Poll: Do you want 6.44-inch phones? What size Chinese phones do you want to see?

The Chinesephonemarket has got itself caught in a mad race to release the latest ‘hot’ device. They believe customers want 6.44-inch phones or larger, but are they right?

It is very interesting to visit Chinesephone manufacturers at their offices here in Shenzhen, as you get a better understanding of the team behind the phone. UMi are a group of passionate phone geeks (who seem addicted to their own forum), iOcean are eager and confident, and Newman are a more traditional Chinese company.

Although they each have different ideas and management structures the general rule is they all believe international phone customers want larger screen devices. 6.44-inch displays look to be the trend, but bigger is a possibility too:

Gizchina News of the week

Join GizChina on Telegram

People will be making calls on 7-inch phones this time next year!

At least that’s what iOcean’s head of marketing believes anyway.

5-inch screens or more?

While meeting these companies I gave them my views on the current situation in the Chinesephone market, and suggested that bigger phones might not always be better. Perhaps they should concentrate on building the best 5-inch phones they can first, with support and updates, before building larger and larger machines?

So, what do you think? Do you think Chinesephone makers should keep on producing larger and larger phones? Or do you think they should work on producing flagship devices with smaller screens and put their efforts in to improving performance and design?

[poll id=”3″]

Disclaimer: We may be compensated by some of the companies whose products we talk about, but our articles and reviews are always our honest opinions. For more details, you can check out our editorial guidelines and learn about how we use affiliate links.

About the author
Andi

Guest
September 17, 2013
For me a phone should be able to fit in my jeans pocket, so I think the best size is like 4.7 inches with very small bezel, like the Moto X or smaller. A bit smaller than a Samsung S3 / S4 anyway.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  I can think of exceptions however: women would want bigger phones because they have handbags to store them in…
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  I think we should wait it out and see if we get used to the big screens. Its brand new so maybe we’re just not used to em yet and thats why they look weird and huge.
  The plus to big screens is you can see em from further away and can minimize that “hunched over anti social staring into the abyss” look when working on your phone.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  My opinion is: 4 to 4.5 inch is ideal for 720p screens; 4.7 to 5.5 inch for 1080p screens. FHD is an awkward resolution because no matter what size screen you put it on, there is always a problem. On 4.7 inch the PPI is too high to matter. On 5.5 inch, your phone is beyond cumbersome. 5 inch is compromise between the two but in my experience it doesn’t feel like a “sweet spot”.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  Sorry, the above was not supposed to be a reply.
  My reply was: I haven’t had trouble fitting a 5 inch phone in a pocket. Getting it out while sitting (for example, in a car) on the other hand can be tricky.

Alan
September 17, 2013
i think you are asking the wrong question here Andi. Complete measurements of the phone are more important and that in relation to screen size.
A 6,44 inch phone has then what an 8 inch length because they had to add so much bezel? you know xiaomi and meizus latest phones screen size and complete measurements are a good example
- September 17, 2013
  Yes you are right in that a well designed phone with large screen is perfectly acceptable, however we aren’t getting this from these smaller Chinese phone makers. They are just producing larger and larger phones regardless of bezel size and overall width.

PeterP
September 17, 2013
As for design, I like the no logo back 🙂 But if you are going for the simple approach, make it symmetrical if possible, not with the holes to the right. Go read some Bauhaus books. Add some styalised design in the casing, like the oppo headphone surround. Make it balanced with things lining up and research some different materials.
Size, it needs to fit in a pocket. 5-5.5 depending on bezel design/construction materials. > 5.5 or maybe 5.9 with design is a fail. It’s not a phone.
The iOcean x7’s problem was it’s lack of clearly stated gorilla glass or other such protection. I think if it had this it would have been a much greater success.
And what’s the price difference between 2000mah and 3000mah? Again, it’s a selling feature which would have been stand out rather than a buy for small cost extra.
Big Battery, Glass protection, well implemented camera (N003) or novel lens/BSI, dual sim, sdcard, 2GB, 1080, NFC, DIRAC, Snapdragon, Design / Bezels / Solid phone (love the wet noodle comparison), waterproof, colour choice, LTE.
Andi, I applaud your remarks. Developer community support is very important. How hard to give away a few free phones for hours of Dev work?
- September 17, 2013
  Don’t forget more microphones. But the rest is a good list. I would like to see 3 and 4gb ram phones too if its at all possible. From what I’ve heard, 1gb of ram is only $8. It would be nice to see 2gb/32gb standard, instead of that $80 more for the 1gb ram and 16gb more rom game.
  The 16gb 1gb versions don’t really even sell over here the US, the market is more concerned with the advanced versions. They don’t mind paying more for the advanced ones, but more will sell if they can do something about the price.
  Zopo is pretty reasonable when it comes to this. The ZP990 spread is only $30 standard vs. advanced. That seems like a fair markup on that extra 1gb ram and 16gb rom.

Guest
September 17, 2013
Thank for telling them what we really want, or they might not have noticed 🙂
4.7 inch is perfect for me, 5 inch is still OK, anything above too big

Chinese Phone Outlet
September 17, 2013
They need to make flip phones that open up hot dog way instead of the hamburger way. That way you could take calls with it in the closed position and it would be long and narrow, more like a natural phone handset design style. Then you could unfold it and have the full sized screen when you needed that. It would have to be bezel-less on one side tho, otherwise you’d have this huge line going across the middle of the screen when you had it open to full screen mode.
That would give you the benefits of the large screen in a size you could slide into your pocket.
- anony
  September 18, 2013
  Yeah well, too bad it didn’t help Motorola back then. Apparently people don’t really like the idea.

Guest
September 17, 2013
What I want to see is a holographic projection phone where the screen is projected up above the face of the phone so a 4″ phone can produce a 7-10 inch viewable area. You control it star trek style without actually touching any screen, it senses you touching the virtual screen.
Ok now go make it happen, we’re waiting.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  No we don’t.
  The idea looks cool but we use phone not to look cool but to get it out of the way.
  This is the same idea people thought would look good but fall flat in the face of reality (think Minority Report, Iron Man, you can do that kind of control nowadays but no one really want to use their pc like that for more than 10 minutes).
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  Its not to look cool its for functionality only. Name another solutipn to put a 8″ screen on a 4″ phone. I guess you prefer the samsung way which is a flexible screen you unroll like an old school roll up window drape that you see in cartoons.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  Im talking about a virtual screen that just hovers over the top of the phone and senses when you “touch” it. I dont think we have seen that yet in reality. Its obviously the way to go once we get to bezeless design.
  Its the only way to get a bigger screen in a smaller device without some inspector gadget style mechanical solution.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  You will see that in the future. You are also gonna see horizontal holographic matrix screens in bars with a mini live holographic projections of sporting events. The players will be 4-5 inches tall. It will be like watching a live sporting event as a giant 200 foot tall person.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  I prefer thought control to some awkward holographic sure-to-be-hard-to-use-practically, we’re not there yet but it’s progressing step by step.
  The best interface is no interface.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  And what? You’re gonna get a dome just to watch that on your effin phone?
  The simpler and more elegant solution to your dream is near, you just have to support Oculus Rift.
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  Voice interface will be the next step before the holographic displays. For that, you want really good mics in the phone and lot of them (from my very humble understanding of phone tech)
  I want a phone that will recognize my voice to where I can whisper to it with it in my pocket in a not silent environment and it will recognize me and do the command without having to speak in an audible embarrassingly loud voice, looking like you’re talking to yourself in public.
  Basically, voice recognition is the future, and there is a market for making your device excel in that aspect of the tech. It is embarrassing enough doing voice commands to your phone where it overrides the convenience factor of it. Android is putting their efforts to getting better on voice tech, so we really need that top level hardware to take it all the way to the next level.
  People want a speaker phone that they can know for sure that the other side of a phone call can hear them clearly when they are not right by their phone.
  I know the iphone is supposed to have really good audio for phone calls, and that it has 3 mics. I notice that a lot of even the really high end Chinese devices only have 2 mics. It’s one area that I think some revolutionary improvement could be made.
  I would like to the the microphone specs published as an industry standard. You kinda have to dig a bit to find that info usually. If you can find it at all on certain phones.
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  The horizontal 3-D holographix matrix screens will be stand alone devices. I don’t know how big the actual projector size is gonna be but it will probably be projected up onto a surface from underneath and the action will be seen on top of the surface. If you scaled down a basketball court, just do that math on how big the figures would be vs the surface size.
  There will be all different scales of em. Smaller ones for your house. Just to be going on while you watch the game on the main screen in the background, but it’ll be fun to kinda feel like you’re there and have a little mini basketball game going on that you can watch. They will do all the sports too. Anything that has to do with sports like that, there is a huge market for it. Just from bars alone in the beginning when they’re really expensive.
  I don’t know if its really gonna be true hologram tech as we know it either, there may be a cheaper or better way. It’s more like a 3-D projector pretty much, but True HD 3-D where the objects you see take up true depth and look real without wearing the glasses.
  Maybe there’s a way to make the pixels go down into the screen a little bit. Like if you had layers of screens stacked on each other, and you turned on the pixels at different layers to create true depth. In a horizontal tabletop screen orientation, you could make it look like objects were true 3-D because you would be looking down into the screen 6-8 inches or so.
  You could also hang a screen like that up on the wall too the regular way. This isn’t that far off. And it’ll catch on quick because it’ll be undeniably really cool and truly revolutionary and futuristic. But also very useful and practical from a wealthy sports fan’s standpoint. Or a business trying to attract customers and be the first in their area to have one.
  With a screen like that, a business could use it over and over again for in store marketing. They would save money vs. buying flashing printed hologram materials that they throw away after one use.

Guest
September 17, 2013
6″ with a perfect device size and weight is my favorite !
I prefer to use a Smart phone and a tablet in one unit . As we know it “PHABLET”.

Guest
September 17, 2013
I really want a highend which has a 4.5 screen and has a nice look (thin bezels, not too thick and is maybe made of steel or aluminium)
and a FHD Display!
That would be amazing!
Guest
September 17, 2013
As you know I started 2.5 years ago with the Samsung Galaxy Tab, a 7″ smartphone. That size is good for my eyes. Considering advancements in technology today’s 6.45″ are an even better deal, so recently I bought the OrientPhone Mega 6.5. That smartphone also fits much better in the pocket of my suit. So not as large, but a great phone, with an even better screen for my eyes.

Guest
September 17, 2013
Number of Galaxy SIII sold within 100 days : more than 20 millions
Number of Galaxy SIV sold within 2 months (60 days) : about 20 millions
Number of Galaxy Note I sold from Jan to March : about 5 millions
Number of Galaxy Note II sold within 2 months : about 5 millions
iocean said : “People will be making calls on 7-inch phones this time next year!”
Sure iocean whatever yous said, hope to see you next year, if you’re still exist that is.
- Guest
  September 19, 2013
  And your point is?
  The Galaxy SIV that you so aptly used as an example of your “why small is better” example is a 5″ phone! The same size that you would have called GIGANTIC and unwieldy only 1 year ago (or maybe 18 months ago 😉
  Look, it’s clear that there will be multiple size options as things settle after reaching the practical limits of ergonomics that would be comfortable for humans. But I think that this will mean basically two sizes: MEDIUM and LARGE. There isn’t room left for the “small” screen, and the only people that seem to want small screens are trying to get an iPhone experience and for some reason couldn’t get an iPhone.
  Medium will be: 4.7″- 5.2″
  Large will be: 5.5″ – 6.1″
  While I hate to discourage ANY efforts from manufactures with large screens, I’m not bullish on the 6.44″ screen size making it. Even with a zero-bezel, it’s still too big even for the large phone advocates.
- Guest
  September 19, 2013
  Did I? I’m not even sure I’m here 18 months ago. Or is that you grasping the straw I’m seeing?
  Also S IV is less wider (ugly way to put it I know) than S III despite being 5″.
- Guest
  September 20, 2013
  Are you sure you weren’t around 18 months ago?
Guest
September 17, 2013
I want phones with 5 inches and with very thin edges.
Guest
September 17, 2013
4.5″ or 4.7″ i guess better

Guest
September 17, 2013
We dont really care about sizes. We care about package. the screen can be 5.5 for all i care, but just as long as the footprint of the phone is small enough to fit .
I’d like to see 4.7 phones with the size of the mi2s and 5.2in phones with the size of 4.8 phones.
As far as phablets go – they’re great for people who actually want a tablet but also need it to have phone capabilities and at the same time be pocketable.
Also : Please copy the LG G2.
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  Yeah I’d say, do as big of a screen you can do with 1mm bezels with it still being fairly durable. I have never hit the side of my phone on anything it always lands on the corner or the front or back. They should just do a layer of that anti shock material on the inside of the phone on the corners.

Guest
September 17, 2013
This Marketing guy will fail, because he believes in an illusion. Making phone calls on an 7″ device is not the future. IFA 3 years ago, 2010: Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 with 3G.
It’s nice to have 3G on such a device, to have internet connection in more places, but holding such a monster to your ear making phone calls: no way.
Huawei ascend mate and Asus Fonepad aren’t a success. You can’t sell it to people as a phone. Markting people should sell it as a tablet, because it is a tablet.
5 inch are enough for mobile browsing and telephony. Note 2 is too big already. My friend looks like a clown while taking phone calls.
If you want a mobile browsing device than use a tablet or even faster in terms of productivity, a laptop (maybe a Ultrabook or Convertible with touchscreen like mine)
Even apple users are lucky with their 4 inch iphones (too small for my taste, but yes, browsing is possible).
A 5″ smartphone can’t replace my laptop/desktop pc and my 10 inch tablet (galaxy note 10.1) wont do it either, but it’s nice PHONE which features multimedia features like web browsing while you are on the road.
seriously, in what pockets do you want to put somehing bigger than 5.5 inch? Sometimes I need to run to catch a bus/train and in this moments I already think that my 5 inch phone is a small obstacle.
- Guest
  September 17, 2013
  pockets arent a standard size. you can fit as much as you want – that’s why we have such large size selection – so people can get the biggest one they’re comfortable with and is still pocketable and just use that.
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  It all depends what you use your phone for. If you don’t talk on voice calls much, and mostly do text and online on your phone, bigger seems to be better. Looking ridiculous when you’re talking on voice calls seems like its a valid trade off for a bigger screen and less portability for a lot of people.
  And for women, the size issue isn’t as big an inconvenience because they can use a purse. Men and women that don’t carry backpacks, fanny packs, wear suits or have murses, and like to carry their phone in their pockets still need choices for phones that aren’t the size of an NES cartridge. My girlfriend likes to carry her phone in her bra, and you can only do that with a phone so big.
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  That last part about your girlfriend was kind of unnecessary. And kind of awkward.
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  It’s also a fact that not many people in this world pocketing such huge “phone” comfortable.
Guest
September 17, 2013
- Guest
  September 18, 2013

Guest
September 18, 2013
i think you are asking the wrong question here Andi. Complete measurements of the phone are more important and that in relation to screen size.
A 6,44 inch phone has then what an 8 inch length because they had to add so much bezel? you know xiaomi and meizus latest phones screen size and complete measurements are a good example
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  Yes you are right in that a well designed phone with large screen is perfectly acceptable, however we aren’t getting this from these smaller Chinese phone makers. They are just producing larger and larger phones regardless of bezel size and overall width.

Guest
September 18, 2013
As for design, I like the no logo back 🙂 But if you are going for the simple approach, make it symmetrical if possible, not with the holes to the right. Go read some Bauhaus books. Add some styalised design in the casing, like the oppo headphone surround. Make it balanced with things lining up and research some different materials.
Size, it needs to fit in a pocket. 5-5.5 depending on bezel design/construction materials. > 5.5 or maybe 5.9 with design is a fail. It’s not a phone.
The iOcean x7’s problem was it’s lack of clearly stated gorilla glass or other such protection. I think if it had this it would have been a much greater success.
And what’s the price difference between 2000mah and 3000mah? Again, it’s a selling feature which would have been stand out rather than a buy for small cost extra.
Big Battery, Glass protection, well implemented camera (N003) or novel lens/BSI, dual sim, sdcard, 2GB, 1080, NFC, DIRAC, Snapdragon, Design / Bezels / Solid phone (love the wet noodle comparison), waterproof, colour choice, LTE.
Andi, I applaud your remarks. Developer community support is very important. How hard to give away a few free phones for hours of Dev work?
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  Don’t forget more microphones. But the rest is a good list. I would like to see 3 and 4gb ram phones too if its at all possible. From what I’ve heard, 1gb of ram is only $8. It would be nice to see 2gb/32gb standard, instead of that $80 more for the 1gb ram and 16gb more rom game.
  The 16gb 1gb versions don’t really even sell over here the US, the market is more concerned with the advanced versions. They don’t mind paying more for the advanced ones, but more will sell if they can do something about the price.
  Zopo is pretty reasonable when it comes to this. The ZP990 spread is only $30 standard vs. advanced. That seems like a fair markup on that extra 1gb ram and 16gb rom.

Guest
September 18, 2013
They need to make flip phones that open up hot dog way instead of the hamburger way. That way you could take calls with it in the closed position and it would be long and narrow, more like a natural phone handset design style. Then you could unfold it and have the full sized screen when you needed that. It would have to be bezel-less on one side tho, otherwise you’d have this huge line going across the middle of the screen when you had it open to full screen mode.
That would give you the benefits of the large screen in a size you could slide into your pocket.
- Guest
  September 18, 2013
  Yeah well, too bad it didn’t help Motorola back then. Apparently people don’t really like the idea.

Chrispynutt
September 18, 2013
I actually think that 6.5+ phones open up an interesting option.
That is of affordable high spec tablets. Think about it, few 7″ tablets come with 1080P screens & replaceable batteries. The addition of GPS, NFC, decent cameras and 3G radios are functions very few tablets have. I can only think of something like a Galaxy Note 8.
If you could switch them to tablet mode, even small handed folks like myself might get one.
Maybe there will be a new category for 6.5″ smartphones called Tablones, ie tablets that can be used as phones, rather than Phablets phones that can be used as tablets.

Manos
September 18, 2013
G4 advanced 4.7 is the best size and has some power but they can make it smaller in the future we will see that
Allanitomwesh
September 18, 2013
I’LL SAY IT AGAIN.SIX AND A HALF INCHES IS STUPID!
Now,4.5inch with JiaYu G3 bezels,4.7inch with JiaYu G4 like bezels and 5 inch with Xpreria ZL bezels,these are my upper limits.I consider Note 2 too large,and galaxy mega and Xperia Z Ultra ridiculous. You cannot hold it to your ear,you cannot put it in a jeans pocket,THEN IT IS NOT A PHONE.SIMPLE AS THAT. PHABLET is not English grammar,and I will not call my device such.

Chrispynutt
September 18, 2013
I actually think that 6.5+ phones open up an interesting option.
That is of affordable high spec tablets. Think about it, few 7″ tablets come with 1080P screens & replaceable batteries. The addition of GPS, NFC, decent cameras and 3G radios are functions very few tablets have. I can only think of something like a Galaxy Note 8.
If you could switch them to tablet mode, even small handed folks like myself might get one.
Maybe there will be a new category for 6.5″ smartphones called Tablones, ie tablets that can be used as phones, rather than Phablets phones that can be used as tablets.

Guest
September 18, 2013
G4 advanced 4.7 is the best size and has some power but they can make it smaller in the future we will see that

Nickname
September 18, 2013
I dont know why the companies cannot see there is a big product hole under 5″. 4″ well made phone is not existing. There is no reason to buy 4″ phone with the same dimensions as a 4.7″ phone :S
I really miss the 4″ phones with thin edge.
Guest
September 18, 2013
I’LL SAY IT AGAIN.SIX AND A HALF INCHES IS STUPID!
Now,4.5inch with JiaYu G3 bezels,4.7inch with JiaYu G4 like bezels and 5 inch with Xpreria ZL bezels,these are my upper limits.I consider Note 2 too large,and galaxy mega and Xperia Z Ultra ridiculous. You cannot hold it to your ear,you cannot put it in a jeans pocket,THEN IT IS NOT A PHONE.SIMPLE AS THAT. PHABLET is not English grammar,and I will not call my device such.
Guest
September 19, 2013
I dont know why the companies cannot see there is a big product hole under 5″. 4″ well made phone is not existing. There is no reason to buy 4″ phone with the same dimensions as a 4.7″ phone :S
I really miss the 4″ phones with thin edge.

Gizchina News of the week

5-inch screens or more?

Andi

Today in Home