I tried the most popular minimal phones... so you don't have to (ad-free version)
Added 2025-05-11 14:00:07 +0000 UTCAlright, you have to see these side-by-side photos of the Nokia (on the left) vs. the Minimal Phone (on the right). The winner is clear to me, but please sound off about which one you prefer. And sorry about the small size, I prioritized getting them right next to each other over scale.
Overall, I was pretty surprised and disappointed by the Minimal Phone's performance. Every day, I was met with a new bug and grew increasingly frustrated when doing the simplest tasks. In its current state, the phone is far from worth $400, though I do hope they can continue shipping updates that make it easier to use.
Let me know what you think! -Becca
Comments
Decided to join your patreon for a month after seeing this video, I caught the Light Phone review when it came out and really enjoyed your presentation style and video production, it seemed super tight and I want to see more of it, so here's $5 from me, I hope it's helpful. As it happens, immediately after watching that video, I dove into online searches for flip phones, and landed on the same Nokia model. I held back on placing an order, because I just got some new wearable tech which I'd still need *some* kind of smartphone tether for. The idea of reverting to dedicated devices for music, photography, and communications does seem appealing though. I hope I can find a solution, I would love more than anything to delete WhatsApp from my phone, I'd even return to SMS, but there's no way I'd get my family off of it too. D'aaah! I will give a minimal launcher a go, though I don't know how well I'll avoid finding ways to work around it.
Rachel Wolfe
2025-05-14 10:19:48 +0000 UTCWhen I was using Android I was a big fan of Niagra Launcher for similar reasons.
Matt McLeod
2025-05-14 02:08:13 +0000 UTCI took Facebook off my phone because it wasn't great for my health, both mental and physical. I was too into posting and reading others posts that it trapped me in a bad mind set and affected my mood and sleep. I like the idea of a minimal phone, but the flagships do things so well already. My only choice would be like you said, buy a budget phone and only download the essentials like Spotify. I really only need google maps, my banks app, and some music on my phone to get through my day.
Matthew Rudomin
2025-05-11 18:58:05 +0000 UTCI have to watch this video- a few have referenced this video today!
Becca Farsace
2025-05-11 16:47:05 +0000 UTCSnazzy Labs published a video that kinda summarized how I feel about this category of device now versus in the past. With some discipline and curation, it is possible to get away from the distractions and still benefit everything great that a modern smartphone does. I had the same issue of not receiving RCS messages, and I think it was because RCS still thought I was on an RCS-compatible device. I had to go to a Google website to manually disable RCS.
dksjournal
2025-05-11 14:37:43 +0000 UTC
