Korean phone companies encounter worst export in last 16 years

Phone companies all across the globe experienced a sluggish 2018 in sales due to the oversaturated market. Numbers for the past 12 months have started to arrive, with the first report coming straight from South Korea - the home of Samsung and LG. According to the Ministry of Science and ICT and the Institute of Information and Communications Technology Planning & Evaluation, mobile phone exports in 2018 totaled $14.61 billion, down 23% or about $4.4 billion, compared with 2017. This is the lowest figure since 2002, effectively meaning the last year was the worst for Korean...

Read More

Week 3 in review: Redmi Note 7 sells out quick, Pixel 3 Lite leaks in detail

This week contained a few quality leaks of some major devices and one major OS. We also saw a lot of the new Redmi Note 7, which went on sale and sold out in minutes. The phone got its innards exposed on video and was used by Xiaomi's President to smash two walnuts. We also learned that the Redmi Note 7 is getting the Night Mode from the Mi Mix 3 and that it will be getting a Pro version powered by Snapdragon 675. Xiaomi capped the week off by showing its future under-display fingerprint tech. Leakland saw a blurry live photo of the Samsung Galaxy S10+ along with its dual in-display...

Read More

Weekly poll: vivo NEX Dual Display, hot or not?

A poll from a month ago showed that people are interested in the extra functionality provided by a second screen. The vivo NEX Dual Display is the latest and, perhaps, most exciting addition to that genre. So, did vivo nail it or not? The eponymous feature comes from the pair of Super AMOLED panels - one 6.39" on the front and one 5.49" on the back. Both have 1080p resolution, but different aspect ratios (19.5:9 and 16:9, respectively). So, what can you do with the second screen? The best use case is to take selfies with the main camera - a 12MP sensor with large 1.4µm pixels and an...

Read More

Opinion: Bezel-less is not the way forward

How do you imagine the phones in three years? Foldable? Bezel-less? With invisible cameras? Powered by new long-lasting batteries? I could get behind a few of those ideas, sure. But bezel-less - that can't be the way forward. While I agree that the sooner we get rid of those awful notches the better, the bezel-less dream should be put to rest, too. I know this is the unpopular opinion, but just bear with me for a while. I was once a fan of the all-screen phones myself. But having reviewed enough skinny bezel-less smartphones, I just can't imagine myself with a true bezel-less phone - it...

Read More

Top 10 trending phones of week 2

The third week of the new year saw the Redmi Note 7 vastly extend its lead at the top of our popularity chart, but also some interesting new additions to the top 10. It appears that you guys are already focusing your attention on the phones to come in Q1 as the Pro version of the Redmi Note 7 and the flexible Galaxy Fold are the other two phones on the podium. That's despite the fact that neither of them is official yet. This has pushed the Redmi Note 6 Pro down to fourth, while the Galaxy A7 (2018) and the Huawei Y9 (2019) were unfazed by all this commotion and retain fifth and...

Read More