- HMD offers four new Nokia-branded phones
- They follow previous Nokia feature phones.
- There is also an AI button on these handsets
Nokia parent company HMD has four new phones for your consideration, but they seem to strike a delicate balance between avoiding and embracing the pitfalls that come with the best modern handsets.
The smartphones (via Notebookcheck) are labeled as feature phones, so you don’t expect the multitude of traditional apps here. Specifically, these are the Nokia 210 4G, Nokia 215 4G 2nd Edition, Nokia 235 4G 2nd Edition and Nokia 200 4G.
These appear to be a step up from similar Nokia-branded phones launched over the past couple of years, but they still offer features left over from smartphone eras past: a 3.5mm headphone jack, microSD card support, and (on all but the Nokia 200 4G) an FM radio.
So far, it’s the Nokia of yesteryear, but there’s one cool feature you’ll notice right in the middle of the device’s front: an AI button. Apparently this is powered by an app called Sikey AI and lets you perform basic tasks on the phone, like making calls or turning on the flashlight, rather than leveraging advanced generative AI models.
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Details on how the onboard AI actually works are pretty slim, but according to Nokia, you can use it to set alarms, open the camera, and add reminders. It can also answer basic questions: the examples given by Nokia consist of producing simple recipes or providing example sentences in a foreign language.
This suggests access to a limited AI model, at least perhaps through the cloud connectivity that Nokia is also adding to these phones. However, it appears the AI assistant is only free for 180 days – it’s unclear how much it will cost you after that.
Video calls and voice messages are possible through the Xpress Chat platform, so as far as feature phones go, it’s pretty advanced. What we don’t know yet is how much these devices will cost, or where they will be available.
The combination of phone basics and a bit of AI hasn’t exactly gone down well on Reddit: posters describe the addition of an AI button as “stupid,” “disconnected,” and “useless” for users who are going to be interested in feature phones.
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