Poll results: How big is big enough (displays)
Well, that's it, folks -- the poll results are in, and the community has spoken.
When we set out to gauge how preferences have changed in the past two and a half years, we kind of expected to see a sharp difference. After all, and with the exception of Apple, diagonals measuring between 4.7'' and 5'' have become standard. Whether such a massive change is the result of consumer preferences, or a push from handset manufacturers, remains an exceedingly interesting topic for debate for us, but one best left for another day.
But just how massive of a change are we talking here? Well, two and a half years ago, nearly 35% of voters said they prefer smartphones with screens less than 3.99''. The results today show a telling difference -- a measly 1.19% of us would settle for something as compact. In fact, nearly 75% of the 2011 poll respondents wouldn't even settle for something bigger than 4.3''. In contrast, and even though the poll options are not layered in the same manner, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that the opposite is now true -- at least 83% of you won't pick up anything smaller than that. Also, nearly 18% of us are now officially phablet users. What's more, if we categorize phablets as anything above 5.3'', then that 18% is likely beyond 20%, as at least some of those who chose the 5'' to 5.49'' bracket will get tagged along.
So what do all these numbers tell us? We'd like to explore that in a follow up to this post, but here are a few pointers. For starters, and even though this is not set in stone, one could say that we do not seem to have bumped into a fundamental physical limit just yet, though you could say we're getting closer. So do we expect, upon another revision of the topic a few years down the road, to get a similar reading? We feel it's quite unlikely, as these bumps, like most anything in life, suffer the fate of diminishing returns. That being said, there's no telling what the tech giants may come up. If anything, foldable displays are a little more than fiction nowadays, and those could certainly introduce yet another, even more massive change.
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