Smartphone design slowed down in 2024

I’m sorry I’m like that. Smartphone innovation has stalled in favor of AI adoption. Samsung, Google and Apple have made AI the main marketing focus of every flagship phone in 2024. It wasn’t about the sleek hardware or the smartphone’s ability to serve as a solid everyday computing device. It was about preparing users for the onslaught of AI that will inevitably force them to update their phones to avoid being abandoned.

This year has been marked by gimmicky feature additions and the rationalization that you’ll need a new smartphone to be compatible with what’s to come if you want to be on the same page as everyone else. From a design perspective, this created a batch of phones that didn’t move the needle. The Galaxy S24 Ultra looks just like Galaxy S23 Ultra but with more square edges. of Apple iPhone 16 Pro doesn’t look all that different from iPhone 15 Pro— you can’t even tell them apart from the back. As for Google Pixel 9 Proit has a revamped camera strip on the back. Yet now it just looks like an iPhone from the front, and everything else in the Pixel lineup prioritizes the Gemini over everything else.

I don’t like the idea of ​​the AI ​​working properly whether I’m trying to open an app to get work done or disappearing into a scroll of doom. But what will be the cost of prioritizing AI-enhanced performance over everything else? Can smartphones stay thin if power consumption is a priority? Won’t they have to make concessions on larger batteries and additional components as AI becomes the primary power source? These are all questions hanging around as we enter 2025.

The meteoric rise of AI

Samsung started 2024 immediately with Galaxy AI. It already did some of what Google’s Gemini set out to do, but this time it also had a unique new feature to debut alongside it: Search circlewhich became the best thing to happen to Android this year, even before Android 15 went on sale developer preview. Samsung and Google teamed up for the Galaxy S24 launch event to keep the message polished, saying that Android will become the vessel for everything going on with AI behind the scenes.

Google followed suit, completing the year prolific Pixel Drops which enables features like Circle to Search, Call Screen and most recently the Gemini extensions. When the developer conference was held in the spring, it was clear that the trajectory of the Android platform was mainly focused on AI. Android was no longer the main event; instead, it was focused on explaining how Gemini would improve the user experience. The most important indicator of this for me was when I ran the beta version of Gemini and set it as the default assistant on my phone. It broke some of my Google Assistant-enabled hardware, like the Roav Bolt, which I use to control my phone hands-free while driving. Fortunately, everything Google has done in the background since then fixed it, although I had to wait half a year until Gemini was fully released. It was a harrowing reminder of what happens when the company behind your smartphone platform suddenly takes a left turn into something new.

Some of us hoped that Apple would be the one to resist AI. Usually, Apple will take what Google does and “reject” it, then explain how it’s not possible because it would destroy the integrity of its product. But Cupertino surprised us with Apple Intelligence at WWDC, announcing that it’s adding AI to its platforms, and doing it the best Apple way: completely rebranding what everyone else is doing and presenting it as a one-of-a-kind, bespoke new technology, even though it still needs a little help from ChatGPT to handle more complex commands. At least the company remains characteristic of it. As a result of the name “Apple Intelligence”, the style guide requires me to spell it out as often as I refer to it, which helps me avoid overusing “AI”. it is not artificial intelligence; that’s Apple’s intelligence.

The cost of generating an image

It has now been months since all the new smartphones debuted for the latest generation. We’re stuck with a slew of premium devices from Samsung, Google and Apple, all focused on selling us this new way of predictive computing. Each platform also has an image rendering app for creating images: Image Playground on iOS and Pixel Studio on Pixel devices. thank you I guessbut that’s hardly what people thought of when they asked for photo help. Instead, I was hoping to have better lenses added to the back of these devices, since they already cost more than a mid-range digital camera. I was even willing to eschew thinness, knowing that the hardware would have to get thicker if I wanted a bigger screen. Instead, I got a generative AI package that makes my photos look like Hallmark Movie Poster.

I’m not saying that cameras haven’t improved on Samsung, Google, and Apple devices. This happens every year with every new smartphone; everything gets a a little a little better. But this time, all three seem entirely dependent on the AI ​​performing the magic to make the picture. The entire Pixel camera system is based on the premise that AI can automatically do what you would try in an editing suite. Apple uses algorithms to ensure that every time you press the iPhone 16’s new camera control button, the photo won’t blur.

Here’s the catch-22 of phone imaging in this age of AI. While AI and algorithms can help with battery management, such as reducing background processes and automatically optimizing settings based on what’s happening on the screen, image generation in apps takes up those same resources, even when pulling from the cloud. A smartphone also needs a huge amount of memory to perform these tasks. That’s why we’re now seeing phones bundled with 16GB of RAM as standard, including Pixel 9 Pro. All that extra hardware to power the AI ​​will ultimately drive up production costs. We’re already seeing higher prices on iPhones and Android devices. It’s not just the economy.

That doesn’t mean next year’s phones will be bulky and unwieldy. They’ll likely still arrive in the same tempered glass chassis they came in this year. All of them will have large, bright displays with high refresh rates and rich colors. They will still fit in men’s pockets. They may even be weaker than they were next year, at least according to rumors iPhone 17 and the Galaxy S25 Ultra. It’s even talked about Samsung’s foldable devices it can get bigger to cater to a different crowd. What will be interesting to see is how each manufacturer manages the requirements to balance what the industry says is essential for competition and what consumers want for utility. Artificial intelligence isn’t worth it if it means hot smartphones that run out of steam in the middle of the day.