Hacker News Reader

They weren't great phones, and the iPhone definitely did a lot to push UI/UX forward, but the iPhone was most definitely not the first smart phone.

I'd argue that the Blackberry was the first practical smartphone, released in: 2003. I remember being blown away by the Wizard before the iPhone was a rumor.

Edit: Changed year from 1999 to 2003, 1999 was the 2-way pager, 2003 was the first device that resembled a smartphone.

View on HN

> 2003 was the first device that resembled a smartphone.

I had a Handspring Visor when they were first released (around 2000), and while it was just a PDA on its own, there was a phone module that slid into the back, making it a smartphone. After that, I had almost all of the Treo's starting around 2002, which (what I think) were the first all-in-one smartphones.

And then there was the Nokia Communicator from 1996.

I was going to bring up the iPaq line of Windows PDAs and phones beginning in '99, but you already preceded me by 3 years with that Nokia play.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com