Smartphones are generally in a better place than where they were years ago. Unlike before, it’s really hard to find a bad smartphone today. Most of them have good screens, good cameras, and decent battery life. The problem is that we end up having phones that look the same. Despite efforts by most phone makers, they can barely keep up. Only Apple and Samsung managed to ride the wave and make money out of it. What does it take to make a great smartphone in 2017? Here are my 5 MUST-HAVE smartphone features 2017:
Dual Cameras
I know, I know. This isn’t an original feature. Heck, there was a phone that did this before this was a trend. Too bad that phone was ahead of its time. Some flagship smartphones like the LG G5, Huawei P9, and even the iPhone 7 Plus carry dual cameras. If a phone maker needs to stand out, then it should focus on getting good dual cameras and EVEN BETTER camera software. Don’t think for a second that software doesn’t matter.
Fingerprint Reader
This one’s a no-brainer. Unlike the recent dual camera trend, this one lasted for a long time. Some may point out the flaws of fingerprint readers but they are WAY MORE CONVENIENT than typing a passcode. If you own a phone with a fingerprint reader, could you go back to a phone without one?
Water Resistance
First off, I want to get this out of the way: being WATER RESISTANT is NOT the same as being WATERPROOF! Unless water has no way of entering your phone, there’s still a chance for water damage to happen despite the phone being water resistant.
That said, I love that more phone makers are starting to put out water-resistant phones. Samsung has been doing that for a long time since the Galaxy S5 but I’m glad that this has become a must-have.
Stereo Speakers
HTC basically started this trend of having front-facing stereo speakers on phones with the One M7. You can’t just release a good smartphone without good speakers. (If you’re Samsung, maybe you can?) It surprised me when HTC decided to ditch the idea entirely with the One A9. (They had to copy the iPhone.) Ever since I got the iPhone 7, I use the speakers more often than not.
A Good Front Camera
Huawei got a bigger foothold on the market thanks to its dual cameras. OPPO and Vivo got it thanks to the front camera. It’s still insane to me that a good front camera for selfies sells phones. Apparently OPPO and Vivo saw the opportunity and took it to the next level!
The OPPO F1s has a 16MP front camera and the Vivo V5 has a 20MP front camera. Despite that being insane enough, Vivo just released the V5 Plus with TWO front-facing cameras last month! INSANE!
Even the flagship smartphones only have 7-8MP front cameras. If this is one way to get to the top 5 smartphone makers in the world, then might as well do it.
What do YOU think of my list of must-have smartphone features 2017? Did I miss anything? Shout out in the comments below!
A good rear camera is really a must these days. I own an ASUS Zenfone Zoom and Im very satisfied with it. Im fine with one camera as long as it is capable of producing high quality image. I have a Vivo V5, got it before official launching, the front camera is indeed impressive but too bad that I dont enjoy taking selfies 😀
Personally, I agree with what Steve Jobs said that mobile phones should be “MOBILE”.
With the trend happening now, most of the phones are now humongous on the hands of small people like me.
I believe smartphones must remain compact, small and mobile just like the size of iPhone5/s.
I think these huge companies must bring these form feature back on smartphones.
Anything bigger should be categorized as tablet or phablet.
A good rear camera is my deciding factor jud when buying a new smartphone because it’s what I use for my travels. 🙂 I don’t usually take selfies, but I am really glad of Oppo and Vivo’s amazing front camera’s. 😀
I agree with JJ. Which is why I consider my phone a phablet. LOL. Sa una kay the smaller the phone, the classier. The bigger ones were somehow considered embarrassing. Haha anyway, I also agree with all that you mentioned. Each feature also has its own market. For me, the camera and fingerprint reader are very essential.
I super agree with a smartphone having dual cameras, some of its features can almost already compete with non-mobile cameras! And yes, a more convenient fingerprint reader. But I honestly don’t like my iPhone 6’s fingerprint reader because I still have to press it for me to unlock my phone. The more modern ones though only requires soft touch now.
Most companies is already having those features in their newer models. The question is, how are they going to stand out amidst the competition?
Software, camera, battery life.
I don’t really care about any additional features of the smartphone, as long as it functions as a phone, I’m good with it. But we’re talking about smartphone, so few things that I am considering in smartphones are it’s rear camera, software and battery life let alone the processing speed because it’s given that most companies would come up with the best on these fields.
You missed a lot hehehehhe….!There are so many things that a smartphone can do know like take 4k videos, super slow mo and probably even be a decent recorder. Sometimes it is not just the specs but also the software or apps that comes with it
I can actually forego the dual camera feature since Im not really too keen if the phone has it or not. As long as it can still take clear, stunning images, both rear and front, then Im pretty much okay with it even if it has only one camera.
The smart phones we have nowadays are bad-ass! Compared to the Sony Erikson P1i I had, everything is way better! The cameras now capture images as good as a DSLR! Isn’t that fantastic? 🙂
These are the features I am also looking for a smartphone. Exactly on the list plus a very good battery life and fast-charging capabilities (with at least 3GB RAM).
A better Pixel is a MUST. This has seriously the best camera out there yet!
#GoogleFanAlert
I haven’t tried the other phones and not really very particular with their specs anymore. Still, we are very much in love with our P9 and highly recommend it. (Also can’t wait to see what the P10 has to offer!)
Wala gyu’y makalupig sa water resistance. No need for GoPro if naa na ni. 🙂
The only thing I’d really like for my phone to have out of all of these is the water-resistance! Even in the latest Pixels, it’s nowhere to be found! I’ll probably still go with a Google-backed phone in the future so I really hope Google gets its stuff together and make one hell of a phone.