10 Nokia Phones that Shaped the Mobile Revolution

Nokia is back with a bang and it's latest offering Nokia 6 has already been sold-out in the Chinese market. HMD Global Oy, the Finnish manufacturer with exclusive rights to market phones under the Nokia brand, is planning to announce four new handsets at Mobile World Congress later this month. The company is also planning to resurrect the iconic 3310 phone at the MWC 2017.

Nokia was perhaps the first company to transform ordinary cell phones into fashion accessories and status symbol. With an impressive history of innovation—it was a pioneer in wireless infrastructure, phone camera technology and more.

We've handpicked some of our favorite Nokia mobile phones from the past and here’s the list.

Nokia 3310

We all remember the good old Nokia 3310 phone which was nearly indestructible, had long battery life and the epic Snake game. Nokia 3310 handset was once the most popular phone in the world before smartphones were launched. It sold extremely well, being one of the most successful phones with 126 million units sold worldwide. The 3310 was hugely popular with text addicts as it allowed long messages three times the size of a standard SMS text message, at 459 characters. It also featured threaded SMS writing, SMS Chat.

Nokia 1100

One of the world's best-selling phone handset and the best-selling consumer electronics device in the world at the time, Nokia 1100 was targeted towards developing countries and users who needed basic features like making calls and SMS text messages, alarm clock, reminders, etc.

Nokia's one billionth phone sold was a Nokia 1100 purchased in Nigeria in 2005.

Nokia 3250

The 3250 running on Symbian OS v9.1 (S60 3rd Edition) was announced on September 26, 2005. It featured a unique 'twist' design that transformed the traditional phone keypad into a camera and dedicated music control keys. It was marketed as a music phone with a storage capacity of 2GB and featured a two-megapixel camera.

Nokia 9210 Communicator

The 9210 Communicator was a third-generation Communicator series smartphone produced by the Finnish cell phone maker and was introduced in 2000. It was one of the few mobile phones able to send and receive fax and was also the first Nokia phone with a card slot for expandable memory.

Nokia 3650

Nokia 3650 was the first phone with an integrated VGA camera which had the potential to shoot both stills and video, was equipped with a color screen and had a unique circular keypad. It featured 3.4MB of built-in storage.

Nokia N-Gage

N-Gage was a serious attempt from Nokia to lure gamers away from the Game Boy Advance by including mobile phone functionality. The original N-Gage was described as resembling a taco, which led to its mocking nickname “Taco phone”.

Nokia N93

The N93 was the most advanced camera phone from Nokia at the time of its release. The USP of this phone was its camcorder, packed in its unique swivel design like its predecessor Nokia N90.

The N93 improved upon camera capabilities over the N90. The phone had a 3.2-megapixel camera, Carl Zeiss optics and 3x optical zoom (the first Nokia phone to have it) as well as a 30 fps 640×480 (VGA) MPEG-4 video recording capability.

Nokia N95

The N95 was the world’s most powerful smartphone at the time of launch.

It had a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver with maps and optional turn-by-turn navigation, a 5-megapixel digital camera with Carl Zeiss optics, flash, video recording and video conferencing; wireless connectivity via HSDPA, IrDA, 802.11x and, Bluetooth. The N95 was one of the first smartphones to support 3.5G.

The N95 and its upgraded variant N95 8GB were one of the greatest products to hit the market.

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic

Nokia 5800 was the first touchscreen-equipped S60 device by Nokia. Part of the XpressMusic line, Nokia 5800 was launched together with the Nokia Music Store.

The 5800 XpressMusic was a commercial success with 8 million units sold a year after release and it was praised for its supplied stylus and low price.

A prototype of this handset was seen in the 2008 Batman movie, The Dark Knight.

Nokia 808 PureView

Nokia 808 PureView was first unveiled in 2012 at the Mobile World Congress. It was the first smartphone to feature Nokia's PureView Pro technology and was one of the most advanced camera phones at the time of its release.

Powered by a 41 megapixel 1/1.2 in (10.67 × 8 mm) sensor and a high-resolution f/2.4 Zeiss all-aspherical 1-group lens, the 808's sensor was the largest sensor ever to be used in a camera phone at the time of its launch. The 808 also won the award for "Best New Mobile Handset, Device or Tablet" at Mobile World Congress 2012. It was also the last Symbian smartphone released by Nokia.