Sitting back and thinking back to the good old days can be fun sometimes. You know, the days when mobile phones had removable batteries, microSD card slots and headphone jacks. The Moto Maker, LG G3, HTC One and countless other smartphones were popular back then. Despite the many options, it felt like the Wild West. Still, it was a lot of fun. Even the Google Play Edition lineup, with phones from Motorola, Samsung, HTC and even Sony, was available! Each device catered to a wide range of inclinations and tastes and put their own spin on the Android experience.

Back in the day when companies weren’t afraid to take risks, we saw some seriously bizarre and wacky designs. While it was slightly different from other Android phones up until the Galaxy S24 Ultra, the Galaxy Note Edge was largely Samsung’s attempt at a curved-screen phone. It seemed like Motorola was on the verge of releasing the iPhone 6S because of how thin the Moto Z was. While the Moto Z ironically didn’t quite take off in the same way, it did seem to lay the framework for MagSafe. When manufacturers were eager to try new things and push the boundaries of what a smartphone could be, it showed in these avant-garde designs.

Given the presence of a microSD card slot, we didn’t have to worry about running out of storage space. The option to use wired headphones without a dongle was also available, so why spend money on expensive Bluetooth headphones? Wired headphones are very user-friendly because of their reliability and simplicity, as well as their expandable storage capacity. Yes, we don’t have to carry a point-and-shoot camera anymore as our phones can now be folded and flipped. We simply use the cameras that are in our bags or pockets. All well and good, but it wasn’t enough to completely erase the memories of the past.

And don’t get me wrong. I wouldn’t trade a foldable phone for the HTC One M8, even if the underlying hardware were modernized. I’m incredibly grateful for how far smartphones have come, more than 15 years after I got my very first smartphone. The advances in camera technology, battery life, and processing power are nothing short of remarkable. My biggest disappointment, though, is that phones just aren’t that much fun anymore. Part of that has to do with the inability to get phones from Europe, Korea, or China into North America. Here, the flagship is just the Samsung and Apple show, with a dash of Google and OnePlus.

When I look at what’s happening in other regions, I feel like a kid staring out the window, yearning to go outside and play. Meanwhile, Huawei, Honor, Xiaomi, Vivo, and others are releasing new phones that dwarf what we have here in the States. Xiaomi even plans to release its first Galaxy Z Flip rival , but the only way I can get my hands on one is to spend what I consider an exorbitant amount of money to have it imported. The same goes for the Vivo X Fold 3 Pro, with its 100W charging and true flagship camera system. The variety and innovation present in these international markets makes the North American options feel limited and repetitive.

At the same time, I wonder what the future holds for smartphones. Slabs are pretty much all the same and I don’t really care, except for phone companies fixing the displays so my colleague Nick can enjoy them again. I would argue that we’ve reached the pinnacle of what smartphones can do in terms of raw horsepower. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 seems to tick all the boxes, being powerful and efficient with little sacrifice. It represents the pinnacle of mobile processing power, offering unparalleled performance and efficiency.

Phone companies are also likely to invest more in AI capabilities because of this. This represents the coming “great frontier,” as the NPU on the device can only handle a small portion of those innovative and exciting features. The point is that the rest is being completed in the cloud, which is great in itself. While AI has the potential to completely change the way we interact with our electronics, it does have some drawbacks.

We continue to pay the price as these gadgets get more expensive, because the trade-off for having more powerful and efficient phones is that we lose all the features we once valued. Processors are expensive to produce, and chips like the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 don’t come cheap due to the addition of more advanced NPUs by manufacturers, which can result in higher prices for original equipment manufacturers.

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