The History of Mobile Phones
From bricky phones with antennas to sleek smartphones that fit into your pocket — mobile phones have come a long way. What was once only accessible to businesspeople on the go has become the new standard for the information age.
In this article, you can read all about the:
- History of mobile phones;
- Timeline of mobile phone history;
- First mobile phone; and
- First smartphone.
Let’s go back to the very beginning of the history of mobile phones — the first mobile phone call.
This scenario occurred in 1973, when New York engineer Marty Cooper made a phone call using a handheld prototype Motorola mobile phone. However, it was a decade later that the company brought out the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X mobile phone, which people could actually purchase.
It was much different from what we are familiar with now — not only did it have a 6 in antenna, but it also weighed 1.7 lbs. Businesspeople needed to charge the groundbreaking mobile phone for 10 hours just to use it for 30 minutes.
The only function of this phone was literally mobile phoning — no texts, games, or pictures.
Mobile phones have evolved over time, with new features being added progressively. Check out the timeline below to find the most important milestones in the early history of mobile phones:
- 1973 — The first mobile phone call was made.
- 1984 — The first mobile phone became available for public sale.
- 1991 — Second-generation (2G) phones were introduced, making text messaging possible.
- 1992 — The first SMS (Short Message Service) was sent.
- 1994 — IBM released the first mobile phone with a touchscreen.
- 1996 — The Nokia 9000 Communicator became the first mobile phone with internet access.
- 1997 — The game Snake became available on Nokia mobile phones.
- 1999 — The first BlackBerry phone with a full keyboard was released, mainly for email use, and the first camera phones appeared.
- 2003 — The first front-facing camera appeared, allowing users to take selfies.
- 2007 — The first iPhone was released, combining a touchscreen, internet access, and a music player.
- 2008 — The first Android phone was released.
- 2009 — WhatsApp was launched.
🙋 Do you want to learn more about texting? Check out our t9 to text converter and our article on The History of Text Messaging.
Although the smartphone era technically began in the 1990s, it was not until the release of the iPhone in 2007 that these multifunctional devices became a widespread success.
In 1994, IBM released the Simon, a mobile device with a touchscreen and access to email and a calendar. Shortly after, in 1999, BlackBerry mobile phones became widely used for convenient email communication.
Only a year after the first iPhone was released, the first Android smartphone appeared. The release of newer and newer models sparked a wave of innovation that added countless new features to smartphones, drastically changing the way we use our phones today.
The history of mobile phones dates back to the first mobile phone call made by Marty Cooper in 1973. It was more than 10 years later that Motorola released the first mobile phone to the market.
The first mobile phone that you could hold in your hand to appear in the timeline of mobile phone history is the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X, introduced in 1983.
Smartphones first appeared in the 1990s, but it wasn’t until the iPhone in 2007 that they became widely popular. Early devices, such as the IBM Simon (1994) and BlackBerry (1999), introduced touchscreens and email on the go.
This article was written by Julia Kopczyńska and reviewed by Steven Wooding.