In the long history of mobile phone development, countless classic models have been born and become the memories of a generation, thus being called classics, or in layman’s terms, “nail households”. In this fast-paced era, many classic products should be remembered by more people, and manufacturers should use them as a reference to polish out classic products for consumers, rather than forgetting their original intentions in frequent iterations.
Especially in the current Internet era, there is actually a very obvious bipolar trend. One pole is the active Internet population represented by digital KOLs. They are the group that frequently changes their phones. Many of them are multi-holders or change their phones every year. They may not have a mobile phone that can be used for more than 3 years. The other pole is ordinary netizens or users who rarely go online. They don’t understand the relevant configurations of mobile phones and use a mobile phone for more than 3 years until it is replaced. Recently, Olympic champion Sheng Lihao posted on Weibo that he used an OPPO Find X3, which triggered heated discussions among many netizens. Unexpectedly, the Olympic champion also used a mobile phone for more than 3 years. This also leads to today’s topic, #What are the nail households in mobile phones#, we will take this opportunity to take stock of the nail household models that have appeared in the past few years.
Xiaomi Mi 6
On April 19, 2017, Xiaomi Mi 6 was officially released. Lei Jun probably didn’t expect that this phone would become a firm fixture in the future. Xiaomi Mi 6 was the first Snapdragon 835 processor to be launched in China, which was very impressive. This processor uses 10nm technology and Kryo 280 architecture, with a main frequency of up to 2.45GHz and built-in Adreno 540 GPU, which reduces power consumption by 45%, making it the best performer at the time. In addition to performance, Xiaomi Mi 6’s appearance was also popular among many people. It has a four-curved glass design, stainless steel high-gloss frame, hole-free fingerprint, flat dual-camera, etc. It is very distinctive, and the price starting at 2,499 yuan is also very competitive.
In addition, Xiaomi also launched a bright silver exploration version for Xiaomi 6. The bright silver four-curved glass is very cool, like a sci-fi liquid metal, and became the dream machine of many people at the time. However, it is sold in limited quantities, which has become a regret for many people. Of course, the exploration version has also become Xiaomi’s gene. Xiaomi has also launched exploration versions of many subsequent products, using extreme technology to explore the upper limit of experience. And Xiaomi 6 has become a nail household mobile phone with its excellent performance, stable system and affordable price. On the sixth anniversary of the release of Xiaomi 6 in 2023, Lei Jun posted a message saying: “Six years ago today, Xiaomi 6 was released. Is anyone still using Xiaomi 6? It is recommended to upgrade to Xiaomi 13.”
Huawei Mate9 series
If Mate7 is the foundation of Huawei in the high-end market, then Mate9 is the one that made the Mate series blossom in all aspects and became an early hexagonal warrior. On November 14, 2016, Huawei’s Mate9 series was officially launched. The price of 3,399 yuan was the highest among domestic flagships at that time. Of course, Huawei also made consumers feel that it was worth the money, and even launched a Porsche design version. From that time on, it was already hard to get a phone. Even now that Huawei’s new products are on sale, it is still hard to get a phone. Huawei’s strength is evident.
The Huawei Mate 9 series is the first Mate series to be equipped with Leica imaging. The rear 12-megapixel color lens + 20-megapixel black-and-white lens allow more users to enjoy the sweetness of taking German-style photos with their mobile phones. Of course, the processor is actually the killer feature of the Mate 9 series. It is equipped with Huawei’s self-developed new generation Kirin 960 octa-core processor, using 16nm FF chip manufacturing process, the latest Cortex A73 architecture CPU, and Mali G71MP8 GPU, which gives it excellent performance. In addition, the Mate 9 series was equipped with the EMUI5.0 system at the time, which was a watershed for Huawei in the system. After 18 months of use, the performance remained above 80%, while other Android phones were less than 50%, making it more confident to become a nail household.
Huawei Mate40 Pro
Another nail product of Huawei is the Mate40 Pro, which not only has excellent configuration, but also has a special era background. The two buffs stacked together make it a rare nail product in recent years. Even to this day, we can still see many consumers using this product on the market. Even Olympic champion Fan Zhendong is still using Huawei Mate40 RS Porsche Design, which shows how strong the nail attribute of this generation of products is.
Many people buy Mate40 Pro for the Kirin 9000 processor, which was regarded as Kirin’s last dance at the time. Of course, more importantly, this self-developed processor is competitive enough. Kirin 9000 adopts a 5nm process technology and integrates 15.3 billion transistors for the first time. It was the most advanced 5G SoC with the largest number of transistors, the highest integration and the most comprehensive performance at the time. Among them, the CPU adopts a three-speed energy efficiency architecture of 1 super core + 3 large cores + 4 small cores, with a maximum main frequency of 3.13GHz, which was the highest frequency mobile phone processor at the time. At the GPU level, Kirin 9000 is equipped with a 24Mail-G78 GPU, and graphics processing performance is improved by 60%. In addition to the processor, including imaging and design, the Mate40 Pro has become a classic among classics, and has also created Huawei’s new nail household product.
Honor V30 Pro
In the years before Honor left Huawei, it could be said that it was killing all kinds of people in the market with its Kirin processor. Huawei’s Kirin flagship products were aimed at the high-end. The next year, Honor could make products equipped with this Kirin chip more than 2,000 yuan, which also made Honor the number one Internet brand at that time. The Honor V30 Pro was released by Honor at the end of 2019. It is equipped with the Kirin 990 processor and is Honor’s first 5G mobile phone. It supports dual-mode 5G networks and the most complete domestic 5G frequency bands. Kirin + 5G, for Honor, sales have soared.
Of course, the Honor V30 series also uses Matrix Camera camera matrix technology. Through the distributed RAW domain AI algorithm matrix, with the help of the self-developed Da Vinci architecture NPU and Kirin ISP powerful processing capabilities, it is deeply integrated with the jointly designed optical system to bring a qualitative improvement in comprehensive imaging capabilities. On it, we can see the familiar RYYB filter array, 409600 ISO capability, etc., which is very outstanding. And when you look back at this product at the end of 2020, a year later, you will feel that it is more classic. Later, due to various reasons, the V40 market feedback was mediocre. Later, the V series faded out of the consumer’s field of vision, and the V30 series became the pinnacle of the V series, and it was inevitable that it would become a nail phone.
iPhone 6s
In 2015, Apple officially released the iPhone 6s. The improvement in product power of the iPhone 6s is more obvious than that of previous “s” products. Whether it is the new A9 processor, 2GB RAM, 1200W camera or 3D Touch pressure screen, they are all stimulating consumers’ purchasing desire. In terms of performance, the CPU performance of the A9 processor is 70% higher than that of the A8, and the GPU performance is 90% higher. In addition, with 2GB of RAM, it can be said to be extremely smooth.
3D Touch brings consumers a new way of interaction. It allows the phone screen to sense how hard you press the screen with your finger, and the phone will achieve different interaction results based on the strength of your press. It’s cool to think about it now. The upgrade of the 12-megapixel lens brought many surprises at the time. It can be said that it was one of the best mobile phones for taking pictures at the time. Moreover, Apple used 12 million pixels for several years, and it was not until the iPhone 14 Pro series was upgraded to 48 million pixels in 2022. In this way, the iPhone 6s at the time can also be called a classic work.
iPhone 8 Plus
In fact, even now when I take the subway, I can occasionally see people using the iPhone 8 Plus, which makes it seem “out of place” after many years of smartphones entering the era of full-screen phones, as if it had traveled directly from when it was released in 2017. Looking back, it has been 7 years since the iPhone 8 Plus was released, and there are still people using it, which makes it hard not to become a classic and a nail phone.
From the product design point of view, iPhone 8 Plus can be said to be the last mobile phone with Touch ID after Apple officially entered the full-screen era. It embodies the usage habits of many users and is Apple’s iconic interaction method. Moreover, some users have feelings for the transition from the non-full-screen era to the full-screen era, and it takes time to adapt. As a very standard product of the era, iPhone 8 Plus also embodies the feelings of a large number of users. After all, the next one will never be like this again. In terms of performance, iPhone 8 Plus is equipped with Apple A11 Bionic chip, which has greatly improved performance. It was a top-level processor at the time, providing a solid performance foundation for it to become a nail-user model.
Final Thoughts
In fact, in the past decade or so, there are many models that can be called nail households in the minds of consumers. You can leave your favorite nail household models in the comment area. The reason why the nail household mobile phone can always be nailed in the hearts of users must be classic. It not only has the significance of the progress of the times, but also has excellent enough software and hardware to support it to provide users with a long-lasting and smooth experience. In this era of transition from smart phones to AI phones, a new batch of nail household mobile phones may be born. This is the precipitation of evolution and the handover of the old and the new.
