At the moment we always come across one problem when writing about the phone design of the big brands -let’s point out the iPhone, Google Pixel and Samsung Galaxy -Handsets for the argument.
That problem tries to say something interesting about the small, iterative changes on an annual basis, which means that this year’s flagship telephone model is only marginal different than it earlier.
It feels that the big brands are all too aware of the market share and their only goal and it is a very high-down-is-aimed, top-down to penetrate each other’s peat a little further. In the US, Apple now has almost 58% of the smartphone market, Samsung 23% and Google 4.5%. It is a bit more even in the UK, with 48%, 33% and 5.5% respectively (according to figures from Statcounter).
Hello, amorphic telephone design soup
And it feels like they strengthen their positions by making very conservative decisions in favor of proven designs or now it is their own or a competitor.
What this means for us, the buyers and users of phones, is less choice. Brands not only apply fewer changes every year to the latest versions of the successful boring models that they have already marketed and sold, but there is increasingly less distinctive character between brands.
Our mobile editor Anyron has already noticed that the Google Pixel 9A is the most iPhone-like Android phone ever.
He points out that it now has the characteristic camera module in the 8A, and has opted for rounded corners and the design of camera with double rear, the 9a really seems to try to speak in the design language of Apple-Misschien to seduce iPhone users who are sick of Siri and an incomplete AI experience about the Superior Gemini.
Foundry
Meanwhile, according to Dummy models that are shown by the familiar Leaker Sonny Dickson (via X), this year’s iPhone 17 air has a camera bar that is not a million miles away from that of the Google Pixel 8a -although the beam of the iPhone glass seems to be not aluminum.
Foundry
Hello, Amorphic telephone design soup.
Does anyone steal Samsung’s design? I would claim that it would be almost impossible to do this, and almost impossible to say if someone did that. Apart from the folding models, the handsets of Samsung are perhaps the most characteristic on the market, with Galaxy S23 of 2023, Galaxy S24 of 2024 and this year’s Galaxy S25, not only not only a design flair, but hardly to be distinguished at a glance.
Foundry
That does not mean that we don’t like the Pixel 9a and the Samsung Galaxy S25. They are good telephones – but man, they look faint.
Where brands Are Bending a creative muscle seems to be in the design of ultra -thin phones, an area in which Apple and Samsung go against each other. The iPhone 17 air, which is reportedly launched in September, has a reported thickness of approximately 5.5 mm, while the new Samsung Galaxy S25 edge is only slightly thicker at 5.8 mm.
There is an enormous amount of technical expertise that goes so thin in a telephone – and a lot of functionality that needs to be omitted. In the case of the S25 edge, that is the missing telephoto lens and relatively small 3900 mAh battery, despite its £ 1,099/$ 1,099 starting price.
Only because the big brands do not innovate when it comes to telephone design, this does not mean that nobody is
And all that effort, despite the fact that I still have to hear another person say: If my phone was only 2 mm thinner. (A larger battery, however, is on many wish lists.)
But only because the big brands do not innovate the telephone design does this not mean that nobody is.
You just have to look at the budget and mid-range markets, where nothing and its sub-brand CMF have released telephones that look different and feel than the norm.
Take the characteristic illuminated glyphs from Nothing Phone, which are more refined on the latest telephone (3A), or the Budget CMF telephone 2 Pro, which you can fit with a large number of accessories, including a Fisheye and Macro-lens adapter, Lanyard and wallet/standard.
Luke Baker
For most people, a smartphone is a necessity. But it is also a purchase with a large ticket that most of us want to be enthusiastic about. I wish the big brands would help us with a little design flair – they can certainly afford it.