Nokia 8110 4G hands-on: the banana phone is back!

Nostalgia has some great powers apparently, evident in HMD's recent announcement during its MWC 2018 press conference. After raising the Nokia 3310 back from the dead at last year's MWC, HMD followed up with yet another classic being reborn – the Nokia 8110 4G!

Made famous by a short cameo in the 1999 sci-fi blockbuster, The Matrix, where Keanu Reeves' character opens up a package to reveal the slider phone, it's the latest classic Nokia phone to be brought back to life. And surely enough, the new Nokia 8110 4G bears all the same distinguishable aspects of the original – like its slider form-factor, and yes, its banana-esque shape as well. It's constructed entirely out of plastic, which of course makes it extremely lightweight and easy to carry around. Of course, its unique shape and design will no doubt cause some eyebrows to raise if you happen to whip one out.

We'd be inclined to say that this won't be a daily driver for those who have grown accustomed to their smartphones, but hey, it surely can make a decent backup phone if you're going on a long vacation or trip, and don't want to be constantly bombarded by notifications and messages. That's because the strongest aspect about the Nokia 8110 4G is its battery life, which is rated for upwards of around 25 days of standby life on LTE with its 1,500 mAh battery.

The Nokia 8110 is powered by a dual-core Qualcomm 205 chipset running at 1.1 GHz, has 512MB of RAM and 4GB of built-in storage that's shared between the OS and the user-installed apps. Up front, a 2.4-inch QVGA display with a resolution of 320×240 pixels makes the rounds, solidifying the 8110 4G's feature phone status. There's no front camera, but a 2MP snapper makes the rounds at the back.

We briefly navigated around the phone, which does take a short time getting acquainted to because navigating around is done by using its physical keypad. Still, you can do all the basics, such as making phone calls, sending text messages, and even surf the web if you dare on its tiny screen. And yes, you can even play a round of snake if you so happen to desire it. While there's no word about any plans on bringing this out to the US, its price of 89 euros might be enough to tempt people to import it for nostalgia.