Nokia 3210 review – The classic phone from the early 00s is back

The new Nokia 3210 doesn't really bear much resemblance to the original, as you can see in the photo below: Its screen is much larger, the earpiece much smaller and the arrangement of its buttons is also completely new.

In turn, the new Nokia 3210 has lost a lot of weight: While the original (first presented in 1999) weighed 151 grams, the new 3210 is a lot lighter, now weighing in at only 89 grams. In total, their measurements are indeed pretty similar. 

You can get the new Nokia 3210 in three colors: Y2K Gold, Scuba Blue and Grunge Black. The former color is named after the turn of the millennium, which is roughly when the first Nokia 3210 was sold and Grunge Black is reminiscent of the original gray case in which the phone was first delivered. At the time, Nokia made heaps of extra cash by selling its XPress-On covers, as customers could swap out the front and back case parts of the Nokia 3210.

The front can no longer be swapped out as easily on the new model. You could at least swap out the back cover of the new 3210 since it can be removed quite easily—situated beneath this is the exchangeable battery, two SIM card slots and a dedicated microSD card slot.

The latter unfortunately doesn't transfer data terribly fast, but it can be used to expand the phone's storage by up to 32 GB. This will be necessary if you are looking to transfer a large collection of music onto the device: 128 MB of internal flash storage is sure to be used up in no time.  

The new version of the Nokia 3210 supports Bluetooth, so you can now connect wireless headphones. It also has a USB-C port which enables the phone to be charged easily, and you can use it to easily transfer files to and from the device when connected to a PC.

The Nokia 3210 is marketed explicitly as a "digital detox" device, which encourages users to go without digital media and, more importantly, the internet. The phone offers no option to connect to WLAN—instead, you can only connect to the web via a SIM card and cellular data. In this case, the smartphone at least uses the LTE Cat.1 standard, meaning it can connect to 4G networks. Its possible transfer rates are rather low at up to 10 Mbit/s (download) and 5 Mbit/s (upload).

All the most important frequencies are available for 4G use within Central Europe, where this test was carried out. If you just want to make calls, then you will likely be able to do so in most countries in the world but when it comes to its mobile internet capabilities, the phone's small number of selected frequencies may limit your use depending on the country.

During our test within a larger city, our test device had a good connection at all times.

Nokia uses its own operating system called Nokia S30+. It is based on Unisoc's Mocor OS that comes with the feature phone's SoC. Although Mocor was initially a split-off from Android 4, no apps can currently be installed on the system and the look and feel of it are not reminiscent of Android designed for touchscreens, but rather of old operating systems known from classic feature phones.

Users have the option to tune into FM radio stations as long as you use wired headphones as an antenna. As for other apps, Facebook comes pre-installed, although this is only a link to the browser Facebook page. Speaking of browsers: The phone uses Opera Mini. It's quite tedious to navigate the web due to the device's small buttons and its lack of a touchscreen or a mouse. However, the Nokia 3210 can certainly be used for reading up on the odd topic.

You can play videos and music on the phone, and it even comes with several games preinstalled: This, of course, includes the classic game Snake, which has now been optimized for color screens. There us also a racing game, a card game and a number of other games but unfortunately, you can only try out the demo versions and you'll have to purchase the full versions if you wish to play them in their entirety. 

The phone also features functions such as a calculator, a world clock and a flashlight.

Of course, the Nokia phone isn't nearly as comfortable to use as a device with a touchscreen. You can navigate through the menus using a 4-way directional pad in the middle and trigger additional functions with two buttons on the right and left. The "end call" button closes the current app and returns to the home screen.

When making calls, numbers are entered via the number keys and you can also type letters when writing messages or typing something into the browser. If desired, you can also use T9 word recognition, which was one of the most important new features in the original Nokia 3210. You only have to press the number key once for the correct letter and the system then automatically suggests suitable words.

Theoretically, you would have been able to photograph the big fireworks celebrating the turn of the millennium on the original Nokia 3210—if it had had a camera. Of course, this is one area in which HMD has improved on the predecessor model, as the new version has been kitted out with a 2-megapixel sensor on the back. This should be enough for documenting situations, taking photos of documents or simple snapshots.

The display as a viewfinder offers a sufficiently fast frame rate. However, when moving quickly, you can see that it doesn't quite show the situation in real-time. The camera also only shows a rather narrow field of view and produces images that are very grainy, quite dark and not very dynamic.

In addition, you can record videos, but they are saved in a very low resolution of 320 x 240 pixels and—at 12 frames per second—have more of a slide-show charm to them.

In the year 2000, could only dream of having a phone with a color display. But now, the 2.4-inch TFT screen on the Nokia 3210 (2024) boasts good color depiction. Although its resolution of 320 x 240 pixels is low, this is enough for a screen of this small size. 

In terms of brightness, we measured a maximum of 164 cd/m², which isn't exactly bright. Moreover, the display glass is very reflective, so you will be blinded in direct sunlight and won't be able to see anything on the screen. Its viewing angles from the side aren't exactly the best, either.

We additionally measured whether the display uses PWM flickering at low brightness levels but thankfully, we can give you the all-clear.

The Unisoc T107 is a very slow SoC only intended for feature phones, i.e. classic cell phones such as the Nokia 3210. We couldn't install any benchmark apps on the Nokia phone's system and browser benchmarks could also not be completed in Opera Mini.

In general, the phone reacts quite quickly to inputs. There are no delays, for example when entering letters when writing a text message. You can also navigate through the menu without delay and the pre-installed games load immediately. As a result, the phone offers sufficient performance for its intended use.

We didn't note any noticeable warming even after prolonged gaming; the phone remained cool throughout.

The earpiece is also used as a speaker and it actually doesn't sound too bad for such a small phone. The trebles are not overemphasized and the sound itself is fine. Our measurement chart also shows that the Nokia 3210 has significantly better low-mid values compared to cheaper smartphones. This may be due to the fact that the Nokia 3210's case is a little thicker than that of most smartphones, thus giving it a little more resonance space.

However, most headphones or speakers that can be connected via the 3.5 mm jack or Bluetooth still sound better. Both work smoothly and without interference.

The battery with the type designation BA-L4M has a capacity of 1,450 mAh (5.51 watt-hours). It can be easily removed from the device and replaced, so you can double its battery life with the use of a second battery. However, you currently can't purchase a second battery directly from HMD and we also found it difficult to find any online.

Even so, one battery usually lasts for a very long time: In idle mode, we achieved a runtime of just under 10 days. What really drains the battery, however, are calls via the LTE network or gaming: In both cases, we only measured a runtime of around 4 hours.

You can purchase the new Nokia 3210 directly from the manufacturer for around US$85.