I replaced my iPhone with a premium dumbphone – here’s my verdict after a month

A lot consideration has been paid to the concept of a “dumbphone.” We have all had the thought: how liberating it might be to ditch the smartphone eternally, liberating your self from the shackles of social media, the limitless stream of notifications, and after-hours work emails.

The issue is that we’re used to a sure aesthetic expertise. The thought of going again to a flip phone or lo-fi early-2000s Motorola may be thrilling in principle, however navigating a 2.8-inch show, bodily buttons, or worse — T9 texting — is, in observe, extra bother than it is value. 

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The Light Phone 3 addresses these issues with a compelling product and third iteration of an thought: it is a dumbphone, however with an gratifying — luxe, even — consumer expertise and {hardware} package deal. I used the gadget for every week and, in that point, discovered a number of issues about myself and some issues about our relationship with our telephones. 

Bodily, the Gentle Telephone 3 is a smooth, non-descript, four-by-three-inch rectangle — all black — with a single USB-C port on the underside, a number of buttons alongside the edges, and a clean, matte show. 

The mere form of the gadget states that it is one thing totally different. It would not actually appear to be something, nevertheless it’s nonetheless by some means knowledgeable by a myriad of designs which have come earlier than. There’s some Blackberry resemblance, some digital organizer vibes, and regardless of little similarity to the iPhone, the format of the date and time on the lock display is actually an identical — one thing so acquainted you may not even discover it.

The show makes up a lot of the gadget’s physique and I’ve to confess, it seems good. It is a 3.92-inch AMOLED (1080 x 1240) display coated in a customized black matte glass that permits for a clean, high-contrast interface. In contrast to the Gentle Telephone 2, this isn’t an E Ink gadget, so there isn’t any ghosting or laggy refresh charge. It is crisp, exact, and ruthlessly minimal.

The interface is so simple as it may very well be: menus are manufactured from textual content, and every thing is monochromatic. There are not any icons, and there are not any colours. It is point-and-click performance, and it is refreshing.

That being stated, there’s a shade digital camera with a 50m rear sensor and 8m entrance sensor, producing 12m default photos and video that look higher than I anticipated. You possibly can retailer them on the gadget and ship them by way of textual content message, however there are not any enhancing features. 

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There may be additionally some {hardware} on the cellphone that is not absolutely useful but. The fingerprint sensor on the high of the gadget will not be enabled for 3 to 4 weeks after launch. And there is an NFC chip contained in the gadget for tap-to-pay integrations sooner or later, nevertheless it’s presently dormant. 

So, what can the Gentle Telephone 3 do? You possibly can name and textual content, clearly. Sound high quality is sweet on each ends, though relating to texting, the educational curve related to the small QWERTY keyboard (with out predictive textual content) is as a lot of a problem as you’d count on. 

There are additionally some emojis, however they’re restricted. There are notes, a calendar, a timer, and an alarm, however there isn’t any electronic mail, and it is a line that the design group at Gentle says it is not going to cross. 

Forward of the Gentle Telephone 3 launch, I met with the 2 co-founders of Gentle: Kaiwei Tang and Joe Hollier. They made it clear that electronic mail performance on the Gentle Telephone was not on the desk. 

“Separating electronic mail from my cellphone makes me much more intentional once I sit down to write down one,” Hollier instructed me. He shared an anecdote about being on trip on the seashore and reaching for his smartphone, solely to catch a piece electronic mail and have his temper fully deflated. It is one thing we have all skilled. 

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So far as the extra subtle options go, there’s an important number of Podcasts, which you’ll be able to arrange within the Dash, the portal you may entry in a browser to make modifications to your Gentle Telephone or account. 

There are additionally Instructions, that are like a simplified model of Google Maps. The Instructions characteristic makes use of the Here Maps API, which is broadly used throughout totally different navigation and location-based providers like Garmin and Lyft, so it is operating on a strong basis.

The Gentle Telephone 3 leverages Right here to offer step-by-step instructions to a location (both by deal with or by trying to find a enterprise) for strolling, transit, or driving, displayed both as a directional map that, on launch, was only a static picture that could not be interacted with. Now, nevertheless, updates have improved the characteristic to permit for pinching and zooming identical to Google Maps. 

There’s one thing ephemeral concerning the static maps, nevertheless: a Level A to Level B journey that exists solely as long as you attain your vacation spot. It is a option to reimagine navigation versus the ever-present grid along with your persistent location. 

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Tang and Hollier instructed me that Instructions continues to be being polished and can be up to date to incorporate further options within the coming weeks after launch. For now, it is actually usable, nevertheless it’s restricted in comparison with the exhaustive quantity of knowledge we’re used to seeing in different apps. Whether or not that is refreshing or terrifying is as much as you. 

There are a number of extra deliberate options coming to the Gentle Telephone 3 that I feel will go a great distance towards enhancing its performance and attraction. The primary is a partnership with Lyft, the rideshare app, to get a proprietary model onto the gadget. So far as a launch date? Tang tells me someday in 2025, doubtlessly as early because the summer time. 

The opposite large integration is with Spotify. The thought is to make use of a minimal, stripped-down model of the app that simply streams the playlists you’ve got already made. Presently, the one option to take heed to music on the Gentle Telephone 3 is with audio information you bodily transfer onto the gadget.

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For now, the Gentle Telephone 3 is a minimal expertise, to say the least. One of many first issues that turns into obvious with the Gentle Telephone 3 is that, nicely, there’s not a lot to do with it. You possibly can’t decide it up and mine for dopamine by scrolling, there’s nothing to “verify,” and there is no deluge of data at your fingertips.

Throughout my first day with the cellphone, I discovered myself idly holding it or choosing it up out of behavior, solely to comprehend what I used to be doing. Figuring out that there was nothing to take a look at took a second, however as soon as it clicked, one thing quieted. In that sense, the Gentle Telephone 3 is a device with a single objective, one thing a smartphone isn’t. 

So what are the drawbacks? First, this gadget continues to be in improvement, with the options I discussed above (and extra) rolling out as updates within the coming weeks and months. That being stated, some critiques are legitimate now. The primary is the value, which is able to undoubtedly be a barrier to entry. 

The common value of $799 goes to be a troublesome tablet to swallow for a tool that may’t do half of what their iPhone or Samsung Galaxy can and in the end positions the Gentle Telephone 3 as a distinct segment product. The preorder sale price of $699 is way more interesting, however even that’s not precisely low-cost.

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Second, the 1,800mAh battery on the Gentle Telephone 3 is somewhat restricted. It is not unhealthy, nevertheless it would not final practically so long as I had first anticipated it to, particularly for a minimalist gadget. This may very well be optimized in future software program updates, and I might like to see the cellphone last more when idle or in any other case not in use. 

ZDNET’s shopping for recommendation

I like to recommend the Light Phone 3 to anybody who has critical inclinations about divesting within the smartphone ecosystem, both wholly or partly. This gadget is not going to totally substitute the smartphone for everybody, a minimum of not but. There is a spectrum right here: some individuals will wish to fully disconnect, whereas others will hold their iPhone or Android in some capability, and that is legitimate.  

Think about whether or not you could hold your smartphone on you always. I like the concept of retaining the Gentle Telephone 3 as an “on-person” gadget if I am out within the metropolis, at dinner with pals, or in any other case spending time with household. 

The Gentle Telephone 3 is a revolutionary gadget — not due to its characteristic set, AI, or next-gen {hardware}, however as a result of it asks of you one thing no different smartphone does: to place it down.

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