When a new flagship comes out, society splits into two unequal parts. One includes those who admire the technical characteristics or just have been waiting for a new product for a long time. Another part, usually larger, is outraged by the fact that the smartphone is unreasonably expensive. Everything would be fine if something breakthrough was sold to us for a lot of money, but now an unpleasant trend has emerged. Flagships, which used to be something breakthrough and moved technology forward, stopped doing it. There is no longer such that a new smartphone can change something, and this is very sad. That's just why this is happening and whether we ourselves are to blame for this is a big question that cannot but be discussed.
Which smartphone is in the photo? Or what? Are they exactly different?
What will the new phones be like?
I think no one will argue with the fact that new smartphones have ceased to receive killer features that we were spoiled with before. That is, manufacturers began to compete on a different front. They just offer more powerful versions of what came before. We get more megapixels, a higher processor frequency, a bigger battery, more RAM that no one needs, and so on, but no one offers anything really breakthrough. As I usually say, the smartphone world needs a revolution, not an evolution. Then you will really want to buy them for at least a thousand dollars, at least for one and a half.
Approximately 3-5 years ago, with the release of each new flagship, it was possible to find how it fundamentally differs from its predecessor. When we lived for one year without changes, we could come to terms with it. Two are also so and so, but three or more – this is already a tendency, with which you need to do something. Now the gap between the flagships of different generations has narrowed so much that I really began to recommend (I sincerely think so) to buy last year's flagships. The price for them is dropping significantly, but they do not have much difference with new devices.
If flagships get new features, then usually these are add-ons that hardly anyone will use. They are needed only in order to come up with a scenario for their use and tell about them at the presentation. After that, as they say, think for yourself what to do with it.
The in-screen fingerprint scanner was probably one of the few new features. And then, she did not appear in the flagships.
Sometimes it seems that the manufacturers, without hesitation, just sat down and Google the specs that should be in the new flagship. After that, they said, “Yeah, so we can,” and went from stamped parts bought from manufacturers like Qualcomm and Samsung to collect what they Google. As a result, the flagships have long since made no sense to compare with each other – they differ only in appearance. And that is not strong.
Which flagship is better?
While not all is lost in the world of smartphones and some manufacturers may offer something new. But one has to look for the “truth” outside the flagship elite. An example would be an exit camera (which, however, did not come in due to 5G). It was convenient and made it possible to make the smartphone frameless. But this technology appeared not in iPhone and Samsung Galaxy S, but in the relatively average Vivo Nex S, if my memory serves me right.
Apple and Samsung sell over a third of the phones in the world and they just don't want to risk their position to make a difference. The most they can afford is to release a separate line, like the Fold and Flip for Samsung and the Max version for iPhone.
At the same time, we ourselves are the first to run with sticks and forks to the manufacturer, if he experiments and releases a flagship different from the previous generation. So it was with the “bangs”, so it was with the screen like a waterfall, so it was with 3D Touch in iPhone and there will be many more things. We want something new, but we are afraid of it. Perhaps Steve Jobs or Elon Musk, who wanted to put on our opinion and knew better than us what we needed, could correct the situation, but the former can no longer change anything, while the latter and others have enough things to do.
de> Perhaps, many manufacturers were inspired by the example Apple, which for many years changed almost nothing in their smartphones. But this approach worked before, but now it doesn't.
Why are all smartphones the same?
But, most likely, the problem lies elsewhere. Manufacturers simply don't want to risk their flagship lines for innovation. Therefore, they release them in new series. For example, the same Samsung Galaxy Fold seems to be on sale, but making the Galaxy S foldable is like death. The current flagship has too many fans to discontinue production and replace with another model. Perhaps the example is too harsh, but you get the point. If something is radically changed, it may not take root and then the company will suffer catastrophic losses.
At least something was new and it was profiled. Interferes with the modem, you see.
Examples of companies that weren't particularly scared to suggest something new are HTC and LG. But where are they now? Even among fundamentally new smartphones like OnePlus and Realme, performance is the first thing we value. We need the page to open a millisecond faster, and the game to display a couple of extra fps.
As a result, when buying a flagship, we pay horse money for some kind of typical gadget. Even memory is about the same for everyone. Something new is provided only by niche devices and devices from Chinese manufacturers who do not care about anything. They have a market where they will sell whatever they want. But then again, they don't risk flagship lines.
All of the above perfectly illustrates that the flagships no longer offer us something new. Manufacturers of something inexpensive are trying to surprise us much more. They cannot endlessly raise the price using expensive components, and are simply forced to come up with something new. For this they are honored and praised, and the departments dealing with top models in large companies would like to wish them more courage. Well, we will accept it somehow. Just make us happy with something new. So far, it turns out that the flagship should be perfect, and perfection should be boring. Something like this…