Which is the best dumb phone?

[zip accident]

I've used a Nokia 1100, and more recently a Nokia 105 (2017 version):

They're both less than ideal, though the 1100 was tolerable.

Shared faults:

#1 by a long way: Texts not being in monospaced fonts. Sounds trivial, but it means when you are writing one, the word you are writing bounces up and down from the end of one line to the beginning of the one below AND BACK as you change the letter you are trying to enter. Texting would still be very annoying without this, but this is definitively extra frustration on top.

Smallish buttons.

Only a weeks battery life; the 1100 may have been better when new, but no replacement battery ever got beyond a week.

105 (2017) only faults:

It has one big central button, and two either side of that, but they're not buttons. The big one is a tiny d-pad, and for a lot of functions you have to hit the centre, which is non-trivial; usually takes me a couple of tries, can easily get to four or five. The side buttons are rockers, one function on the top, another on the bottom, thankfully nothing on the middle with these, but that's a very minor concession in my view.

Anyone know of anything significantly better?

[venusian]

My elderly mother didn't get on with the Nokia 105 due to the small buttons and general fiddliness.

Prior to losing it she _did_ get on with an Alcatel flip phone which has bigger buttons, a bigger screen (so less like peering through a pin hole). Argos sell one: https://www.argos.co.uk/product/1480337 ... ne:6:868:1. Similar devices available for less elsewhere and I couldn't be sure it the same model (or family of models).

[zip accident]

My elderly mother didn't get on with the Nokia 105 due to the small buttons and general fiddliness.

Prior to losing it she _did_ get on with an Alcatel flip phone which has bigger buttons, a bigger screen (so less like peering through a pin hole). Argos sell one: https://www.argos.co.uk/product/1480337 ... ne:6:868:1. Similar devices available for less elsewhere and I couldn't be sure it the same model (or family of models).

Thanks for that, I don't think I'm fed up enough with the Nokia quite yet to spend that much on a replacement.

I am most concerned about the monospaced font issue, there may not be a phone that does it, but if there isn't, then that's not a mark against the Nokia so much as it's a mark against phones. That's probably the only issue that's pressing enough to make me change phones.

I don't want a camera in a phone, the Nokia doesn't have one and that's a plus for the Nokia. I've put stickers over the cameras in my laptops.

Non-fiddly buttons would be good, but I don't use a phone much and I don't care that much about it.

Screen size isn't that important to me, I don't see particularly well but I'm shortsighted enough that I can take my glasses off to look at things if they're close.

[tufty]

I really liked the old motorola flip phones. they were great. but, y'know, getting on for 25 years old now and about to no longer be supported on networks.

[zip accident]

My elderly mother didn't get on with the Nokia 105 due to the small buttons and general fiddliness.

Prior to losing it she _did_ get on with an Alcatel flip phone which has bigger buttons, a bigger screen (so less like peering through a pin hole). Argos sell one: https://www.argos.co.uk/product/1480337 ... ne:6:868:1. Similar devices available for less elsewhere and I couldn't be sure it the same model (or family of models).

Went for that via Amazon, it is better than the Nokia, but that's not saying much and on the whole I think losing it may be a good idea.

The screen is garish and trippy in a bad way. There are a lot more pixels but a not much bigger screen, so everything is tiny.

The buttons are indeed better.

The camera doesn't work without an SD card, so killing it is easy, but you can't add memory to the phone without risking activating it.

The installed memory is 40kB.

I really liked the old motorola flip phones. they were great. but, y'know, getting on for 25 years old now and about to no longer be supported on networks.

In the UK apparently that's 2033, so that's nine years more use, by then maybe we'll have talk-only phones again.

[MattyP]

No best I guess depends what you want! I have a Nokia 6310 - new re-released version and it’s a solid little thing. Have it in the car as an emergency backup phone.