Phones review of the year: Introduction
It has been a funny old year for phones. In some areas it seems as though progress has plateaued, that the improvements we're seeing these days are a case of diminishing returns.
Are phones getting boring? Anything but. This year we've seen the capabilities of phones branch out from the phones themselves into other parts of our lives. A while back this sort of stuff was 'the future' but it's fast becoming the norm.
We're talking about things like Chromecast, smart watches, fitness trackers, and that just about every new TV offers a mode to stream video directly from your phone. What was once the preserve of very expensive gadgets is now here for everyone.
Even multi-room audio, which became a much, much bigger deal in 2014, centres around your smartphone. If you don't think phones really changed enough in 2014, consider the ways they're subtly changing the way we live in the periphery. We live in exciting tech times.
The best in the biz
An awful lot of phones were released in 2014. It's not all about watches and fitness trackers. We reviewed more than 100 phones this year, ranging from the great to the truly awful.
It has been a tough year for many phone-makers, with the rate of sales slowing for most manufacturers. Apple is one of the few that seems to be immune to this.
Apple gave the iPhone series a full reboot this year, bringing the most radical design changes since the series began back in 2007. iPhones are no longer dinky things that anyone from a child to a 57 year-old banking executive can handle with ease.
The giant 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus raised a few eyebrows, and while it hasn't sold quite as well as the iPhone 6, Apple shifted a jaw-dropping 10 million of the pair in just a weekend. These sorts of figures have Samsung execs crying into their balance sheets.
Sad-sung
It has been a tough year for Samsung. Sales of the Samsung Galaxy S5 haven't matched those of the Galaxy S4, and the company has been clutching at straws ever since.
To combat the most common criticism: that Samsung's phone often look and feel a bit cheap, the plastic fantastic style of Samsung's premium phones has been tweaked. We now get metal around the edge of many phones instead of plastic, although it hasn't managed to get over its obsession with leather-effect plastic. Some vices are hard to give up.
What's next? Samsung has already shown us its next steps with the Galaxy Note Edge, a phone with a curved edge to its screen. Some say this is what Samsung is banking on to re-inspire you in 2015. The jury's out on whether it'll do the trick.
HTC and LG have always been smaller Android players than Samsung, but we actually preferred these companies' top phones, the HTC One M8 and the LG G3, to Samsung's. Did they sell as well as the Galaxy S5? Of course not. Here's how the main top-tier phones' sales stacked up in 2014, judging by little tit bits of information we've gathered from a whole bunch of financial reports:
iPhone 6 and 6 Plus: 10 million in a weekend
Galaxy S5: 12 million in 3 months
LG G3: 'on track' for 10 million
HTC One M8: 3-5 million in Q2 2014
The revelation here is the LG G3. It's LG's best-selling phone ever, and after the smash that was 2013's LG G2, the G3 has really brought the company back into the big time. If you want a high-end phone, you should always consider an LG. We certainly wouldn't have said that a couple of years ago.
Where's the hover-phone?
But what have these phones brought that we didn't get back in 2013? The laser beams and 10-day batteries we ordered never turned up, and a lack of features that might induce pant-wetting excitement might be why most manufacturers struggled this year. After all, why would you spend £500 on an upgrade when all you get is one more digit on the name and a 0.1-inch larger screen?
Still, we did get a few important upgrades. The LG G3 was the first big-name phone to use a QHD screen, offering four times the resolution of a 720p display. A 5.5-inch phone with more pixels than a 65-inch TV. It's kinda crazy when you think about it.
This is the future, and we'll see this resolution in most super-high-end phones next year.
What else? Android and Qualcomm's Snapdragon CPUs kicked battery life up a notch, with two-day battery life seeing Androids leave iPhones chowing down on dust.
It's really the parts outside of the phones themselves that got us excited this year, though.
Android Wear is still a newborn baby and the Apple Watch isn't even out yet, but they're going to change the way with interact with our phones. Fitness trackers have exploded too, if you find Wear just that bit too much like a box of gimmicks no-one asked for.
We live in a wearable world now, folks. You need to get on-board to earn your gadget geek points. Just having a phone isn't enough anymore.
Phones of the year 2014
The Phones of the Year 2014
More pixels. More screen inches. More power. Faster mobile internet, and all for less cash.
2014 saw the capabilities of phones expand in both directions. As ever, the ceiling for power and camera performance in phones was raised, while the expectations of what you can get for under £100 and under £200 have changed completely.
But who won the smartphone war that really matters: the one the top-end phones battle out every year? Samsung didn't get a sniff this year, despite the Galaxy S5 being a top-notch, high-performing mobile. The competition was incredibly fierce.
This year also saw the beginnings of a few phone innovations that'll become common next year. LG set the bar with the first widely-distributed phone with a QHD resolution screen, which is four times the resolution of a 720p phone like the Moto G.
And while screens have got bigger once again, the extra space taken up by a phone's bezel has been trimmed. We're pretty close to all-screen mobiles now.
This was the year that even normal people who wouldn't consider spending hundreds of pounds and hours of research on a phone embraced big screens. When Apple goes with an idea, you know it's finally mainstream.
Best Flagship Phone: HTC One M8
What's special about our winner? The HTC One M8 is a phone that seems to consider what it's like to use on a daily basis in almost every aspect. It's not just about one-upping the competition with a bit more spec here, some more tech there.
The design has a lot to do with it too. Like the HTC One (sometime referred to as the M7), it's made of aluminium, but HTC took the curved back a step further, making an incredibly smooth handset that feels great to handle. It's not small, but its ergonomics are more-or-less faultless.
You also get the BoomSound speakers we loved so much in HTC's other top-end phones, getting you much beefier sound than just about any other phone maker's mobiles. These two bits alone make the HTC One M8 a pleasure to use.
But there's more too. HTC plugged one big hole of the One M8 by adding microSD card support, while the camera adopted a dual-lens system that lets you create photos with artsy-looking blurry backgrounds. A gimmick? Perhaps, but the HTC does it better and quicker than any of the competition. And it's a sure way to get you a few more likes in Facebook with any portrait shots.
Also consider:
LG G3
It's not often that a phone combines a 'first' with standard-setting value, but that's just what the LG G3 did. It arrived cheaper than arch rival the HTC One M8 and Samsung Galaxy S5, but was also the first big-name phone to use a QHD screen.
Next year's top-end phones will almost all offer this grade of resolution, but the humble LG G3 got you that all the way back in mid-2014. Did it get credit? Not as much as Apple would have for pulling the same trick. Meanwhile the LG G3 is still far, far sharper than the iPhone 6 Plus, despite costing half the price.
We don't love absolutely everything LG does, but we'll hand it to the company: it really pulled it out of the bag with the G3. Screen quality is far from the only benefit too. You get OIS in the camera, infrared, NFC, expandable memory. The list goes on.
Not everyone instantly falls in love with the way LG puts the volume and power buttons on the back of its phones, but even if you actively dislike the design, you'll get used to it in days. We still find ourselves regularly recommending the LG G3. We're often met with eyes rolling at the idea of buying an LG phone, but the G3 proves LG is back and deserves to be taken seriously.
iPhone 6
Apple's iPhones have gotten bigger. The iPhone 6 makes the iPhone 5S look like a toy, and it's the smaller of the two new iPhone models. However, it's also the better choice for many people.
You get an alarmingly thin body, whose increased size does not remotely feel like a practical compromise now we're all so used to much larger phones. Where the iPhone 6 Plus has come under fire for possibly being a bit bendy should you put too much pressure on certain parts of it, the iPhone 6 is a very solid design. And one that has all the power of its bigger sibling.
So why isn't it our phone of the year? Quite a lot of the key technical improvements were made in 2013. The iPhone 5S already had a fingerprint scanner, a 64-bit CPU and as ever there's nothing too specific to the iPhone 6 when it comes to software, which is shared with all recent iPhones.
Much as people always want Apple to drop the ball each year, though, it hasn't with the iPhone 6.
Best phablet: Samsung Galaxy Note 4
The Galaxy Note series has, since its beginnings, been the flag-bearer for those who think gadgets should have the latest tech. A giant screen, a stylus, loads of power and high-end specs across the board mean it can't really fail to draw in the enthusiast crowd.
Samsung hasn't messed with the Note philosophy too much this year with the Galaxy Note 4. You still get a large screen, this time 5.7 inches, and the fantastic S-Pen, which now offers a whopping 2,048 pressure sensitivity levels.
The Note 4 is also the first Samsung flagship to use QHD resolution, making it a good deal more pixel-packed than the Galaxy S5 despite having a much larger screen. There are two variants of the Note 4 and only one of them offers a native 64-bit processor, but we take this as a sign that Samsung doesn't think 64-bit is quite a necessity yet. And the Snapdragon 810 CPU Samsung's lead phones will use isn't available yet.
For pure phone royalty you can't do much better than the Note 4.
Also consider:
iPhone 6 Plus
Apple's move into the 'phablet' market seems quite awkward at first. Apple has always made small, super-accessible phones but now, with the iPhone 6 Plus, it hasn't gone with half measures. Thanks to its 5.5-inch screen it's much bigger than much of the large Android phone brigade.
It really is competing with oversized Androids like the Note 4, which have always had a slightly niche appeal. Apple going for a niche with one of its main products? Perhaps it sees more big-screen potential than even us.
The launch of the iPhone 6 Plus has been beset by a few niggles though. First there was bendgate, where it was claimed the phone could bend by being put in your pocket. We've not experienced this ourselves but there are plenty of claims online. There are also rumours of scratch-prone screens and crash bugs. But what Apple launch would be complete without a bit of controversy?
Best Compact Phone: Sony Xperia Z3 Compact
There's only one company that makes smaller versions of its phones that don't end up feeling compromised in most core respects: Sony. The Sony Xperia Z3 Compact is a fantastic, palm-friendly phone, and one that offers the same high-end hardware as its bigger sibling the Xperia Z3, aside from the display.
You get the Snapdragon 801 CPU, IP68 water/dust resistance and a seriously impressive-sounding 20.7MP 1/2.3-inch camera sensor. Some 'mini' phones barely seem better than budget models. This one is a real high-end device in a small body.
The one bit of hardware you might want to try and poke a hole in is the screen itself, which is 'just' 720p resolution. With QHD screens around, why can't we pack a 1080p display into a 4.6-inch screen?
Well, it's still very sharp, while well-saturated, vivid colours mean only pixel obsessives need worry.
Also consider:
HTC One Mini 2
The HTC One Mini 2 is more of a traditional take on the 'mini' version of a flagship. It looks the same as the HTC One M8, feels similar, but the hardware has been cut down a bit to get the price (and the profits, no doubt) to the right level.
HTC's TouchWiz UI arrives intact, and performance is generally very good, though, making it a sound choice if you're not too bothered about pure specs. Several of the HTC One M8's design benefits are here too.
Those BoomSound speakers we raved about so much in the One M8? You get them in the One Mini 2, alongside the cool and expensive feel of aluminium thanks to that smooth brushed metal body. It goes a long way towards excusing that you're arguably paying a fair bit for such a middling phone in pure spec terms.
We're tech pedants though. Plenty of people will use the HTC One Mini 2 without even noticing the cheaper bits.
Best Budget Phone: Moto G
The Motorola Moto G was the budget king of 2013, and Motorola has pulled off the trick again in 2014 with… the Moto G. We're not giving another award to the same phone, though. Motorola has actually released two updates to the phone in 2014.
First we saw the 4G version of the 4.5-inch model announced in May, then Motorola gave the design a full refresh in September. For around £130-140 you get a 5-inch 720p screen, the sound Snapdragon 400 processor and a much-improved camera.
There's just one issue: it doesn't have 4G. We expect to see a 4G version announced, which some of you may want to hold out for.
There have been a few attempts to steal the Moto G's thunder, for example the Asus Zenfone 5, but none have been quite as good. And none of the major manufacturers even seem to have tried. Their phones are either a lot more expensive, or simply nowhere near as good.
Also consider:
EE Kestrel
4G phones used to be expensive, but the EE Kestrel proves you don't need to pay too much to get on-board with high-speed mobile internet. £99 on a pre-pay deal gets you a 4.5-inch QHD screen, Snapdragon 400 CPU, dual cameras — the works, really.
The design won't get many excited, but if you want 4G and you are on a budget this actually gets you even more than the Moto G in some respects, for less cash.
Huawei actually makes the phone, and it has a lot in common with the Huawei Ascend G6, a very similar but not quite as cheap mobile.
What's wrong, then? Screen resolution isn't as high as the Moto G's and it uses Huawei's infamously quirky Emotion UI. You can tweak out most of the odd little bits in the EE Kestrel, but it does take a little bit of effort and know-how.
Sony Xperia M2 (and Aqua version)
The Sony Xperia M2 was one of the most convincing budget 4G phones, and one of the only ones from the real big players. It costs Pay As You Go-grade money, but gets you good-looking design, 4G and a big screen.
Sound battery life is another solid bonus, making this a phone that's extremely easy to live with. If you want even more of a carefree style, there's the Sony Xperia M2 Aqua. This is a waterproof version of the M2, using similar rubbery flaps to the Sony Xperia Z2 and Z3: a recipe for bath-time Netflix bliss. Makes us feel all warm just thinking about it.
The screen's not as good as the Moto G's, and despite having a relatively high-res sensor its camera photos are pretty rubbish. As such it's not quite on-par with the Moto G. But if you just can't get on with Motorola's budget baby, this is a good second bet.
End of year report: which brand did best?
Which brand should you choose?
Brand loyalty: should it be a thing of the past? As far as we're concerned, how good a company's phones are, not the name on them, is how you should pick your next mobile.
With many of the big phone-makers struggling to turn a decent profile from phones in 2014, it hasn't really been a great year for the coffers of the mobile megacorps. But is it just the way the market's going, or have Samsung, Sony and co. just been taking their position as leaders of the phone world for granted?
We're going to have a look at the highs and lows of the biggest names in mobile from 2014 to find out.
Samsung 2014
It's hard being king, as Samsung found out this year. Despite still producing many of the most popular Android phones in the world, it has struggled to reproduce the sort of success it had in 2014.
Towards the end of the year, we saw numbers in the company's Q3 2014 figures suggesting the Samsung's profits were down 60% since 2014. It makes scary reading coming from the company that's still the behemoth of Android phones.
Look at the phones themselves and things aren't quite so drastic. We loved the Galaxy S5, and the Galaxy Note 4 was, as usual for the Note series, another smash.
Still, Samsung needs to figure out how to gets its mojo back, because it's slipping between the company's fingers like a toddler trying to grip a giant jelly dollar sign. The current tactics: phones with metal edges instead of plastic ones and screens that wrap around the side, as seen in the Galaxy Note Edge. Who knows if that'll succeed.
The Good
2014 saw Samsung finally try to get classy. It calmed down its custom TouchWiz interface a bit, so that looking through the array of preinstalled apps on its phones isn't like thumbing through an encyclopaedia. Samsung's phones are altogether more approachable these days.
While it hasn't proved as big a smash as hoped, the Samsung Galaxy S5 is also rather special.
With a fairly high price, initially strange design and lack of real eye-opening features beyond a frankly rubbish fingerprint scanner, it may seem like a disappointment. But the excellent ISOCELL camera and superb AMOLED screen make it a top pick for tech fans to this day.
The Bad
There's a lot more bad to bring up this year for the big dog of Android phones. It may have produced some of the years best, most popular phones. But that hasn't really been enough to offset all the wrong moves.
In 2014 Samsung failed to offer a single lower-cost phone that truly captured the imagination, and as much as it may think itself on-par with Apple, a core part of Samsung's business is serious box-shifting, not just selling ultra-premium phones.
You only need to look at phone retailers to see the fallout of this failure: why is the two year-old Samsung Galaxy S3 Mini still on sale? How can a two year-old phone that was disappointing at the time possible compete with something like the Motorola Moto G? The painful truth is it can't. Samsung needs to realise this rather than piling its effort into high-end phones that offer little for the value buyer. Its low-end phones are often dreadful.
Samsung is failing at both ends of the spectrum too. Despite racking-up plenty of hype, the Galaxy S5 has hugely under performed when it comes to sales. Mental images of warehouses full of unsold S5s paint a pretty painful picture and that's the reality according to current reports.
HTC 2014
After a few precarious years, HTC pulled things back a bit in 2014. It made our favourite phone of the year for one, making it a twice-in-a-row victory for the company. We're talking about the HTC One, a favourite from 2013, and One M8, two of the best phones ever made.
2014 also saw HTC come back to the world of tablets, which it hasn't set foot in since 2011 with the cataclysmic disaster HTC Flyer. Google got HTC in to make the Nexus 9 tablet. It's early days for that tab, but first impressions are fairly good.
After trying to establish itself as a king of phone cameras, something it hasn't quite pulled off, HTC fell back to the less ambitious goal of making the best phone speakers. If you want a phone that sounds great, HTC is a pretty good bet. It has been one of the main promoters of stereo front-facing speakers. You'll even find its BoomSound speakers in several of its phones, not just the most expensive ones.
The Good
How can we start other than talking about the HTC One M8? It's our favourite phone of the year, offering the most beautiful, best-sounding handset you can get, even six months on since its release.
Many of its values are the same as last year's HTC One, but with a curvier body, memory card slot and larger screen in tow. What's not to like? Nothing. Well, apart from the low-res camera.
Later in the year HTC had a go at making its cameras stand out once more, but without any UItraPixel branding this time. The HTC Desire Eye was the first phone to use 13MP cameras on the front and back. Fancy a selfie demi-god? Look no further.
We're yet to see whether the phone really captures the imagination of the selfie brigade, though as it's barely on shelves yet.
The Bad
Just like Samsung, HTC has failed to come up with a killer budget phone this year. But unlike Samsung, it's not for a lack of trying. HTC has released a full range of budget mobiles this year, from the HTC Desire 310 to the mid-range Desire 610 and beyond. But they're all a bit expensive compared with the best out there. Where are the competitive models, HTC?
Again, like Samsung, HTC's revenues are generally on the downward slide too, with its Q3 2014 results showing a decline year-on-year. However, for a company that has been seen as being on its last legs, we're glad to say it's still in the black.
Many of us are disappointed that HTC hasn't really done anything with the UltraPixel tech that was all the rage in 2013. This was all about cameras with relatively low-res sensors but larger photosites, making them much better for low-light shots. Look deeper and the truth is pretty simple. HTC's 4MP UltraPixel sensor was really made by ST Microelectronics, not HTC. And we guess no-one had made a similar, cost-effective sensor solution offering higher resolution.
LG 2014
Ahead of the curve and managing to undercut most of the competition, LG showed everyone how it's done with its top phone for 2014, the LG G3. It was the first big-name phone to be released with a QHD screen, which several of the big names won't get to until 2015.
However, it lost the bid to make 2014's big Nexus phone, having made the Nexus 5 last year. Motorola got that honour, robbing LG of a few potential plaudits.
Still, having really upped its game in 2013, LG has slowly been gaining steam this year, winning back credibility as a serious phone brand among the general public. Where Samsung is on the wane, LG's slow-but-steady approach seems to be paying off.
LG's Q3 financial results were its best since 2009. Its profits may just be a fraction of Samsung's ($163 million to Samsung's $3.8 billion) but having positive momentum in mobiles, where everyone seems to be struggling, is a big win for LG.
The Good
LG produced the one super high-end, big-name phone this year that could really be considered a bargain. We've seen the LG G3 on sale for as little as £299, and for that price it offers a ridiculous amount of hardware.
Even at its launch price it offered a much better deal than arch rivals the Samsung Galaxy S5 and Sony Xperia Z3. LG is the one major manufacturer that reminds us high-end phones don't need to forget about value entirely.
This high-end value has seen several of its 2013 phones sell very strongly well into 2014. The Nexus 5 and LG G2 are still great options even now, and that's despite the Nexus 5 having been discontinued by Google.
A few years ago we'd have laughed at the idea LG would become a paragon of reason and taste in high-end phones, but that's exactly what's happened. Quite how is still a mystery. They must have made some great hires.
The Bad
After LG made such a cracking job of the Nexus 4 and Nexus 5, we were a little sad to hear it wouldn't be taking the reins for the Nexus 6. Instead Motorola got that honour.
Why? Perhaps we'll never know, but it seems likely money had something to do with it. Pitching for a Nexus design is a bit more involved that coming up with a science fair project and handing it to the teacher.
LG also failed to match the value of the LG G3 and G2 in models lower down the line-up. The LG G3 S was the closest we had to an 'LG G3 Mini', but just like the Mini models from Samsung and HTC, it failed to recreate the magic of the original, or offer aggressive-enough pricing to make up for it.
LG's re-entry to the tablet space has proved a bit of a dud too. The LG G Pad 7.0 and 10.1 seemed outdated at their point of arrival. They're low-price tablets that can't even match the 2013 Nexus 7 for specs or value. Better luck next time, LG.
Sony 2014
Sony has a frankly quite bizarre approach to its upgrade cycle. It has worked itself into a six month upgrade loop. You can buy a new Sony flagship for £500, only to find out it's out of date before it has even earned its first scratch.
It's a funny situation to find yourself in, but we've come to accept that it just means you have to consider that Sony's upgrades just aren't as big as everyone else's.
This sort of cycle was seen as a way for Sony to keep up with competitors more easily, after some of its early Xperia Z phones found themselves quickly beaten by Samsung and co. It doesn't seem to have done the company any favours longer-term though.
Fairly poor mobile sales led to a huge restructuring of the company and have let Xiaomi become the third biggest global phone manufacturer, ahead of Sony. Of course, hardly anyone's even heard of Xiaomi in the UK or US.
The Good
Sony has spearheaded a couple of pretty neat changes in the way mobile phones are designed. It was the big force behind making waterproof phones mainstream, and that has continued into 2014. The Xperia Z2, Z3, Z3 Compact and Xperia M2 Aqua are all happy to be dunked in water, as long as it's not chlorinated or salty.
The lead Xperia phones have also offered some of the biggest batteries around. The Xperia Z2 has a 3200mAh battery, and while that was chopped down to 3100mAh in the Xperia Z3, it's still much bigger than the units you get in Samsung or HTC rivals.
Sony is one of the few big companies to offer a really good low-cost 4G phone this year. The Sony Xperia M2 was a bit like a cheap Xperia Z2, and was available for just £149 right around its launch. LG and Samsung failed to offer anything quite as alluring that you could also buy easily on the high street.
Granted, between the M2 and the 4G Moto G we'd probably pick the Motorola, but it was still one of the year's better budget phones.
The Bad
Sony's high-end cameras have a great reputation. They can replace compact cameras if need be. However, step down the line-up a bit and you'll find some real photographic stinkers. Horrible processing and seemingly naff sensors mean you end up with some real ugly photos from some of Sony's lower-cost phones. Manage your expectations or read our reviews.
Some of the real entry-level models are pretty bad all-round. The Motorola Moto E absolutely wipes the floor with the Sony Xperia E1, for example. The moral of the story is not to put too much faith in a big brand. They are often used to scrimp on models because there's a certain feeling among some that 'a Sony phone can't be bad, can it?' We're afraid it can.
In late 2013 and 2014 we also saw Sony's Lens Camera idea fall more-or-less flat on its face. These are camera sensors, processors and lenses that fit into the space of a normal camera lens that you're meant to clamp to your phone. It sounds like a neat idea, but slightly dodgy implementation and lag meant it took too long for them to get up to speed.
Microsoft/Nokia 2014
It has been a turbulent year for Nokia, and really the end of the company as we know it since Microsoft bought Nokia's mobile division in April. It's pretty obvious why: Nokia has for a long time been the main manufacturer of Windows Phone devices.
The middle of the year saw the company in limbo, releasing Lumia phones and even a now-abandoned Android phone range as if nothing had happened. However, in recent months we've seen a true picture of the future.
Nokia phones are no more. In October, Microsoft announced the Nokia brand is being dropped, to be replaced by 'Microsoft Lumia'. Maybe it makes sense, but we're still left feeling sad as one of the great long-standing names in phones has walked into the night.
Still, it is not gone for good — other parts of Nokia not owned by Microsoft are planning on releasing an Android tablet soon. And it's going to be dirt cheap at £199.
The Good
Nokia's phone team doesn't half know how to make a great phone camera. 2014 didn't see any of the gigantic sensor phones like the Lumia 1020, which was released back in 2013, but high-quality sensors and optically-stabilised lenses were used to great effect in mobiles like the Lumia 930.
The benefit of newer phones like this is that, because the hardware involved is fairly petite, you don't end up with a truly massive phone but get fantastic image quality that provides much of the functional benefit of Nokia's best.
Even further down the range, the Lumia phones have started top-notch low-light photo performance, with models like the Lumia 830 and Lumia 735. Given this is where phone cameras usually fail, it gives the Lumia range of phones great all-round photo skills.
We also love that despite being in a brand identity crisis, the phones themselves have kept their colourful character. Lumias are bright and fun-looking, and have even started adopting a bit of metal trim in some models.
The Bad
So, whatever happened to the Nokia X series? Nokia announced these low-cost Android phones at MWC 2014 to confusion and great interest. Then, well, then they were never really released beyond a few spots, before being officially axed in July, going from birth to funeral in under five months.
2014 also saw Nokia piss away all the goodwill it worked to get with the excellent Nokia Lumia 620 and 520 models from 2013. They were fantastic value-packed phones that really helped establish Windows Phone as an important force among budget phones. And then Nokia followed it up with the Lumia 530.
It's worse in just about every way than the Lumia 520. And we don't mean worse in the sense of 'for its time', we mean flat-out worse. Worse screen, worse CPU, worse camera. At the time of release you could still get the Lumia 520 for about £40 less than the Lumia 530. It was a real 'palm meet forehead' moment.
Apple 2014
What might seem like a small change for another phone manufacturer is a world-shattering move for Apple. It changed the size of the iPhone screens this year. Just about every other phone-maker does this every year, but Apple doing it had jaws dropping across the world, afterall, its phones have been 4-inchers since 2012.
Aside from being, bigger, slimmer and faster, 2014's iPhones are actually more-or-less business as usual. The Touch ID fingerprint scanner was introduced back in 2013, as was the 64-bit CPU architecture that's now standard across all Apple's new iPhones.
Sales are going well too. While Samsung has had bad news about its Galaxy S5 sales, iPhone sales are healthy. And the iPhone 6 is reportedly outselling the larger iPhone 6 Plus 2:1.
The good
The new iPhones have strolled into their more spacious skins with ease. Compatibility issues? Not really. Complaints from the fans? Nah, pretty much everyone decided the old iPhones were tiny and toy-like upon first getting an iPhone 6 in their hands.
The iPhone 6 Plus is a little big for some, but then that's the whole idea.
For all the talk of Apple devices not being as powerful as the competition, the A8 processors used in the new iPhones are extremely adept. Even now, most Android rivals aren't using 64-bit architectures while iPhones have used them for more than a year. It's mad when you think about it.
The iPhones are also the only mainstream models to offer 128GB of internal memory, making them real storage trailblazers. But before you ask: no, Apple still doesn't let you use memory cards.
The Bad
Heard about bendgate? Or #bendgate for the Twitterati? It was a rather tedious interlude that looked like it might tip over into a recall-inciting event for a bit.
People say the larger iPhone 6 Plus will bend under the pressure of your backside/thigh if you keep it in a pocket for a good long while. Now, no-one wants their £600 phone to bend, but the jury's still out on whether the claims of bendy iPhones are totally exaggerated. With the scandal dying down, it looks as though the iPhone 6 Plus has lived to bend another day.
The same old Apple complaints ring true, though. These phones are very expensive, especially when you consider something like the LG G3 offers more compelling tech in some areas for half the price. Screen resolution may be high enough not to be a serious issue, but for the price you're paying it is a bit low, way off QHD.
How to buy the perfect smartphone
Buying Tips for Christmas 2014
Need to buy someone a phone this Christmas? It's a great idea, especially now that you don't have to pay anything near a top-dollar price to get a great phone.
However, you need to do some research and abide by a few rules to make sure you don't spend more than you should, or end up with a dud.
1. More than a 5-incher? Time for a test drive
For most people, the point at which phones can go from seeming big to 'too big' is somewhere between five and six inches. It all depends about how big your hands are, and how used to smaller phones you are.
A good general rule to live by is to test drive any phone with a screen of five inches or larger. Almost every high street is littered with phone shops, or at least shops that stock them. Even a dummy model with give you a good indication of whether you might find a phone too big.
2. 'PAYG' gets you better deals than SIM-free
Pre-pay deals are phones sold with SIM cards, while SIM-free phones are generic models without any carrier associations. You'll almost always get a lower price with a pre-pay or Pay As You Go mobile, and there's actually no commitment to spend any money with that network.
The only limitation is that the mobile phone may be locked to the network it's bought from. Most phones can be unlocked without too much trouble though.
3. Mobile gamers beware of Windows Phone
Windows Phone is a great system, one that in most respects is a great alternative to iOS and Android. However, serious mobile gamers should think twice about buying into the operating system.
There are loads of games available for it, but if you want to check out that latest mobile phone game you keep on hearing about on Twitter or down the pub, there's a good chance it won't be available for Windows Phone. It's generally much lower down the porting priority list for developers, meaning games and apps generally come to the system a good deal later, if at all.
4. You can unlock phones
If you buy a phone locked to a specific network, you can normally get it unlocked to work with any carrier. You'll often have to buy an unlock code though.
This generally costs £10-30 depending on the model. You'll find spots that sell these codes online (Google is your friend) or some shops on the high street offer an unlocking service. It's normally the sort of shops that offer a colour photocopying service and an 'internet cafe' that is just an ancient PC hooked up to a CRT monitor. But, hey, if it gets the job done…
5. There's nothing wrong with buying 2013 models
2014 saw relatively little development in terms of core phone hardware. Chips have gotten new names, but the top CPUs of 2014 and the top CPUs of 2013 really aren't worlds apart.
It's a good idea not to rule out some of the phones released in 2013 (particularly the Nexus 5 and LG G2) because if you're willing to shop around they offer better value these days than 99% of phones released in 2014.
6. Import phones from China without getting stung
If you want to get a phone that's completely different from your mates' mobiles, you might want to consider importing from China. There are several solid brands that aren't really distributed here, but flourish over there. The most important is Xiaomi, the third-biggest phone producer, and one you'll currently never see on the shelves of your local phone shop.
Want to import? Rule number one is to make sure the site your order from is legit. A dodgy site may nick your credit card details, so check it out on a user feedback site like TrustPilot before even considering placing an order. Also, be sure to read their terms and conditions as you will also be liable for customs charges. Some sites mark orders as 'gifts' or 'samples' to try to avoid these charges.
7. Android vs iOS? notes on the big decision
Android or iOS? It's a question we've been asked regularly for six years. The answer is not simple.
If you want a cheaper phone, Android is definitely the way to go. Unless you want a phone that's scratched to death and possibly stolen, there's no cheap route to iPhone bliss. There are loads of good, cheap Androids. However, iOS still has the edge for apps and games, with titles generally coming to iPhones first if one platform is to get the jump on another.
8. 4G or 3G?
If you're buying on a budget you need to decide whether you need 4G or not. Some of the best-deal budget phones still do not have 4G connectivity.
Is 4G the future? Absolutely. The present, if anything. However, it's important to know the truth about 4G. Most carriers do not offer anything approaching the sort of speeds the standard is capable of because — as usual — mobile networks are crowded, and 4G isn't much use unless you have a pretty generous data allowance. Factor this in when deciding whether you need 4G. Other factors may be more important if you're working with a very tight budget.
9. £130 is all you need to pay for a great phone, £80 for a good one
Our top pick budget phone is the Moto G, and it's available for £140 SIM-free. If someone tells you that you need to spend £500 to get a great phone, they're talking nonsense. For most people, the compromises involved in a phone like the Moto G are relatively minor. It can do most of the key things a £500 model can.
You can get a perfectly good phone even cheaper, too. The Moto E costs just £80 and we'd be happy to use it as our main phone. You don't always have to spend the earth on a mobile
10. Buying someone a contract is no gift at all
Want to get someone a phone this Christmas? Whatever you do, don't go getting someone a contract deal: stick to pre-pay deals or SIM-free phones.
The one time when a contract might be a good idea is for parents buying phones for their children. A contract comes with the burden of paying the monthly fees for the whole term — usually two years. So if you're not going to pay that too, you're not doing someone any favours by buying them a contract phone.
The future of phones - what to get excited about
What to look for in 2015
What do we have to look forward to next year? Nothing ever stands still in the mobile phone business, and the things that'll come to define 2015 are already in the works. The cogs are whirring away even now.
On the technical side, we're on the verge of a 64-bit revolution in Android with Google adding native support for 64-bit system architectures as part of Android 5.0 Lollipop.
Within just a few months we'll see almost every new phone use a 64-bit CPU, not just the pricey ones. The Snapdragon 410 is already out there, a 64-bit version of the Snapdragon 400 we see so often we swear it's stalking us.
This will soon be joined by the Snapdragon 810, the upcoming Qualcomm flagship CPU that'll make the Note 4's Snapdragon 805 look like old news.
But what is 64-bit going to get us beyond smug bragging rights? It'll mean we start to see phones with 4GB of RAM along with a radical performance boost that'll make us forget that the Snapdragon 805 really isn't all that much more powerful than the Snapdragon 800, which is so old its original adverts were in black and white.
It's up to the devs to prove the upgrade is really worthwhile, but it'll also come in handy for those QHD phones. More pixels means more power demand.
iOS on games
So will Androids have the advantage for games, and power in general? Not quite. Apple started using 64-bit processors with the iPhone 5S.
We've also seen some pant-wettingly exciting demos of what we can look forward to soon thanks to something called Metal. This is an Apple API that gives developers access to a graphics processor's power with lower overheads, unlocking the potential for even more dazzling visuals.
It's not going to affect Farmville 6, but DICE has even got parts of Battlefield 4 working on iOS thanks to Metal. And, yep, that's the same game you might play on Xbox One and PS4.
The power's already there, but hopefully we'll see it used a bit more in 2015.
Microsoft goes hardcore
Going from exploiting what's already there to companies with an awful lot of change on the horizon, we have Microsoft and its Lumia phones, which has just dropped the Nokia brand.
2015 is when we'll see where Lumia phones are headed. Will they change completely or is Microsoft going to keep the sort of design identity Nokia has diligently forged for Windows Phone over the last three years (colour, plastic, curviness)?
The first non-Nokia Lumia, the 535, has that classic Nokia styling. But it's no guarantee that some bright spark at Microsoft won't upturn the cart and start making all-grey devices made of compressed cardboard.
What's the future for poor old Nokia then? Well, when Microsoft bought Nokia it actually only bought its mobile division. And that leaves, ooh, at least five people working in a shed in Finland somewhere doing other things. The brand still has big plans, though, with a super-cheap Nokia N1 tablet already confirmed.
For the money (£199) it sounds amazing, but we're yet to touch, or even see, one in the flesh. Its 7.9-inch 2,048 x 1,536 pixel screen has us excited, mind.
Drowning in pixels
These sorts of ultra-high resolutions are going to become very common, too. Just about all the top phone of next year will have QHD displays, just like the LG G3. More pixels than your eyeballs could possibly compute is going to be terribly de rigueur, you just wait.
What's far more useful for the average person, though, is that the UK's 4G networks are going to be given a thorough overhaul. Telecoms regulator Ofcom is selling off more frequency bands carriers can use to beam 4G over to your phone, meaning the currently horribly crowded 4G services will be able to ease up a bit. The speeds you get with 4G in many places really aren't that '4G' at all. Hopefully this will change.
Some of the most exciting new stuff won't be in the phones themselves, but the bits and bobs we use with them.
Accessorise like the world is ending
2015 may be remembered as the year of the USB headphone. iOS and Android 5.0 can both output audio from their USB/Lightning ports, meaning that the simple headphone jack may become a bit, well, redundant.
USB headphones would be able to bypass a phone's DAC and amplifier, letting you get a true audiophile experience from a phone with the right pair of cans. Match up something like this with Tidal, the lossless Spotify alternative, and you have an audio nerd's dream.
A bit closer to home, we'll get to see how Android Wear develops and whether the Apple Watch does for smartwatches what the iPod did for MP3 players. Or will it bumble along like Apple TV, not quite setting the world alight?
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