While OnePlus (i've owned all OnePlus phones since OP1) is a great example however there is a common misconception that it was "new" at that time. The OnePlus 1 was almost identical to the Oppo Find 7A in specs, price, etc [1]. Also not commonly known, OnePlus was started by an ex-Oppo executive and is actually (majority) owned by Oppo Electronics which is the parent company of Oppo Mobile [2].

Also while price was definitely a huge factor for it's popularity, the main reason IMHO was because it was the first phone that officially supported a popular AOSP at that time - CyanogenMod (now LineageOS [3]) and it even had the logo branded on the back. Almost everyone I knew with a OP1 phone bought it simply for cyanogenmod and how fast/smooth it ran it with no issues. Remember that when OnePlus 1 was first announced in 2014, android phones were well known to be filled with vendor bloatware (Samsung Galaxy S3,S4 anyone?), expensive, became really slow over time and for those of us that wanted custom ROMs, it was relatively painful to flash/root a stable AOSP on any device. OnePlus 1 was the first phone that I had absolutely no issues with having CyanogenMod on it such that I even turned on nightly updates knowing full well that it was tested at least on a OnePlus device.

So yea, I think OnePlus became popular simply because of price and their official support for CyanogenMod which meant a phone with a fast & responsive running android and most importantly, no bloatware.

[1] https://www.gsmarena.com/compare.php3?idPhone1=6214&idPhone2...

[2] https://www.gizchina.com/2014/04/28/oneplus-responds-oppo-co...

[3] https://www.androidauthority.com/cyanogenmod-lineageos-65481...

> Also while price was definitely a huge factor for it's popularity, the main reason IMHO was because it was the first phone that officially supported a popular AOSP at that time - CyanogenMod (now LineageOS [3]) and it even had the logo branded on the back.

Maybe for the tinkering crowd, but I think you vastly overestimate it's importance in becoming a sales hit. I don't have the numbers for how many people flash their phones, but I'd guess less than one in a thousand. They do advance the sales via favorable reviews and recommendations though, I'm sure.

As far as I see, it was simply just the price-quality ratio that made it a success.

It sold moderately well and had fantastic software (up until it was ruined by management decisions...)

I'm not sure how typical I am in this regard, but I was 100% prepared to buy an essential until I found out that it didn't have 3.5mm audio.

I am in the same bucket. I have such a number of 3.5mm devices. A couple of pairs of cheap over-the-ear headphones that I use for running and walking. A few pairs of noise-blocking earbuds: work desk drawer, home desk, normal backpack. A decent pair of headphones.

There is no way I'm replacing all those with much more expensive bluetooth devices, all of which I need to keep charged. And I'm also not buying six dongles or carrying an adapter with me everywhere.

I just don't get the obsession with getting rid of the jack. I'm sure some people don't need it. And I even get it with Apple; they have a strong sleekness bias and it lets them sell more expensive AirPods. But is everybody else just cargo-culting Apple?

All of the big companies know that most people aren't willing to base their purchase on whether or not a phone has a headphone jack, and therefore they don't have much to lose from ditching it. They can use that space for more battery or for whatever else they want to put there. The inside of a modern smartphone is a pretty space constrained place.

Buying 6 dongles would also only cost $54 ($9 each) which isn't a ridiculous price for an accessory in my opinion, especially if you're buying a high end phone that's going to cost you $700+ anyways.

Personally, I just carry one dongle attached to my keychain and keep one in the car. It hasn't been an issue for me yet.

The space argument makes sense in theory, but one very dedicated person added a headphone jack back to his iPhone 7, and it was possible only because there was a suspiciously empty space where the jack used to be:

https://strangeparts.com/bringing-back-the-iphone-headphone-...

I'm also not persuaded by the "most people won't base their purchase" argument, as that applies just as well to adding another 5-10% to the battery. Most people don't base their purchase solely on anything. I may have to go by my local phone stores and chat with the staff to see how much this matters in practice to people.

It makes IP68/69 waterproofing standard difficult to achieve. I suspect that is the main driver.

I don't think it does. It just exposes three (4?) contacts. Less than a USB port. There have been plenty of waterproof phones with jacks.

Galaxy S7 and above are IP68 rated and still have a headphone jack. iPhone X is still IP67 w/o a headphone jack.

I was 100% prepared to buy an essential until I saw photos from its camera. What a disappointment.

As a Nexus owner (4, 5, 6, 7), I am 100% willing to compromise in camera quality. However, something has to give. If this phone debuted at $299 or even $349, I suspect we'd be seeing very different results.

It is a shame too because I think the Amazon Fire phone failed for the very same reason.

In hindsight, the ridiculous invite system that one plus had makes sense now. Maybe they were trying to limit the number of phones sold because each one sold at razor thin profits (possibly at a loss after warranty support).

I was 100% prepared to buy (upgrade to) an Essential phone on Sprint until they pulled the deal after massive abuse (people buying for $150, canceling line, and flipping on eBay for $300 profit).

I'm mostly in the same boat: not having a 3.5mm jack is an excluding factor for me. As someone who has multiple headsets, I'm not surrendering to #dongleLyfe until I'm left with no other options. Thankfully the likes of Samsung, LG and OnePlus don't seem to be interested in dropping it.

I would've had a huawei p20 pro right now if that thing carried a 3.5mm jack, as it's one of the very few phones who fills my other requirements.

I would've liked it to have a headphone jack and a screen about an inch smaller. It's a gorgeous phone.

I was 100% prepared to buy an Essential until i found out it was just another mobile phone.

Downvoted for stating the obvious? $100 bazillion needs to be put in perspective.

Damn you, humourless down-voting Philistines.

The Philistines thing worked with the David+Goliath comment tree...not as much here.

It’s debatable whether it worked the first st time! But I am happy that to be guided.

Would you please stop posting unsubstantive comments to Hacker News?

>This is sad but forseeable as Essential sold poorly. It was a nice phone but it can be hard to establish a new brand right now and differentiate oneself.

I don't think it is, everyone is just too afraid of doing something radically different. Essential phone was just another generic midrange Android phablet at a top end flagship price. Until someone completely throws that paradigm away we will be stuck with the bloated nonsense that smartphones have become. I would give ANYTHING for a 5" phone with capacitive touch e-ink display, 3000mAh battery, and a barebones BSD based OS that did nothing but call, text, take pictures, gps, and text-based web browsing.

ANYTHING? Would you pay 20x the price of a bloated smartphone? In the developed world, that's what it'd cost due to the small market for such a device. Unfortunately, the price point for such a device further reduces the market ... essentially to zero.

not a rhetorical question. Does ANYTHING include 20x cost factor?

I wonder what they do in the developing world. Previous gen bloat-phones or simple flip phones, or something market-specific, closer to what you're asking for.

Why do you think people don't own smartphones in the developing world?

It's really a shame the Yota[1] phone never took off. I'd kill for a e-ink on the back, screen on the front phone with software that was built to take advantage of it.

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2014/2/28/5450258/yotaphone-e-ink-d...

> I would give ANYTHING for a 5" phone with capacitive touch e-ink display, 3000mAh battery, and a barebones BSD based OS that did nothing but call, text, take pictures, gps, and text-based web browsing

Isn't that pretty much exactly what the light phone2 is? https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/light-phone-2-design#/

Not sure if it'll have browsing, but it's got everything else, including an e-ink display, which is probably the hardest feature to comeby in a phone

If you'd give around $300000 it can be done ;) Battery life could be an issue though. Also taking pictures with an e-ink screen won't be a very satisfying experience. Unfortunately I'm not convinced there's much more than a few hundred people worldwide who would pay good money for a "phone" that can't run any popular apps.

And each of those hundred people probably has _one_ additional app that they find essential, that no one else does. It's a brutal market.

Consider building your own. There's nothing stopping you.

I've heard whispers of mini PCIe 3G cards that have "unused" pins that actually offer up a USB device. That's how the USB-to-miniPCIe adapters work.

There are also ARM processors that can operate as USB hosts and run Linux or a BSD.

LiPo batteries are cheap and fun to use. The charging circuits are less fun, but there are probably ways to handle it without too much trouble.

And finally, our good friends at AliExpress or eBay have plenty of SPI-driven e-ink displays and probably a few usable digitizers, although you'll have to combine them yourself.

If you ever actually go through with building this, let me know. I looked into it once but lacked the time to ever finish.

Not quite what you're looking for, but at least somebody trying something different: https://www.unihertz.com/jelly.html

Glad to know others exist that just want a basic device that will last a week without charging without massive bloat and apps I don't care about.

You can get one for <$30, they're called featurephones. The rebooted Nokia 3310 claims one month of (stand by) battery life.

Aggh, sorry...I meant to be agreeing more with the parent comment I replied to. I want all that plus an e-ink screen running freeBSD and some very basic browsing. I don't think old Nokia dumb phones had that.

Feature Phones are still a thing. You can still get such a thing.

https://www.verizonwireless.com/basic-phones/

There's a whole bunch of phones that do basically what you're looking for.

Just buy a dumb phone. It does exactly what you described.

Yotaphone 2 for £103 https://www.gearbest.com/cell-phones/pp_346981.html?wid=1527...

The market for this is tiny, that's why it doesn't exist.

Agreed, I don't think anyone really wondered why it doesn't exist...kind of one of those expressions that don't translate well to message boards

I'm actually really hoping that Light Phone 2 takes off. Seems that they're making a very smart move to specifically contrast themselves to the addictive functionality sets of other smartphones, and Light Phone 2 seems to be in a good sweet spot.

I bought the OnePlus One when it was released and it was and still is a great phone, however their price point now places their newer offerings with the Samsung S series and Nexus/Pixel devices. It doesn't have enough going for it to warrant paying those prices. If anything it taught me that phone brands I hadn't heard of could compete with the top line ranges. After my OnePlus I tried a bunch of Chinese brands and found Xiaomi to have the best combination of features and price in the market, plus due to their ubiquity they also get plenty of custom ROM options.

> The only new brand of smartphone in the last four years I can think of is OnePlus that has had success. OnePlus did this by buying their popularity. By offering a ton of value initially and then raising the price each generation.

Aren't they a major Chinese brand? Seems like the message here is that you'd better already be big with deep pockets to wade into the smartphone market.

They're propped up by Oppo, but neither company will acknowledge it. Having weight like that behind you is definitely a competitive advantage when trying to enter this market as a new brand.

Their ads were terrible. They talked so much about their lack of bezel but the shots of the phone would display apps or pictures with black bars so you couldn't even tell the screen was nice.