For most people, the words “Android” and “feature phone” don’t feel like they belong in the same sentence, and yet that seems to be exactly what we’re seeing here. The image above, sent anonymously to 9to5Google, purports to show a version of Android made for physical buttons running on a Nokia handset.
As the site says, despite not being able to verify the image, it certainly does look like a Nokia phone – that ‘answer call icon’ seems to match Nokia’s style, and in fact the whole handset looks a lot like the Nokia 220, albeit one with some kind of rubberised case hiding the branding.
So how would Android even be tolerable without a touchscreen? The main answer to that could come from the icon prominently displayed at the top, which looks suspiciously like a Google Assistant microphone. The text inviting the user to “change speaking language” below certainly feels like confirmation.
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More promisingly, if this doubles up as a standard voice to text input, then the days of tapping out text speak on a numbered keyboard could be mercifully condemned to the past.
Underneath that there’s a row of five icons, three of which will require no introduction to anybody who’s used a smartphone in the last five years: camera, Chrome and YouTube. The four dots looks like an app drawer of some kind, but we’re somewhat baffled by the remaining one – two arrows pointing outwards in a green circle.
You may be scratching your head and wondering why anybody would want Android on a feature phone. The answer, as anybody who grew up in the 1990s and early 2000s knows, is battery life. While the phones of today are considered to have great stamina if they can go beyond a day, the Nokias of old used to go for weeks on a single charge. While we can’t vouch for the battery life of ones running Android, the potential is there for a great backup phone, without the need to lose too many of the smartphone home comforts.
Would you be interested in a feature phone running Android? Let us know on Twitter: @TrustedReviews.
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
