Discover some of the most iconic cell phone designs ever invented

It is a truth universally known that, with each launch of a cell phone on the market, the responsible company will guarantee that this is one of the best cell phones of the world. Bearing in mind that the design of a model is the final trump card that will make you decide once and for all which item of desire will become your consumer item, experts give the final word to a hairy question: which cell phones have the best design already released?

Cell phones that made a difference: BlackBerry

“Say what you will about BlackBerry smartphones, but their undeniable popularity has brought to light a bitter truth: the best design is not always the prettiest or most elegant, but the one that, for all intents and purposes, is functional. With their simplistic, useful interfaces and obsolete keyboards, the BlackBerries of yore were ideal for making calls and sending emails, and not much else. They were productivity tools, and that was it.

They weren't the best cell phones in the world, but they were extremely competent. Of course, compared to today's sleek touchscreen models with numerous features, the model's success seems unwarranted. The BlackBerry's complete lack of charm was a feature: a reminder to turn off the phone and live a little, as soon as you sent your colleague one last email.” – Suzanne LaBarre.

The best cell phones: iPhone

“My favorite phone by far remains the original iPhone. It represented and still represents the biggest advance in the category design aspect. It is, in my eyes, perhaps the biggest risk and most effective ever taken in any product in any category that I have witnessed in my lifetime. Virtually any of the best cell phones available, anywhere in the world, is inspired by this model. He was a watershed. What came after him is inspired by him.” – Stefan Sagmeister.

Ultimate design: iPhone 3G

“The best iPhone was the iPhone 3G – yes, the model that defeated the Motorola RAZR and transformed the cell phone, the conventional one, into what we understand today as a smartphone. Yes, history can also remember 3G as the first plastic iPhone. In terms of design, its rounded shape was ideal for handling, even if this compromised its finesse. The iPhone 4 would revert back to the slim design, and Apple wouldn't get back to the same comfort level as 3G again until the iPhone 7, with its curved screen (which, I must say, is my second favorite iPhone).

3G was more than a design milestone for Apple. It was also the first iPhone that realized the smartphone's potential for connectivity. With 3G speeds, you could really surf the web without Wi-Fi. And even more importantly, 3G was the first iPhone that came pre-installed with the App Store, which established both the software distribution and payment model for billions of smartphones that were to come and are used today.” – Mark Wilson.

Darling: iPhone 4

“I owned an iPhone 4 until 2016. It was a small device that fit perfectly in my hand and in the side pocket of my favorite backpack. Its screen was much smaller than my phone now, but that made sense: I didn't need to see so many apps at once, with their pesky notification alerts. I became aware of its practicality until it stopped working altogether, when I left it next to the bathtub. The next day, with an Apple 6S in hand, the amount of new information was alarming. As the best cell phones become more complex, faster, with better cameras and bigger screens, we end up accepting that maybe everything that is offered to us is indispensable. And maybe it is. But sometimes I yearn for the simplicity of my iPhone 4, still a feat of design and engineering, even though it is smaller and simpler in comparison.” – Katharine Schwab.

Price that fits in your pocket: iPhone SE

“I loved the iPhone 4. When I first saw it, it looked like the most beautiful phone ever released. The symmetry was unparalleled and reminded me of science fiction objects from the 70s. But its aesthetic perfection was marked by its extreme fragility: 'Glass is not a good material for making products that are constantly being handled,' I wrote at the time. 'Glass breaks'. That's why the iPhone 5 became Apple's perfect design. In fact, it has become the pinnacle of phone design, period. The essence of the iPhone 4 was there, with a visually larger but still manageable screen. Eventually, the iPhone 5 became the iPhone SE, which took the courage of the iPhone 6s, making it very fast and capable of recording videos in 4K quality. That's why the iPhone SE – despite not being as good looking as the iPhone 4 – has become my all-time favorite Apple phone.” - Jesus Diaz.

Den of Improvements: iPhone 7

“A good design for a functional product should not, under any circumstances, be superfluous. It should continue to improve the integrity of the product and provide a better experience than the last release. There is no doubt about that. For that reason, I believe that the pinnacle of cell phone design is the iPhone 7. Being thinner, faster, stronger, and with the introduction of AirPods, it is, without a doubt, liberating. It represented the most seamless execution of features to date, with no new commitments, but let's not forget that we're still in the early stages of what a smartphone is and can be." – Imran Chaudhri.

Special Edition: Motorola Startec Rainbow

“The Motorola StarTAC Rainbow was a flip phone manufactured by Motorola, but offered exclusively in Europe. The phone measures just 98 x 57 x 23 mm and was the lightest and most expensive phone of its time, selling for around $1.000. The model in rainbow tone can be considered rare, even for the time. I still have one, even if it is no longer functional. Available in a mix of red, blue and yellow, its design is, in my opinion, unbeatable. There are no flaws.” – Forest Young.

Nostalgic element: Motorola V220

“Perhaps the Motorola V220 is not a good example for a design considered beautiful. Like many other flip phones from the early 2000s, it's lost in the so-called pre-iPhone haze. It took me a long time to decipher its real purpose. It was the phone my sister and I received for Christmas 2003, and before we knew it, we'd spent the entire holiday sending each other our first emojis. Everything seemed to make sense, as did every aspect of its design – from its perfect fit in the hand to the magical flip of the plastic screen. This era of phone design lacked the glitz and charm of current models, but looking back, it was the beginning of the world we live in now. RIP, flip phone.” – Kelsey Campbell-Dollaghan.

Classic from the 2000s: Nokia 5110

“I remember my father lending me his Nokia 5110 on a long trip. Being able to call ahead to find out where we were going to sleep that night felt like science fiction. It was with Nokia that I started using SMS (or text messaging) to get in touch with friends and family. It was one of the first phones to come with the Snake, a perfect phone game before mobile phone games were even popular. These two features made the Nokia I had in my hands a symbol of that generation. It looked more like the future of computers than the future of mobile phones.” – Alex Schleifer.

Pioneer: T-Mobile Sidekick

“In 2003, when I worked at PC World magazine, we named the T-Mobile Sidekick – a smartphone created by a startup called Danger – our product of the year. The decision was far from unanimous, but I think it holds up: the Sidekick was the first device to put the Internet in your pocket. With a screen that rotated to reveal a large keyboard, the Sidekick had a PC feel, which made perfect sense in the era before touch interfaces. It offered a surprisingly usable web browser and that was important in 2003. Andy Rubin, co-founder of Danger, was one of the people behind the creation of Android, that says a lot. This phone has given us the ideal compilation of features at the right time, a surprisingly complicated feat that is always worthy of celebration.” – Harry McCracken.

Source: Fast Company.

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