If you need a smartphone, get a smartphone. If you need a feature phone (otherwise known as a dumbphone), this effort from Nokia/HMD Global will throw enough features in your direction to justify its price point. Simple navigation, oversized keys, and a lack of other complications, plus the ability to insert two SIM cards and a microSD at once, make it a fair choice as a backup business device too.
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Design
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Performance
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Battery
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Value
The flip phone never really went away. Sure, Samsung and friends are bringing it back in smartphone format but the original dumbphone has proved to have remarkable staying power. One of the more recent of these is the Nokia 2660 Flip, which conveniently includes the word ‘Flip’ in the name. It also includes ‘Nokia’ in the title, in case you’re not familiar with Human Mobile Devices (HMD) Global, the company that owns the brand now.
You don’t actually need to know any of this. All you need is the desire to own a basic cellular phone with a battery that will outlast Eskom’s longest load shedding avoidance streak since March 2021. A desire for monster keys and a return to the T9 keyboard format from the late 1900s would also be useful since that’s what you’re getting here.
Something old, something new
So what does a twenty-first-century dumbphone look and feel like? It’s a fair amount like the devices from the heyday of cellular phones but with lighter plastic. The folded device is neatly compact and even unfolded it’s very easy to handle in a single hand. This owes a lot to the Nokia 2660 Flip’s narrow width and generous keys. Even the cellphones of yesteryear didn’t feature keys this large. There’s the classic T9 configuration topped by a navigation wheel and other physical buttons to help you get around not having a touchscreen.
The Nokia 2660 Flip is otherwise light on physical features but there’s one rather modern(ish) one to marvel over. That would be the external 1.77in display. It’s really only good for checking the time and the odd notification but since it helps you avoid flipping even this low-effort device open, it’s handy to have. Oh, and there’s a camera sensor and flash on the outer side.
A headphone jack, a charge port (microUSB), a volume rocker, and a wakeup key along one edge round out the other features. There’s also what looks to be a dock connector at the base of the phone. Being what the Nokia 2660 Flip is, the whole rear panel can be pried off. Inserting one or two SIM cards and a microSD card (there are slots for all three) calls for this operation. Very retro.
Mocor, fewer worries
That’s almost all there is to this smartphone. The official specs list a Unisoc T107 processor inside the Nokia 2660 Flip, along with a mighty 128MB of storage and 48MB of RAM. Yes, they’re measured in megabytes. When you scroll through the very simple-t0-navigate operating system, you’ll see why. The internal 2.8in, 240 x 320 display doesn’t call for much in the way of speedy hardware. It doesn’t take that much to play Snake, after all, even if the revised version of Nokia’s mobile classic is now rendered in colour instead of monochrome.
It took us a while longer than expected to run down the Nokia 2660 Flip’s Mocor operating system. This OS is developed by MediaTek and is typically used on lower-end phones. Long story short, don’t expect to download and install much, though there are a set of apps pre-installed. Some of these you’ll somehow be asked to pay for, in the case of the trial versions of Tetris, Doodle Jump, Crossy Road, and a couple of others. Facebook, as ever, is entirely free. So are the calculator, stopwatch, and converter apps. There’s also a voice recorder, which is a nice touch. It’s simple to read and navigate, which suits this device’s target market.
There are a couple of other features still outstanding. There’s a built-in FM radio and the flash on the outer screen doubles as a torch during load shedding. We know this because you have to use the Torch app to turn it on. Finally, there’s actually a camera. It’s a 0.3MP camera, sure, but it’ll take photographs. We wouldn’t post the pics to social media unless it was being done ironically, but it’ll let you assign a face to a contact on your device effectively enough.
Nokia 2660 Flip verdict
The Nokia 2660 Flip is a basic cellular phone and it doesn’t pretend to be anything else. It has a R1,500 starting price point, which might seem contentious since you can grab a budget Android for less than that. But Nokia’s flipping dumbphone is designed for a very specific market that will appreciate what it has to offer. We’re talking about folks with (some) mobility or visual issues who can’t easily handle a smartphone.
The oversized keys, simple navigation, and stripped-back features make it ideal for older users, those with some physical issues, and even folks who just want a cheap business backup or emergency phone. The battery lasts for absolute ages when powered on and even longer when the phone is off. That’s handy to have when you’re stranded on the side of the road with a couple of flats and a car boot full of slowly melting ice cream.