New Barbie mobile phone is the perfect pink throwback accessory

A brand new Barbie phone, which is a basic device with no access to social media, has been manufactured by HMD in partnership with Mattel. Photo by HMD/Mattel.A brand new Barbie phone, which is a basic device with no access to social media, has been manufactured by HMD in partnership with Mattel. Photo by HMD/Mattel.
A brand new Barbie phone, which is a basic device with no access to social media, has been manufactured by HMD in partnership with Mattel. Photo by HMD/Mattel. | HMD/Mattel

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A brand new Barbie mobile phone has been launched - and it’s just as pink and pretty as you would expect.

The phone, which has been manufactured by HMD in partnership with Mattel, is not just the perfect girly accessory. It has actually been created in a bid to help young people take a break from social media.

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An advertisement for the phone on the HMD website reads: “Nothing beats spending real time together. That’s what the HMD Barbie Phone is all about! No distracting apps here. It’s time to disconnect to reconnect.”

Everything about this phone is nostalgic, from the flip phone design to the capabilities of the phone itself. Users can make phones and send texts, but not much else. It’s a very basic device; there’s no front camera for selfies, only one game, no social media apps and very limited access to the internet. It reminds me of my first ‘proper phone’ - by which I mean my first phone after the obligatory Nokia brick. I can’t remember the brand now as I bought it about 20 years ago, but it was a cute little pink flip phone. Back then, I was still on pay-as-you-go so I had to carefully consider every character in a text. The phone did have the internet, but I was very careful never to actually load it up or my £5 credit would have been gone in minutes, if not seconds.

Just when you thought the new Barbie phone couldn’t get any more wonderfully nostalgic, the new Barbie inspired phone comes with branded covers to switch in an out, and there’s even stickers and crystals. It also has a beaded lanyard with Barbie charms. It’s everything pre-teen me would have loved. I loved then, and still love now, anything pink and sparkly. In fact, I’m a self-confessed pink-a-holic.

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Manufacturer HMD, which also incidentally makes phones for Nokia, says it's trying to tap into what it calls a "surge" of people wanting a smaller "digital impact" on their lives. If this phone had been available two decades ago, I’d have saved up my birthday money and bought it without question. But, in 2024, I’m not sure stickers and crystals will be enough to stop users from wanting to access social media on the go. It feels a bit like trying to close the stable door after the horse has bolted.

Having said that, I appreciate the bold step that HMD and Mattel are making by taking the time to design and create this phone and putting it out there in the market. I have previously written about my worries surrounding social media addiction, particularly for young people, and why I believe people should only be allowed to use social media when they are age 18 or over.

Although I have loved taking a trip down memory lane and remembering a simplier time in technology, the phone isn’t actually meant for adults like me. It is meant for the pre-teens and young teens of today.

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For people of this age, it is their parents and carers who ultimately decide what they do and don’t have, so I think it’s great that a phone is finally available to them which doesn’t have all the apps that we are so used to having now.

I know some parents and carers of pre-teens today have struggled because they want to give their child a phone for safety reasons, but as the phone market is saturated with what my grandma and mum would describe as ‘all singing, all dancing’ models they feel they have had no choice but to allow them to have a smartphone. Now, they do have a choice.

Not only that, but the Barbie phone is fashionable and nice to look at. Previously, we may have associated these sorts of stripped back devices with uncool, clunky and ugly handsets. Hopefully this Barbie phone is just the first of many basic, but beautiful, phones.

You can buy the new Barbie phone now on the HMD website. It costs £99.

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