The year is 1999, and if you don’t have a Nokia 3210, you are officially a social pariah. This isn’t just a phone, it’s a cultural phenomenon that has finally killed off the protruding antenna, tucking it away inside the chassis for a sleek, “bar of soap” design that fits perfectly in a pair of Levi’s. It’s the first mass-market phone to pull this off, and it makes every other handset look like it belongs in the 80s. But the real reason this phone is selling 160 million units is T9 predictive text. No more tapping the ‘7’ key four times just to get an ‘S’, the phone actually guesses what you’re trying to say, turning SMS from a chore into an addiction.
Nokia has aimed this squarely at the youth market, bringing back the “Xpress-on” covers so you can make your phone look like anything from a metallic blue dream to a glittery nightmare. Inside, you’ve got three games, Snake, Memory, and Rotation, which are basically the only reason anyone is ever late for anything anymore. The 1.5-inch monochrome screen is crisp, and the composer feature lets you write your own monophonic ringtones so you can annoy everyone on the bus with a tinny version of the Mission Impossible theme. It’s 151g of pure Finnish perfection, and while some purists say the internal antenna isn’t as good for signal as the old “stubs,” nobody cares because they’re too busy trying to beat their high score on Snake.