On phone sizes: Apple was right, but it didn’t matter

There is always something magical about revisiting a drawer you haven’t opened for a while. This last time I found my previous iPhone 5, the last iPhone I used before transitioning to Android. Wow, ‘what a tiny thing’ was the first thing that occurred to me. The huge Nexus 6P has become my new normal, so the iPhone 5 looked like something alien that I could barely recognize as something I had joyfully used in the past.

However, after recharging it and playing with it for some minutes, very different feelings came to surface. Somehow it felt right, not only in terms of size but also weight and grip. I immediately recalled the below Apple Ad claiming that the size was engineered to fit a human’s hand.

No one can question the hardware evolution of our smartphones. They have become very powerful sensor-equipped computers that we use in unfathomable ways. And despite growing bigger, they became remarkably thinner and lighter.

But I would like to question the evolution of phone sizes and predict that the reverse trend will kick in sooner rather than later. If you take a look at the evolution of phones from the 1990s to 2010s you will find out something more or less like the diagram below:

Okay, you might think, people have always wanted more screen real estate as their phones got more capable, and they got it. Case closed.

I would agree with this idea if with the bigger screen no burden came along. Using my Nexus 6P is only a pleasure when I am static and have my two hands available. It’s a beautiful big screen, perfect to consume all sorts of content. It is however quite an inconvenient gadget to carry around and deal with, especially with one hand and on the go. I am pretty sure I would feel the same if I had an iPhone 6S.

So why in the world did we humans want so badly the big phones to the point of forcing a stubborn design-driven company like Apple to give up pushing their right-sized phones?

In my opinion, the “Phablet Movement” or humongously-sized-phones-taking-over is a reflexion of our desire to rely on one gadget for most of the things we do. The idea of a desktop computer for serious hours of work, then a notebook for work on the go, a tablet for reading and a phone for the rest, is only the reality of a small percentage of people. And as you rely more and more on one device to fulfil most of your needs, it’s only natural that the screen size plays a huge role.

Then as more and more people show up with their big phones and buzz is made around them, more people are convinced they need one as well. I remember the first time I saw a phablet on a NYC subway train. I thought it was ridiculous. Now the people with small phones are looked at differently.

Now imagine that you have a new phone with the vertical size of an iPhone 5 and that it’s orders of magnitude more powerful than the iPhone 6S. You bring it near to a monitor, keyboard and mouse and it works just like your MacBook. You sit down to read something and you just roll a piece of a paper-like screen where you can see and control your phone screen as it lies next to you. You can project movies and games to virtually any screen around you, including inside airplanes. Instead of relying so much on apps and their individual interfaces, you can get most of what you need through voice and smart applications that work like personal assistants. Need a reservation for two in a certain restaurant? A flight to Cancun? Just ask and get the best possible outcome given your individual constraints.

Would you still prefer to carry a phablet or could you even imagine that this very personal gadget you call smartphone could be even smaller than the original iPhone or maybe even the size of a smart watch?