I switched to a Mudita Kompakt as my not-quite-smart phone in January. After 15+ years with an iPhone, I find the Kompakt to be a joyous little device.
The phone feels like an exercise in asking, “What’s necessary?” Mudita’s answers, for the most part, fit my goals. I want a phone that’s simple, that needs very little from me, and that has just enough connectivity. The Kompakt delivers on all fronts and it gets as close as a phone probably can to being a quiet thing.
The biggest drawback is more a critique of modern software: you realize just how many services only work with a relatively narrow definition of phones. It’s like everyone forgot about desktop or web-based software. From Starlink to banking apps to mesh WiFi management there’s this complete assumption that you’ll of course have an iPhone or Google-dependent Android build. So, for now, I still have my old iPhone that gets pulled out once or twice a week to tend to some maintenance task that only it can service.
The Kompakt’s hardware is better than I expected and it’s great to have something so small, sturdy, and well-balanced. Every time I pick up an iPhone now I realize just how dang top-heavy the thing is, like the camera bulge is going to cartwheel it out of my hand. The Kompakt is plastic, but it’s really good plastic! Smooth, well-rounded, sturdy, and free of creaks.
There are 3 flaws in the hardware that I hope they fix in future builds:
- The power button needs to read your fingerprint as you push the button. The current push, lift, touch feels like an invocation of the phone spirits.
- The battery needs to be user-replaceable. That would create a path toward longer term use and, I feel, better fit the phone’s pared back philosophy.
- The screen needs a color-adjustable backlight. I never use the backlight during the day, but at night I deeply wish it was a warm, amber hue instead of bluish white.
All that said, the battery lasts for 4-5 days (even out here in the land of no cell service). And the physical offline toggle that, at first, felt gimmicky has become one of my favorite features. Flick that down and you’re left with a palm-sized e-reader.
Mudita has built-in support to sideload apps, which is part of why I bought the Kompakt over other options out there. The two big additions for me were inkOS, an open source launcher designed for e-ink screens, and Aurora, an open alternative to the Google Play store. The latter meant I could throw Beeper, Instapaper, and the Kindle app on the phone. Outside of that, the phone’s stock software is enough.
All in all I’m glad I made the switch. It’s a quirky, opinionated phone with all that entails. But it’s also a phone that asks very little of you and almost encourages you to do anything but use it.
