I had a Mitsubishi bag phone with a car mounting kit from around 1989.

The thing weighed like 8 lbs.

Eventually upgraded to lighter phones, flip phones, bar phones.

My first smartphone was a Palm Treo 600. Pretty sure I still have it in a drawer. I think I got that around 2004.

I got my first cell phone around 1985. It was a Motorola that was hardwired into my truck. It was great until I got my first bill and realized how expensive using it was. My carrier at the time was Cellular One.

My recollection is pretty vague. First cell phone: circa 2003, don't remember the make. First smart phone: c. 2017-18, an LG, don't remember the model.

1991 Motorola bag phone

First cell was a Motorola Startac flip phone.

First was a hard wired NEC car phone in and about 1989.

Then had a Motorola Razor flip phone.

Sort of "smart" was a Nokia Windows phone next.

Eventually ending up with current Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra.

2003 - LG flip phone w/ retractible antenna (long gone)

2012 - iPhone 5 (still in my possession)

2001, senior year of high school. Some kind of bar phone. My little brother had gotten it, then couldn't pay the bill so I took it over. I think it was like $20 a month for 20 minutes of talk time.

I was late to the smart phone party, probably didn't get my first one until 2015 or so. Samsung Galaxy S5. I've gotten a new Galaxy every few years whenever I need an upgrade.

bar or brick in about 2003 or so,
it was the Wife's phone and she upgraded and gave me her old one,

to answer or talk while downstairs, I had to place my hand on the fridge in teh kitchen,

or go upstairs,



2 or 3 phones later I got a Motorola Droid, don't recall which version, but that would have been 2009 or 10 ish,

replaced that with another droid, then a pixel 3, pixel 7 and now a pixel 10

I was late to get one, and in fact my first one belonged to the Forest Service; I believe it was a Nokia. This was in the early 2000s, perhaps 2002 or 03.

I don’t remember when I got the first phone that was actually mine, and if it was a smart phone. I might be on my 3rd iPhone by now.

1998 Nokia 6162.

2012 Motorola Razr Maxx HD with Kevlar.

It was early 90s. A Mitsubishi Model 92.
Quite the brick.
Billy

Nokia bar phone in the late 90s, then a Motorola flip, then a 1st gen iPhone.

Late 1980's I lived in Nashville & was doing a lot of work in Huntsville. I had to have three plans & 2 phones. Nashville, Nashville to Alabama state line, Huntsville area. I soon dropped the in between service as three bills were too much.

~ 1997/1998. I got a little bar phone like you describe, and I got my wife a Motorola flip. I recall mine was "digital" and hers was analog (radio side I assume). You paid for minutes, you paid for texts (though without a keyboard, it was laughable to think that you might bother to do so).

At some point my wife got an Envee (sp?) with a slide out buttons keyboard. that was neat. My first iPhone in 2009. It's funny to look through our family photos over the years. The quality just started getting better and better from 2009 to present.

My first cell phone was a Motorola “brick” in the 80’s. One summer day I was going to visit a friend and had it bungee corded to the back end of my Harley’s seat when I hit a speed bump on a bridge over a waterway in Seattle.. It flew off causing me to have to make a u-turn 2 miles later and return to try to find it. Found it. Perfect shape & function with just a couple of scrapes. Went on to Motorola FlipPhone. First smart phone was a 3G iPhone in 2009.

My parents got a bag phone in maybe '96 or '97. I was allowed to use it only for emergencies when I started driving at around that time.

I guess I got my first personal phone, I think a Nokia, in 1998 when I went to college because the prepaid phone was cheaper than long distance rates for calling home. I called home literally once per week on Sunday. I may have gotten that phone in '99 and not '98?

I don't think I got a smart phone until maybe 2010 when I was working in Greensboro. I don't know if I ever even sent a text message before that point.

My first phone was back in 1988, a hard-wired GE. I had 60 minutes/month, and I don't remember the monthly bill-let alone roaming and additional airtime. Coverage sucked, and you had tiny local calling areas. I don't recall how incoming calls were handled, but they weren't completely free.

Late 80s or early 90s Motorola bag phone. And I had a two way Motorola pager too.

It was around 2003 for my first phone, a Nokia 3360.

First smart phone was an HTC Tilt (I think) in 2006. In 2009 I got my first android phone, a Motorola Droid. Still on Android today.

1992 or 1993 for me. I was working for Motorola's cellular group at the time, so a lot of us employees were "early adopters" to cellphone service.

A lot of folks may remember the Motorola StarTAC, which was a big deal when it came out. I was going to night school in Chicago, so one of the engineers gave me a beta version and told me to use it walking around downtown. I remember people stopping me on the street asking me to look at it.

As for smartphones, I got my first in 2008. I was on Verizon, not AT&T, so I couldn't get an iPhone. Instead, I got one of the early Android phones and it was a piece of crap. It kept freezing up and going back to the factory setting. I finally got rid of it, went back to my "dumb" phone, then ran to the Verizon store as soon as the AT&T iPhone exclusivity expired in 2011.