Is it necessary to buy latest smartphone?

Zoe Kleinman

Getty Images: Recently Google unveiled its new Pixel 9 handsets ll

Happy new smartphone season to all who celebrate. It’s that time of year again, when the tech giants pull out all the stops to persuade you to upgrade your gadgets.

Recently we’ve seen Google launch the latest Pixel 9 handsets, followed by Apple unveiling the iPhone 16.

In July, Samsung released the latest versions of its foldable phones, the Z Flip6 and Z Fold6, and Huawei has just upped the ante in that department by unveiling a handset called the Mate XT, in China, which contains two folds, folding the screen into thirds.

With smartphone sales slowing worldwide, the marketing messages getting pushed out are increasingly dazzling.

Apple boss Tim Cook promised that the iPhone16 would “redefine what a smartphone would do”, whatever that means. Google product management vice president Brian Rakowski waxed lyrical about the “stunning” design of the “gorgeous” Pixel 9 (whisper it: it still looks a lot like a black rectangle to me).

Huawei now has its own consumer brand song, it says in its press material, which “powerfully expresses the pursuit of dreams, highlighting that every breakthrough and success the company has achieved stems from a belief in dreams”.

Yes, we are still talking about phones.

Both Apple and Google have gone big on baked-in AI features. Google’s new Magic Editor can add AI generated content into existing photos, as well as remove the bits you don’t want (with varying degrees of success, in my experience).

Apple Intelligence on the iPhone16 includes ChatGPT-maker OpenAI’s tech being embedded into the digital assistant Siri – which many argue has long been in need of an update.

But has anyone actually said that they want all of this stuff?

Camera quality is said to be one of the main concerns when people buy a new smart phone

Mobile phone expert Ben Wood, from research firm CCS Insight, said that while AI features aim to make digital life easier, they’re not necessarily on top of everybody’s wish list.

“I think that most people now know what they want from a phone, with one of the most important things being the camera,” he says.

The phone designers also know this. The tech spec of every new handset camera is usually an improvement on the previous generation. But even this isn’t a guaranteed sales generator any more.

“What is definitely happening is that people are holding on to their phones for longer. Back in 2013 there were 30 million phones sold annually,” adds Mr Wood. “This year it will be around 13.5 million.”

There is of course an ongoing cost of living crisis affecting people’s spending decisions. And there’s also an environmental price tag attached to every handset, all of which contain rare elements and precious metals.

In addition, there is a growing trend, especially among parents and young people, to try to step away from smartphones entirely.

Read original and full article on the BBC