If you were born early enough to come into semi-adulthood in 1999, you used to have a Nokia 3210. OK, maybe you didn’t, but your friend or a family member had one, or they had a slightly later model. Maybe you forgot about it completely because, for hell’s sake, it’s been 25 years. But you’d recognize the silhouette, the thick body, the thumbnail-sized monochromatic screen. New reports show that the HMD-owned Nokia is working to worm its way to that core of nostalgia by releasing its old 3210, and it could be here within a week’s time.
Finnish outlet Gigantti may have accidentally revealed the return of the Nokia 3210. According to images obtained by Nokiamob, the next Nokia throwback will come in cyan or yellow options and could be released on May 8. That lines up with a recent Twitter post from HMD which implied they’d release some kind of “icon” phone this month. The product listing is now down, but Nokiamob noted the phone was supposed to go for 89 Euros ($95) though we’ll have to wait and see what price point the phone will have if it gets a U.S. release.
It also lines up with previous hints, such as a teaser that the company shared at a recent trade show that was reposted to Twitter and swiftly taken down. From the pictures, it does resemble the 3210, at least in silhouette. However, as Nokia fans were quick to point out it actually looks a fair bit more like the Nokia 6310, another reboot phone that included the bigger, 2.8-inch screen compared to the old tiny monochromatic display. Still, according to the teasers, the new 3210 will have a “retro interface.” Will it play snake? Yeah, at least according to the teasers, but now it will also have a MicroSD card slot, Bluetooth, and 4G connectivity.
The old 3210 didn’t have a camera. It didn’t even have a headphone jack. It had three games and SMS messaging. If the new 3210 is going to be at all like the 6310, then the new phone will have Bluetooth 5 and MMS messaging. According to the listing, it will also sport a rear-facing camera, though if you were looking for the true 1999 experience you should ignore that 2 MP, F2.8 lens completely. Plus, it will also support USB-C to charge the 1450 mAh battery.
HMD rereleased the Nokia 3310 more than seven years ago, and for all intents and purposes, it was exactly the kind of device you wanted if you were desperate to avoid the tyranny of smartphone distractions. Since then, the brand has released tons of throwback phones that include slim flip phones like the 2660 Flip.
The “dumb phone” craze has brought on some rather interesting throwbacks but perhaps too many companies are shilling out to hook an inch of your exposed nostalgia. Take the Boring Phone which was a partnership between Heineken and online marketplace Bodega. It was an exclusive phone shown off at Milan Design Week last month, but other than the transparent shell and large buttons it also sported an awful puke green screen that I suppose was trying to invoke the colors of everybody’s second least favorite beer for when your local shop doesn’t have any Samuel Adams. It was marketed for the “zillennials” (those stuck between Gen Z and millennials) who are obviously tired of the trappings of social media and do-anything devices.
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