Short version is, I've decided to get rid of my iPhone, and go back to a basic non-smartphone for my daily carry device. I still have an iPad, MacBook, and PC at home for any tech needs I have. Does any weird Swedish company still make old-school candy bar type cell phones? My basic needs are calls, texts and if I'm lucky, photos (a halfway decent camera would be nice). The smaller and thinner the better.

I don't need wifi, apps, etc, etc.

Does such a thing exist any more? preliminary googling doesn't bring up anything. Has anybody else ditched the smartphone? The discontinuation of 3G has really rendered a lot of older phones useless.

 

 

OK, I just discovered a new need: something that doesn't look Betty White dropped it at bridge club. Don't rich people with assistants have some secret brand of simple phones so they can call Jeffrey Epstein?

 

Kyocera is the phone you want. They give some of us them at work... Well, i could have gotten one, but rather get the $80 stipend and use my smartphone that has a $30/mo bill...

Anyway.

My dad also has one, i think his is the DURAXT. That damn phone has been alive for 6 - 8 years now.

Edit* looks like they have a couple options.
https://kyoceramobile.com/phones/?filter=type:basic

 

Nokia still makes these, and they are robust as ****. Bought one for my father 4 or so years ago (do not remember the exact model though), as he cannot tolerate smartphones. Still going strong.

 

https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_int/nokia-3310

 

https://www.thelightphone.com/

Just bought one to get rid of my apple garbage phone.

Screen keyboard for texting, but no camera.

 

It looks like that's a 2G phone. They were phased out by most carriers years ago. ATT has been sending me notices for the last 6 months that even my 3G phone will no longer be supported after Feb. 2022.

 

That's the problem I've been running into. A lot of nice older phones out there but they're all 2G/3G.

 

Go into any cell phone store and ask for a "bar phone" or a "burner phone".
Don't mind the odd look you get when you ask for the "burner"...
IIRC, we got one for $30 out the door at T-Mo with no contract a few years back. My wife used it for a couple weeks until her warranty replacement smartphone arrived. I don't think it had a camera.

They won't typically have them on display - that would negatively impact profits. A "super-cheap" smartphone brings in more up front than a decent quality dumbphone.

 

 

Does anyone even make a 4g (truly) dumb phone?

 

https://www.thelightphone.com/faq

"The Light Phone II is unlocked. It is not limited to any specific carrier, as long as the SIM and carrier are compatible, any 4G VoLTE capable Nano-SIM should work fine."

 

That one has GPS, so not truly dumb.

 

Interesting. I had no idea Kyocera was still in the business.

Their DuraForce PRO 2 intrigues me. I'm rough on phones, but still require certain apps for work which are Android / iOS only. And I don't want an Apple product.

 

Any chance you could share a review after you have used it for a couple of weeks?
I am giving serious thought to switching from my current 6 year old iPhone.

 

I have it in hand, but haven't activated it yet. First impressions are that it is very small and nice. Love the screen and supposedly there will be integration for some sort of directions/map functionality in the future which is awesome. The dev team for this is on point. Emailed them a few questions and everything was stuff they were already working on. For $360 seems like a great option and I think their service plan is only $30 a month for unlimited text/calls.

 

So you paid more for a dumb phone and more for service to use it? That's funny to me. You can buy a Pixel 4a for $350 and Mint Mobile is even cheaper than the Google Fi I use that's $20/month for unlimited calls/text.

Is all the dumb phone stuff, Boomer-type "I don't want to be tracked" stuff? Because even without GPS they can pretty accurately located through triangulation of the cell towers and that's all recorded.

 

Can confirm pixel "a" phone and $20/month plan is solid.

 

The purpose for me is to get away from the iphone. My iphone is newer (8+ i think) and has been driving me crazy with auto updates and restoring to previous versions of backups and contact lists with a mind of its own. To the point where it takes me hours to fix the damage an "update" does and apple tech support has been worthless. I'd also prefer a phone that is simple, has texting and calls and very little to screw up. Hence the light phone. I also like supporting companies that do weird stuff and the light phone is very fascinating to me. It's also small and seems to be well built. I don't use 99% of the capability of a smart phone, so something simpler seems like a nice change.

And I would rather smash my ***** with a hammer than give google any money.