The average American now holds onto their smartphone for 29 months, according to a recent survey by Reviews.org, and that cycle is getting longer. The average was around 22 months in 2016.
While squeezing as much life out of your device as possible may save money in the short run, especially amid widespread fears about the strength of the consumer and job market, it might cost the economy in the long run, especially when device hoarding occurs at the level of corporations.
29 months is too long??? I consider that the absolute minimum.
If my device doesn’t last at least 36 months I look for a new company. I aim for at least 48 months.
I refuse to buy Samsung or Google devices anymore, since they definitely did not meet my 36 month criteria. They didn’t even make it to 24. Google did at first with my Nexus 4 and I loved it but they shit the bed real quick after that.
any recommendations for long-lasting phones?
for desktop computers it used to be acer (laptop) for me. i bought one in 2012 and it lasted close to 10 years, which i consider really long. even then, i didn’t buy a new one because of hardware defects, but because the hardware specs were long out of date. i bought a new acer (laptop) in 2021 and it enshittified heavily, lasting only 18 months before i had to buy a new computer.
then i bought a thinkpad (laptop) and have been happy with it ever since. it’s been running for at least 2-3 years by now and shows no signs of aging at all, even though it’s already second-hand. great device.
Either I’ve had weirdly good luck with Samsung, or I’m exceptionally gentle on phones. I expect 6 years minimum out of my Notes, and so far that’s held up.
i had a samsung s4 mini (one of those really old phones, which are closer to a nokia brick than a modern smartphone IMHO) for years and it worked well. it lasted for 5+ years minimum. i bought a new samsung smartphone in 2022 (second hand though) and it shipped broken. randomly shut down, some kind of power issue. i never bothered to return it because it was rather cheap anyways and i had installed a custom OS on it at that point, which voids the warranty.
I bought a motorola afterwards but am only semi-happy with it. everything seems to work well with it, but i don’t feel like it’s a good phone. it feels kinda sleazy, somehow. i’m not sure whether it’s only because of the color scheme it uses or sth else, but it doesn’t feel alright. i’m still looking for a new phone.
I bought an older Samsung and only use it for doom scrolling, 2FA, and podcasts. Its fine stripped down to nothingness. My next purchase, once the cracks from me dropping it spread, will be an older Pixel so I can run GraphineOS. I’m hopeful that like my Linux experience, it’ll extend the devices life given my use case. Like buying old laptops and kicking windows to the curb in favor of Linux buys you tons of time and product life.