Nokia 3310 to Motorola RAZR V3: Landmark phones that shaped the smartphones of today

While the need for wireless communication was realised before the 1940s, it wasn’t until World War II where the need for truly wireless communication (not limited by distance) was made evident. Yes, Graham Bell had discovered the trusty telephone by then, but the wires that these phones would be connected to had started to feel like a leash that kept users planted. Communicating meant stopping everything else, and that had to change.  

That is exactly what spearheaded the development and evolution of mobile phones. From large antenna-bearing handhelds to today’s pocketable smartphones, mobile phones have surely come a long way. While a complete look at the evolution of mobile phones would likely take more time to read than the Harry Potter series, here’s a quick look at some of the landmark mobile phones that helped pave the way for how smartphones look and function today.  

Prelude

Between the 1940s and the 1960s, many countries began realising the need for truly wireless communication, one that wasn’t bound by wires or range. Combining the wireless ability of radio-waves with the large-scale range of a satellite network, the first-generation mobile network was created in the early 1970s. This tech was so nascent, it wasn’t even termed first-gen mobile telephony.  

ALSO READ: Television sets to Smart TVs: A look at how TVs in India have evolved

Instead, companies who were developing these networks would settle for 0G (the precursor to 1G, 2G and eventually 5G). The first cellular handheld mobile phone would then be demonstrated in 1973. This 2kg Motorola phone, however, wasn’t available for the masses. The 0G network itself could only support few simultaneous calls and was very expensive to operate.  

DynaTAC – the first mobile phone

The DynaTAC was the first mobile phone to ever be released commercially in 1983, a whole decade after Motorola demonstrated its original ‘mobile phone’ concept. The phone was much lighter at 790 grams and about 25cm tall. It had a flexible whip antenna on the top, clubbed with a 12-key telephone keypad.  

The DynaTAC 8000X also featured some additional buttons like Rcl (Recall), Clr (Clear), Snd (Send), Fcn (Function), and Pwr (Power). It could support a wireless call for up to 60 minutes, after which it needed charging for 10 hours before it could be used again. The phone operated on the first cellular 1G network, which had just come into play four years ago in 1979.  

Over the next decade, more mobile phones would launch, and while the overall functionality remained the same, the focus would largely be on making the handheld lighter and more compact. More stable and wider networks would be available with 2G networks which launched in 1991. 

IBM Simon – The first smartphone

The IBM Simon launched in 1993 as the world’s first smartphone. It lacked an advanced operating system like Android or iOS but did combine the basic functionality of a mobile phone, pager, fax machine and PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) all into one. It had a touchscreen, and users could use a stylus to tap on-screen buttons. Other features like predictive typing which would guess the next characters as a user typed were also introduced.  

Nokia 9000 Communicator – The first phone with internet connectivity

While calling and SMS were growing in popularity, the Nokia 9000 Communicator would shake things up by being the first handheld device that could access the internet. Powered by an Intel CPU and 8MB memory, the phone could send and receive emails and fax, and sported a web browser. It looked like a regular phone, but opened to reveal a monochrome LCD display and a full QWERTY keyboard.  

Kyocera VP-210 – The first phone with a front camera

In 1999, Japanese brand Kyocera would release the Kyocera VP-210, the world’s first ever phone with a camera. Contrary to popular belief, the world’s first camera on a phone was not on the back, but on the front, facing the user. Meant for users taking pictures of themselves, the VP-210 also came with an integrated stand. However, the tiny 0.11MP camera wasn’t very powerful and could only take 20 pixelated pictures before the storage would get full.  

Sharp J-SH04 – The first phone with rear camera

The year 2000 would bring the first phones with a rear camera on them. While these phones were nowhere close to digital cameras at the time, they were handy for quickly taking pictures when you were on the move as users were always carrying their phones with them.  

Many argue that the Samsung SCH-V200, a device that could take up to 20 pictures with 0.35MP resolution was the first camera phone. However, it’s camera was more of a second device attached to the back instead of being an integrated one. The Sharp J-SH04 was the first phone that could actually send your photos electronically to other users, beginning the media sharing experience that is crucial in personal and professional communication today.  

Nokia 3310 – The first ‘mainstream’ phone

Probably the only phone you’ll remember from over two decades ago is the Nokia 3310. Thanks to its significance in popular culture as a simple, no-nonsense mobile communication device, the 3310 was very popular in the years 2000 and 2001. This Nokia device would go on to sell about 126 million units, making it one of the most sold phones in history. 

It didn’t have the fancy bells and whistles of early smartphones, or the perks of an integrated camera sensor. Instead, the Nokia 3310 was a simple mobile phone anyone could pick up and easily learn to use. It was also very durable and featured a threaded SMS feature that let users send longer SMS messages of up to 459 characters. Games like Snake and Space Impact also made the phone popular among younger audiences.  

Nokia 7650 – The first all-round phone

With mobile phone development headed in all directions, the Nokia 7650 was one of the first do-it-all phones. It featured a sliding design that was compact and revealed the keypad only when needed. It also had a colour display, a 0.3MP camera and integrated MMS (multimedia messaging service) capabilities. With an early iteration of Nokia’s iconic SymbianOS that made the UI more polished, the phone also had Bluetooth, which allowed wireless connectivity to supported audio accessories.  

Motorola RAZR V3 – The first iconic flip phone

The Motorola RAZR V3 was not the world’s first flip phone. It wasn’t even Motorola’s first flip phone, which would be the Motorola StarTAC. However, flip phones would only become popular in the mainstream market in 2004 when Motorola released the legendary RAZR V3. Coupled with all the modern innovation of the early 2000s and phones in general becoming more affordable and accessible, the V3 sold like hot cakes.

Super compact when folded and the slimmest phone (at the time) when opened, the RAZR V3 featured a keypad on one folded face and a large colour screen on the other. A small outer display also alerted users of calls and other notifications.  

BlackBerry Pearl 8100 – The phone that made QWERTY keyboards cool

The BlackBerry Pearl 8100 wasn’t the brand’s first QWERTY phone, but in 2006 when elements like internet-powered texting and multimedia messages became mainstream, this form factor’s popularity exploded.

With a squarish display and a large SureType QWERTY keyboard, the phone made texting faster and more accurate. Cementing the QWERTY form-factor with idea of a phone being a smartphone, the impact of the device was so huge that every phone after the Pearl that didn’t feature a QWERTY keyboard wasn’t considered “smart” enough.  

The BlackBerry Pearl also made the trackball popular, something that was staple in all BlackBerry phones, later taking on a trackpad form in the BlackBerry Curve and Bold series. 

Apple iPhone – The first true smartphone

Apple revealed the first iPhone in 2007 and revolutionised the modern smartphone. The buttons were largely gone, in favour of an all-screen design. The touchscreen could now be used with your fingers, and the display area was used like never before, adapting as per your needs when you wanted to type a message on an on-screen QWERTY keyboard, or watching a full-screen video with no interruptions. 

The iPhone series would also make brands and the audience realise the importance of software development in making smartphones smarter. Pushing the interactive user interface and elements like apps for years to come, the iPhone can be considered the father of modern smartphones. 

HTC Dream – The first Android smartphone

The HTC Dream, also known as the T-Mobile G1, became the world’s first Android phone in 2008. It also featured a large touchscreen, minimal buttons, and a slide-out full-size keyboard. However, the highlight of the device was a full-fledged operating system called Android. It supported apps and much more customisation that other phones at the time. 

Released at a time when soon-to-be rival iOS wasn’t officially named yet, the phone would kickstart the growth of Android smartphones, which years later would be the most widely used operating system on the planet.  

Samsung Galaxy Note – The world’s first big smartphone

At a time when smartphones were still focused on being as small and compact as possible, Samsung went the opposite way with the Samsung Galaxy Note, a phone that featured a ridiculously big 5.3-inch screen at the time. The Galaxy Note made the most of the all-screen form factor that was now standard among smartphones, also featuring an AMOLED panel for better colours and contrast. 

It came with a stylus that you could tuck inside the phone’s body when not in use. When you did use it, you could create precise drawings and take notes just like on pen and paper. Considered the first ever phablet (phone + tablet), the phone would go on to inspire brands to put larger and larger screens on smartphones, eventually making compact smartphones a rarity.  

Sony Xperia Z – The water-resistant phone

2013 was perhaps the most important year for technology and entertainment in the last few decades. Gaming got GTA V, movies got the Wolf of Wall Street, and smartphones, well, smartphones got four legendary models that would be the first to feature elements that would be staple features years later. 

The first of these is the Sony Xperia Z, the first phone to come with an official certification for water resistance, something the phone achieved with both clever internal design and external flaps on ports that you could cover when not in use. The Xperia Z could survive everything from a shower to an accidental drop in the pool (if you pulled it out in time). 

iPhone 5S - First smartphone with fingerprint authentication

2013 also brought us the iPhone 5S, the first phone to feature a capacitive fingerprint sensor via TouchID. The phone would go on to make biometric authentication a popular feature and inspired both the fingerprint and facial recognition sensors of today.

OnePlus One - First budget flagship phone

In 2013, a new brand would also come out of nowhere and take the tech world by storm. The OnePlus One was an affordable phone that challenged flagships that nearly cost twice as much. It had no-compromises on hardware or software, and even featured a beautiful design on the front and back, kicking off a new ‘budget flagship’ segment that would quickly grow in regions like India. 

Nokia Lumia 1020 - The first phone with a big camera sensor

2013 also gave us the Nokia Lumia 1020, which featured an unreal 41MP camera, the highest resolution at the time, and for several years later as well. Showing brands and users a glimpse into a future where smartphone photography could rival cameras, the 41MP camera on the Lumia 1020 supported very high-res photos as well as RAW photos. While the Lumia series has perished today, the legacy of 1020 lives on as nearly every major smartphone now features a 48MP (or larger) camera sensor. 

Google Pixel – The first all-Google phone

The first Google Pixel launched in 2016 and ended the tech giant’s line of Nexus phones. While the Pixel series stood as a symbol for an all-Google phone where the brand controlled both the hardware and the software of the phones, the first Pixel also changed smartphone photography forever. Rather than a bigger sensor or fancy optics, the Pixel opted to make photos better via better image processing. 

ALSO READ: 15 years of Android: How Google’s OS spearheaded the rise of smartphones

The result was a phone series that clocked the highest camera score (89) on DxoMark at the time and proved that good processing was just as crucial to mobile photography as good hardware, something that would help most brands get better pictures in years to come.  

Apple iPhone X – The first phone with no navigation buttons

While phones at the time had one or more buttons to navigate the UI, Apple’s iPhone X launched in 2017 changed all that. The result was a gorgeous, futuristic looking phone with no buttons at all in the front and true IR-powered facial recognition instead of a fingerprint scanner.  

The iPhone X popularised that gesture-based navigation style that most smartphone users prefer today. It also killed the bezels on the top and bottom of smartphones, forcing brands to come up with innovative ways to hide components like the earpiece, front camera, and the other sensors that were getting in the way of an all-screen experience.  

Oppo Find X – The first true all-screen phone with a pop-up camera

A direct response to Apple’s iPhone X was the Oppo Find X, which launched just a year later. The device shared its launch timeline closely with the Vivo NEX, also considered the first pop-up camera phone in some regions. The Oppo Find X wasn’t just a powerful flagship, but it featured an innovative way to hide the front camera for a true full-screen experience – a mechanical pop-up camera that would only come out of the phone when you wanted it.  

The pop-up camera would quickly be replicated by nearly every other major brand, but would cease to exist a few years later due to persisting mechanical wear-and-tear related issues. It’s honestly a shame that the pop-up camera was never perfected.  

Samsung Galaxy Fold – The first foldable smartphones

With the invention of bendable displays, a race to build the first phone with a foldable screen began. While Samsung and Huawei went with different approaches to a large-screen folding phone, Motorola revived the Moto RAZR as a modern, flipping smartphone with an all-screen front. 

Ultimately Samsung would go ahead and launch the Galaxy Fold as the world’s first commercially available foldable device, paving the path for today’s Z-series. Originally a niche category, foldables would become much more popular in the coming years, prompting brands like Google, OnePlus and even Microsoft to take a shot at the segment.  

The way forward

That brings to the present day, when smartphone innovation continues to rapidly grow and integrate new technology on both the hardware and the software front. Note that the list above only includes some of the landmark devices that shaped the development of phones over the decades. 

ALSO READ: How gadgets shaped the way we listen to music

Over the next few years, smartphones could come with bigger folding and rolling displays, no buttons, and may even be powered by AI in ways we probably can’t imagine right now. Cameras would capture better photos, and batteries could last longer than ever while charging faster than ever. Your next smartphone may become yet another landmark in the history of mobile phones a decade from today, who’s to say?