"The price plummeted from $1000 to $600 in less than a year" Wow it really is crypto inspired.

ok i won’t buy it as your titles states

Lol, the Bonk on the phone is worth more than the phone itself now 😂

Spot-on review and analysis, sums up my own feelings on this phone as well. I had the Essential PH-1 from 2017 to 2020, basically until shortly after Essential collapsed, and I grew tired of firmware and software issues (partially caused by me modding it, but the bootloader/firmware was also *really* buggy) and the suboptimal camera. With GCam, the camera was relatively capable actually, but it was still a night and day difference when I upgraded to the Pixel 5. That phone was also way more stable and is still usable as a backup today, whereas the PH-1, while it works, has gotten kind of slow. But man, I miss that build quality and the feel of holding it. The titanium, the ceramic, the ridiculous weight, it's something that made this phone seem nearly luxurious to use. I wish phones like these would have more success in this world.

So they corrected some of the issues that doomed the original essential phone... to make room for some new features that will doom this phone. Lovely

Before, Cryptophones were about encrypted data and now they're about crypto currency

Literal bottom signal

really liked the essential phone during that time, especially the minimal black area for the front camera. However, the ceramic back makes it super slippery and made it fall on the floor several times, which then caused the screen to crack. Unfortunately, there was no way to fix that by that time.

I couldn’t imagine building a business model around this.

I'm surprised MKBHD reviewed this device - I was at Solana's exclusive launch event for this phone and it was interesting to see how divided even the hardcore community was

Dropped a like just for the slick af editing at 6:54. Fantastic production quality as always, Marques

I was one of the first 300 preorders and as a developer was excited for the oppurtunity to build on the platform. What turned me of was the fact that even though I was in the first batch of preorders for this "dev-kit" people who ordered later where getting their phones months ahead of me. The drawing line was when a crypto influencer who didn't preorder and wasn't a developer was on social media braging about the gift he recieved from the team. Overall that experience made me leave the crypto market altogether. This phone is a cash grab and in an industry where big name companies are giving their dev kits for free. Paying $1000 to make their platform succesful is idiotic.

I love the fact that you can't market bad products

I legit thought he was holding the new Fairphone 5. 😅

2:47 damn this design looks so good. The camera design and material for the back side is so aesthetically pleasing 😮😮

Aside from the low grade camera experience, the Essential PH-1 was a great phone. My brother and dad had/still have them and their experiences have been really solid. The hardware is great, as you know, but the stock, clean Android build was kept up to date for a long time and they got major updates at pretty much the same time as the contemporary Pixels. This is pretty much unheard of and is to be commended for any manufacturer that isn’t Google or Apple.

That build material list has me interested though, I want to see it durability tested at a level 6 with deeper grooves at a level 7

I absolutely loved my PH-1, had it imported to the UK. It lasted for about 3 and a half years, with 1 screen replacement and battery replacement, and now stuck in bootloop.

Switch on cable brings me to 2000s when I was die-hard Siemens user. But they had it for exactly opposite thing (and placed on little box in the middle of the cable), to turn off charging which was needed in case of firmware flashing (and modding…).

Having a custom ROM for this phone would at the very least give it some better use than what it is designed for.

"It's not easy building a new smartphone company unless your name is Carl Pei" 💀 So much truth in one sentence!

I just pre ordered Solana Phone Chapter 2 for 450 USD. I will come back in 2 years when I get my phone and let you know how is it. Like this comment so I can find it easy. Have a good one.

To think that "upper mid range" is now at the $1000 mark now i was expecting like $700 but then again like you said after a year it dropped to $600 which sounds more mid range to me, on the other hand you can get a pixel 7 for roughly the same price and get a better experience.

5:09 Even that poor dog is sad to be involved with this Phone.

I really really miss these fingerprint-reader on the back! No matter which phone i use, the ones under the screen just don't work for me that well

Whenever a product is made of titanium, I just roll my eyes. Its completely unnecessary in consumer products. Its cost to manufacture vs. the material property benefits isn't worth it. Its all just marketing.

Apple CEO quoted YOU. I'm so impressed. Clearly a lot of hard work to get you to the panicle of UKposts. Congrats!!!

Interesting, Ive always wondered whatever happened to the one hit wonder that was the Essential Phone, but thats unfortunate that the Osom company that came after it didnt gain any traction. The essential phone was pretty ahead of its time design wise and had a lot going for it. If they continued that really premium design element with the osom brand, as well as focused on upgrading the software and cameras, maybe people would have noticed it more. But a caviet with that is that the phone would be insanely expensive, since you already have the most premium materials, and then adding more premium hardware would make it more expensive.

5:49 picks fingerprints everywhere apart from the FINGERPRINT reader 😂

nobody is talking about how you just got mentioned by name in an Apple Keynote. That's one of the biggest achievements of all time. Congrats.

This aged like fine milk

9:25 The cable is cool. I like that. I knew there were cables that were power-only (specifically to prevent malicious data transfers). But I didn’t know there were any cables that (on the cable itself) could switch from power-only to power and data. Thank you, crypto phone (and Marques), for introducing me to that. I will check out that Amazon link now.

I didnt know OSOM were the people from Essential. I loved my essential phone while I had it. Sadly, the only phone I have ever dropped and broken in my life was my essential :( I was sad to hear at the time that there would be no Phone 2, so Im glad to see this company of the same people still moving forward. Sad to hear the direction of this phone though, hopefully they learn from this mistake and move in a better direction in the future.

I'm always impressed by how Marques footage is so highly detailed, I can almost see the individual hairs on his head. Watching this in 4k, it's almost uncanny how good the quality is.

MKBHD please we are waiting for iPhone 15 review

just as an FYI for those watching this now, and it's not like marques could have predicted this - but each Saga comes with 30m in a token called BONK. this is currently worth $200 dollars more than the phones retail price at $600. the phone pays you to buy it and it has since sold out. also, placing the release date of this video on the Solana/USD chart marks pretty much the bottom. heh.

I bought the Essential PH-1 in 2018 and used it for nearly 4 years. I loved it to bits! It was built like a tank, and very unique when all other phones seemed like clones of each other. It got updates faithfully and before most other brands back then. I was pretty bummed when the company failed, because i was a huge fan of their approach. I was really looking forward to this new remake by the former PH-1 team... but what you've shown just aint gonna cut it in 2023... I'm now on team Pixel.

I just wanna make a 20,000$ phone so this man will buy it.

Thanks for the big arrow in the thumbnail Marq, i couldn't see the phone without it!

Anyone waiting for the iPhone 15 and watch 9 reviews?

Hey Marques, worth mentioning as well that the so-called privacy cable is a super expensive cable in search of a problem. It's $30 for USB 2.0 and protects against juice jacking attacks that have never been identified in the wild. It's a nice idea, but definitely not worth it, especially because devices won't share data over USB C without it being explicitly enabled either, like for file sharing or via adb.

One thing that every company should take away from this phone is Titanium body. I don't particuarly mind the current trend of glass backed phones with aluminum frames, but I grew up carrying the "active" series of Galaxy phones in my pocket, and I would love to go back to the days of being able to use my phone as a damn hammer if the situation required. Also I think a phone with a single piece of brushed titanium that goes from the back and wraps around the sides into the screen would look SICK.

BONK justifies the price 😅

And its sold out

i think the best way for new phone companies entering the market is by launching entry level phone first and crawl up the level as the time goes.

Can confirm, I bought the Solana Saga during pre-order phase and as of late it has been a very fancy paperweight/backup phone Edit: dw fam I flipped the Saga-exclusive NFT mint for the price of the phone it's basically free lol Edit 2: Saga $BONK airdrop worth another $600 we're so fucking back baby

Looks quite sleek

Skip to highlight is literally a lifesaver feature

There is always room for new stuff to emerge. It's a pity though that they didn't continue and present a "modern" Essential phone. Imagine that Essential design and build quality paired with an LTPO screen, a good pair of cameras, proper software support and even with last year's flagship chip! The design could have been their differentiator... But no, for some reason they always manage to burn the cash!

$1k?! Nah man I think I'll buy groceries with that

The phone will literally pay you when you buy it. The free airdrop that comes with this phone is now worth 800 usd (phone is at 599 currently) at the time of this writing.

The Essential Phone was and is still my favorite phone of all time. I miss using it. The 360 camera was bomb. Not to mention NO BRANDING anywhere to be seen. Chefs kiss.

We’re at the point where if you’re not an iPhone, Pixel or Galaxy or don’t have an ecosystem, the premium phone market barrier is ungodly enormous and you better come to the table with something special

The unlock power button placement is perfect.

There are some bonk coin on the phone that you can sell for a good chunk of money btw

Just so y'all know, juice jacking is almost literally non-existent. The cable seems cool, but I can 100% guarantee you will not encounter this. Even if you did, modern phones require authentication ("do you trust this device?") before just letting all your data go out a wire.

9:42 ok I will admit that is cool!!!!!

$600 price and already got more than $800 worth of airdrop 😂

It's a niche phone for a niche market. While they had some trouble marketing it at the beginning (bear market and all), nowadays they're selling for $3-$5k per phone. If you're a non-crypto user and in the market for a new phone, there's probably wayyyy better phones out there. But if you're a crypto native and understand how things like dApps and airdrops work - you're in for a treat. Fwiw, the discounted price was $600, but all the airdrops that the phone comes with are currently worth $800+. +EV play

This is the most polite thrashing of a phone I've seen in a very long time

I've used Essential PH-1 for 4 years, loved it so much I actually had 2 when my first was stolen. Surprised to see the PH-1 still looks awesome after so many years.

The PH-1 is still my daily phone when I bought it back in November 2017. I agree, the camera quality isn't great but the build quality is unmatched even to this day. The phone is still very snappy, the finger print unlock is much better than any on screen finger print reader. I'll likely purchase the Solana phone for the build quality alone, but I'm in the minority.

Hey @Marques , you might want to revisit this review , the crypto gift (BONK) that was included in the phone is now worth $600 😁

Essential phone actually looked really good to me when it came out. Very sad to see that it went nowhere and this is what its destined successor is

I bought week ago zenfone 10 and love it. Came from 1+7T, small size and weight are the killing features. System smooth, just back black side already became weared notably, and shows notifications by accidentally touching power button with the middle of pointer finger 😢 But overall, the phone is the very best upgrade I wanted 🎉

30,000,000 BONK included

Apple quoted you directly in the first 5 minutes😊

I wish we could have seen more essential phones. I loved mine. TBH I think it's still one of the best looking phones.

11:05 Almost everyone is saying that the Nothing phone 2 is good priced device, but the truth that it's specs are almost identical to this phone, same Soc, camera sensor with worse building quality, so why nothing is good priced and this isn't?

now they are $5,000 bucks on Ebay.

Refreshing to see someone in the technology review business that doesn't blindly believe all the crypto stuff. The review wasn't biased, you mentioned that you don't like it but I think you judged those features fairly.

Being a brand new phone company is really hard unless your name is Carl Pei apparently - MKBHD

My computer security professor laments how it feels like a bunch of people show up to cryptography conferences thinking it’s related to cryptocurrency. This thing launched about a year and a half too late

Would appreciate a new update on this. Now it's only available through pre-order and costs 450$ with some crypto and NFT airdrops included

I'm just disappointed he hasn't uploaded a video on the iPhone 15 .0000003 seconds after the live event ended

My GF loved the essential phone I bought her. It looked stylish and was just the right size for small hands. I envied that she got new android updates day of release while I was several behind... And they really did improve that camera with software updates. I'd suggest the nothing phone 2 for someone looking for a well rounded device containing some essential DNA

Hey Marques!! The design of this phone reminded me of the fairphone 5. Would love to know your thoughts on that phone!!

This guy is a bottom indicator

What if I told you the smartest thing apple could do was to build their own android phone line 😮

Glad to see you doing a review of this ! i love solana, need that phone

I bet MKBHD is using the iPhone 15s right now. Can’t wait for the review!

Imagine releasing a product in any shape or form just for the biggest and most influential tech guy to say „don’t buy it“ in the title

Zenfone 10 is almost great. Like the smaller size, but the lack of an sd slot killed it for me. Really limited options for me as an sd slot is a must. Stuck with mid range phones as those tend to have it.

I would love a Samsung phone built exactly like this. (with sPen and great cameras) Simply solid.

So essentially the team learned nothing from the mistakes they made in making the essential phone. I don't have hope whoever is seriously buying this phone will ever get good software support. This scenario sounds a lot like the Freedomphone.

I just got a Solana ad…suspicious

...or buy it now and it will be for free. As it's shipped with BONK, thats currently worth more than the phone itself right now (dec 2023).

I think if it uses Calyx/GrapheneOS it would have more of a selling point for "web3 and privacy" I really dig the material choice ngl, but having such a big price at launch and some mediocre spec, its interesting but not worth it

I don't know if it was intentional, but @3:28 there is no OSOM logo on your right hand.

I always find it funny that they come up with how to make the back glossy or titanium. In my honest opinion it really doesn't matter BC majority of people get a case with it BC in reality if U didn't the phone will just slip out of ur hand very easily.

You forgot mentioning the airdrops to phone buyers worth $1500 tho, just sayin

1:35 Ah yes titanium. Very essential

Hi Marques, Great video as usual. I actually met one of the Saga engineers around 6 months ago and in the conversation, Solana’s sole aim was for this to be tied to the Solana ecosystem. There goal never was to go mainstream and the 1000 USDT price at launch came with the Saga Pass- an NFT which would to a certain degree cover the price of the phone. Recently, VISA announced a partnership with Solana for payments and stablecoin settlements and will be getting more mainstream through that. This phone was never built with the intention of catching the masses but of those who are in the web3 and use hardware wallets but with a bit more functionality.

Bought the phone and with $bonk drop. Phone paid it self and had a frw extra $$$ left over

having your phone as a crypto phone that you use daily and go everywhere with is the equivalent of going around with your ledger wallet hooked to your keys chain on open display half unlocked for payments and transfer it if was possible. and lets be real there are tons of lazy ppl in the world who would just plant their 24 key phrases on a note on the phone and the reason i know this is because many ppl still leave their crypto on exchanges. not your keys not your crypto. this is why its very important when you do crypto on a smart phone device you dont want possible hackers cloning/ghosting your simcard. and ppl lose or get their phones stolen on the regular. 600$ phone 50k crypo gone.

Thanks for the infotech brother, i really love that are built with nice materials to last, it's just a shame it was made only for the solana ecosystem alone

None of those crypto specific features require special hardware. I don't see why this couldn't have just been an app available on any other phone.

you didnt mention that it gets free crypto which you can sell, making the phone free

The fact people made profit buying this phone is even funnier. You were the bottom signal😂.

Tbh it's been known since the announcement over a year ago that it's gonna be directed just at that niche. Nobody expected it to be a good overall phone that'll go mainstream. It's just a glorified hardware wallet with a huge price tag and the ability to work as a phone.