Smartphone Design Plateaued in 2024

Sorry to be that man. Smartphone innovation has stagnated in favor of adopting synthetic intelligence. Samsung, Google, and Apple made AI the first advertising focus of every flagship cellphone in 2024. It wasn’t about svelte {hardware} or the smartphone’s potential to function a strong every day computing gadget. It was about making ready customers for the AI onslaught that can inevitably drive them to replace their telephones to keep away from being siloed.

This yr was marred by gimmicky characteristic add-ons and the rationalization that you simply’ll want a brand new smartphone to be appropriate with what’s to come back if you wish to be on the identical web page as everybody else. Design-wise, that produced a batch of telephones that didn’t transfer the needle. The Galaxy S24 Ultra seems similar to the Galaxy S23 Ultra however with extra sq. edges. Apple’s iPhone 16 Pro doesn’t look all that completely different from the iPhone 15 Pro—you’ll be able to’t even inform them other than the bottom. As for the Google Pixel 9 Pro, it has a revamped digicam bar on the again. Nonetheless, now it simply seems just like the iPhone from the entrance, and all the things else in regards to the Pixel lineup prioritizes Gemini over the rest.

I’m down for the thought of AI appropriately clocking in, whether or not I’m attempting to open up an app to get work achieved or disappear into doom-scrolling. However what will probably be the price of prioritizing AI-enhanced efficiency over all the things else? Can smartphones keep skinny if energy consumption is the precedence? Gained’t they need to make concessions for greater batteries and extra parts as AI turns into the primary energy draw? These are all questions floating round as we exit the yr into 2025.

The Meteoric Rise of AI

Samsung began 2024 proper out of the gate with Galaxy AI. It already did a few of what Google’s Gemini presupposed to do, besides this time, it additionally had a singular new characteristic to debut alongside: Circle to Search, which grew to become the very best factor to occur to Android this yr, even earlier than Android 15 went into developer preview. Samsung and Google mixed forces for the Galaxy S24 launch occasion to maintain the messaging honed, stating that Android would grow to be a vessel for all that was occurring with AI behind the scenes.

Google adopted, peppering the yr with prolific Pixel Drops that enabled options like Circle to Search, Name Display, and, most lately, Gemini extensions. When its developer convention rolled round within the spring, it was obvious that the Android platform’s trajectory centered primarily on AI. Android was now not the primary occasion; as a substitute, it was centered on explaining how Gemini would enhance the consumer expertise. Essentially the most important indicator of this for me was once I booted up the Gemini beta and set it as my cellphone’s default assistant. It broke a few of my Google Assistant-enabled {hardware}, just like the Roav Bolt, which I exploit to command my cellphone hands-free whereas driving. Fortunately, no matter Google has achieved within the background since then has fastened it, although I needed to wait half the yr for Gemini to roll out absolutely. It was a harrowing reminder of what occurs when the corporate behind your smartphone platform out of the blue takes a left flip towards one thing new.

A few of us had hoped that Apple can be the one to carry out on AI. Usually, Apple will take what Google does and “neg” it, then clarify the way it’s not potential as a result of it could destroy the integrity of its product. However Cupertino stunned us with Apple Intelligence at WWDC, saying that it was including AI to its platforms and doing it in essentially the most Apple manner: fully rebranding what everybody else is doing and presenting it as a one-of-a-kind, bespoke new know-how, though it nonetheless requires some assist from ChatGPT to sort out extra refined instructions. Not less than the corporate stays attribute about it. On account of the title “Apple Intelligence,” the type information requires that I spell it out every now and then when referring to it, which helps me keep away from the overuse of “AI.” It’s not synthetic intelligence; it’s Apple’s intelligence.

The Price of Picture Era

Now, it’s months in spite of everything the brand new smartphones have debuted for the most recent era. We’re caught with a wealth of premium gadgets from Samsung, Google, and Apple, all centered on promoting us this new manner of predictive computing. Every platform additionally has a picture rendering app for producing pictures: Picture Playground on iOS and Pixel Studio on Pixel gadgets. Thanks, I assume, however that is hardly what folks thought of once they requested for assist with images. As a substitute, I’d hoped to have higher lenses added to the again of those gadgets since they already price upwards of a mid-tier digital digicam. I used to be even keen to eschew thinness, realizing the {hardware} needed to get thicker if I needed a bigger display screen. As a substitute, I received a generative AI suite that makes my images seem like a Hallmark movie poster.

I’m not saying the cameras didn’t enhance on Samsung, Google, and Apple’s gadgets. That occurs yearly with each new smartphone; all the things will get a little bit higher. However this time, all three appear wholly depending on AI performing the magic to make the image. The Pixel’s total digicam system relies on the premise that AI can mechanically do what you’ll have tried in an enhancing suite. Apple employs algorithms to make sure that any time you press the iPhone 16’s new Digicam Management button, the photograph doesn’t blur.

Right here’s the Catch-22 of picture era on the cellphone on this AI-forward period. Whereas AI and algorithms may also help with battery administration, like lowering background processes and mechanically optimizing settings based mostly on what’s occurring on display screen, producing pictures throughout the apps takes up those self same assets, even when pulling from the cloud. A smartphone additionally wants a whopping quantity of reminiscence to carry out these duties. That’s why we now see telephones bundled with 16GB of RAM as the usual, together with the Pixel 9 Pro. All that additional {hardware} to energy AI will ultimately improve manufacturing prices. We’re already seeing larger worth tags on iPhones and Android gadgets. It’s not simply the economic system. 

That’s to not say that subsequent yr’s telephones will probably be bulbous and cumbersome. They may seemingly nonetheless arrive in the identical tempered glass chassis they got here on this yr. They may all have massive, shiny shows with excessive refresh charges and saturated colours. They may nonetheless match into males’s pockets. They could even be thinner than they had been subsequent yr, not less than in keeping with rumors in regards to the iPhone 17 and the Galaxy S25 Extremely. There’s even discuss that Samsung’s foldables may get greater to cater to a distinct crowd. What will probably be fascinating to see is how every producer manages the calls for of balancing what the trade says is important for competitors and what shoppers need for utility. It doesn’t make the AI price it if it means piping-hot smartphones that peter out midway via the day.