looks. When evaluating the Xiaomi SU7, the president of Porsche China, Matthias Klink, said that good designs always have something in common. This statement also holds true in the mobile phone industry. In the later stage of the smartphone era, the mobile phone industry is extremely mature, and both manufacturers and consumers know which design has the highest practicality.

The changes in the appearance of new phones from manufacturers such as OPPO, Nothing Phone, and Realme this year can only create slight differences from phones with traditional designs and are not enough to be the decisive factor for phone sales. In terms of appearance form, consumers are looking forward to a cross - era change.

In an era of rigid product form, what can users still expect?

On July 21, OPPO will release the new K13 Turbo. The biggest difference between this model and other mid - range phones is that it is equipped with an independent cooling fan that supports waterproofing. Generally, only gaming phones have built - in cooling fans, but gaming phones are a niche demand, and now only ROG and Red Magic remain as mainstream gaming phone manufacturers.

Moreover, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8s Gen 4 installed in the OPPO K13 Turbo performs well in terms of energy efficiency and has very strong performance in Geekbench tests. The improvement of the independent fan on the user experience will not be very obvious in most scenarios. The design of the OPPO K13 Turbo seems to be for differentiated competition with other mid - range phones, but it has really attracted me.

(Image source: OPPO)

From the performance of manufacturers, we can see that the change in mobile phone form has reached its limit. Although manufacturers such as Samsung and Honor have applied for patents for quadruple - folding phones, limited by factors such as yield rate, price, and consumer demand, the possibility of mass - producing quadruple - folding phones is low. Triple - folding is probably the upper limit of the folding times for folding - screen phones.

On the Zhihu platform, netizens have also discussed what new forms mobile phones might take, but most netizens believe that the form of mobile phones has reached its peak, and in the future, smart glasses or implantable devices may replace mobile phones.

(Image source: Screenshot from Zhihu)

Lei Technology believes that after entering the smartphone era, there has been no fundamental change in the form design of mobile phones, and it is difficult to have major improvements in the future. Mobile phone manufacturers may continue to work on details such as phone color schemes and body materials and wait for the arrival of the era of the next - generation computing platform.

Smart glasses have the potential to become the next - generation computing platform, but judging from the current development of this industry, it may take more than 10 years to replace mobile phones. At least, problems such as interaction and battery life need to be solved.

This article is from the WeChat public account "