AI step aside – 3 ways phone hardware could finally get interesting again in 2025
For the first decade of the smartphone industry’s lifetime, progress was absolutely rapid. We went from the iPhone in 2007 to the iPhone X in 2017, with phone makers implementing massive changes to design, performance, and software with each new generation.
However, in the last five or so years this progress has tapered, with phone makers pushing for marginal gains, squeezing the absolute most performance possible out of existing technologies. Again looking at Apple, the jump from the iPhone 13 to iPhone 14 in 2022 felt more like a hop as the latter phone launched with the same camera, design, and chipset as its predecessor.
Indeed, at the start of 2024 we saw a phone market dominated by broadly very similar pieces of hardware – whether you prefer the iPhone 16, Samsung Galaxy S24, or Google Pixel 9, the average flagship sports a powerful processor, roughly 6.2-inch display that looks fantastic, a double or triple rear-camera system that takes great photos, and a long battery life. A plateau had formed.
With phone makers effectively neck-and-neck in terms of hardware, it looked like AI would be the next great decider between brands, with Apple Intelligence and Google Gemini ushering in an era of software rivalry not seen since the early days of iOS versus Android.
However, as the year pushed on, I kept hearing of new hardware technologies popping up time and time again in rumors, or bundled into new flagships from lesser-known phone makers. Now, looking to the new year, I’m confident that we’ll see the phone hardware race reignited in 2025.
A battery boost
The first development that has me truly excited for phone hardware next year is the silicon carbon battery. Though not technically brand new – the first phone with a silicon-based battery was released in 2023 by Honor – this past year has seen the adoption rate of this excellent new technology begin to speed up.
Since penning our Oppo Find X8 Pro review, I’ve been daily driving the phone and its 5910mAh battery, which continues to amaze me. Lithium-ion phone batteries are more common at the moment, but as Tom’s Guide notes silicon has a higher energy density, meaning a silicon battery can store more charge in the same amount of space.
What this translates to for a large flagship such as the Find X8 Pro is charging once every two days and leaving the house with 30% charge knowing it’ll see you through an evening. For smaller phones like the iPhone 16, silicon-carbon technology could finally give users truly reliable all-day battery life. Having tried it myself, I reckon it could change the game in 2025.
A powerful performance push
Sticking with internals, 2024 was the first year in a few in which we saw significant gains in the world of chipsets. After a few lackluster generations from both Apple and Qualcomm, we were treated to a push forwards on both sides.
The A18 chipset found in the iPhone 16 boasts 30% faster processing and 40% faster graphics than the A16 found in the iPhone 15. While the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite nearly doubled the performance of the A18 Pro found in the iPhone 16 Pro when our US Mobiles editor Philip Berne ran benchmarks to compare the two.
The first Snapdragon 8 Elite phones are starting to emerge from Chinese phone makers like Xiaomi and Nubia, though I’m especially excited to see what Samsung does with the chipset in the rumored Galaxy S25 Ultra. The world’s most powerful phone with the world’s new most powerful chipset? That’s reason enough to be excited right there.
MediaTek has also emerged as a worthwhile challenger to Apple and Qualcomm, supplying plenty of mid-range and budget phones as well as Chinese flagships. Speaking from experience, the top-end Dimensity 9400 chipset found in the Find X8 Pro absolutely rips – I’ve yet to find a way to slow the thing down. It’s great to have a new competitor in the mix as we head into the new year.
Finally, some decent zooming
There’s plenty to be excited about in terms of photography, too. If rumors are to be believed, 2025 could be the year we see a leading flagship launch with a 1-inch sensor thanks to the rumored Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra. There have been other phones produced with a 1-inch sensor, like the Xiaomi 14 Ultra and Oppo Find X7 Ultra. But these aren’t widely available – a 1-inch sensor camera from Samsung, Apple, or Google would set a very high bar for the entire industry, and no-doubt shake up our list of the best camera phones in the process.
I’m expecting telephoto cameras to get more and more impressive in 2025, too. The iPhone 17 Pro is rumored to ship with a 48MP 5x zoom camera optimized for video – that’s four times the resolution of the 12MP zoom snapper found on the iPhone 16 Pro. Further tips suggest that Samsung has developed a telephoto lens with a brighter aperture to aid with low-light portraits. Some might consider this a niche aspect of phone design, but I’ve long thought that zoom is a crucial part of the phone camera experience and am hyped to see some progress made.
With some of these technologies already available, and others still only existing in the aether of rumors and tip offs, it’ll be up to phone makers to either take up the potential with new models or develop rumored tech into reality. I’m also hoping for further surprises in display tech, sustainability and repairability, and adventurous design choices.
With that all said, one thing remains clear: the stage is set for some exciting phone hardware developments in 2025.
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For the first decade of the smartphone industry’s lifetime, progress was absolutely rapid. We went from the iPhone in 2007 to the iPhone X in 2017, with phone makers implementing massive changes to design, performance, and software with each new generation. However, in the last five or so years this…
