I agree that the requirements should be pared down to the absolute least common denominator, but disagree that the headphone jack belongs in that category. You (and GP) surely have to recognize that at this point requiring a headphone jack is also a niche request.

The fact that the lack of a headphone jack was normalized by Apple with the release of an iPhone 7 doesn't mean it's any less of a nonsensical idea. Unlike storage media, wireless can't supersede wired simply because each of these options has its own strengths and weaknesses and whether one is better than the other is highly subjective.

Everyone I know gets annoyed from time to time that their modern phones lack the jack.

A lot of people are willing to go without it because practically nobody makes smartphones with the jack any more. But given the choice of a phone with, say, 2% less battery and a jack vs. a phone with a slightly bigger battery and slightly better waterproofing... I'm pretty confident what more users would choose.

That's just fiction phone manufacturers want to make true by repetition.

Phone are available with and without headphone jacks. The ones without sell better. The ship has sailed, move on.

Uhhhh no. Most phones lack headphone jacks these days, so of course the ones that still have them would sell "worse". The same can be said about screen sizes, there are no new phones smaller than 5" "because no one buys them". Of course no one buys something that no one sells.

There are myriad models available with headphone jacks. If it's an important feature to you, you have a lot of choice.

The best-selling mid-range phone in the world was the Samsung A51 if I'm not mistaken. I have one and it has a headphone jack. It's only the highest-end phones and tablets that don't have it.

> mid-range phone

I said "phones", without qualification. So while your factoid is interesting, it has little to do with what I wrote.

Bluetooth is the new line-in/out.

No. This software-controlled madness susceptible to interference from microwaves can't possibly be a replacement for just plugging things in. It's literally a Rube Goldberg machine for sending an audio signal between two devices that are a meter apart.

I am more concerned about the lack of a microSD card slot.

I'd love a microSD card slot as well. I suspect, though, that it's less popular a feature than the headphone jack. Until 2016, almost every single smartphone had a headphone jack. Maybe 50% of phones at best had microSD card slots.

That being said... the Xperia compact series is all the proof you need that a small phone can have it all. Good battery life, flagship camera (though understandably you won't have as many sensors as a giant phone), a headphone jack, a microSD card, good battery life, waterproofing, a fingerprint sensor...

It's such a shame that people continually insist that technology we HAD in 2012-2016 is impossible today. All I want is an Xperia Z3 Compact with modern bands and software support.

Hey! I got the Z3 Compact as well. Besides the medicore camera, it was a great device! Too bad mine died with some crappy Google app update (constant reboot loop). Happened on my Shield Tablet as well...