Every now and again a year passes in the mobile world where a clear, overarching theme emerges. In 2022, that theme was consolidation. While there were a handful of exceptions — be it brash upstart OEMs or established names trying to stand out from the pack — most of the industry’s heaviest hitters and familiar names spent the last 12 months iterating on previous successes. With the reality of global inflation leading to rising costs for brands and consumers, it’s not hard to see why many brands stuck with a tried and tested formula in an attempt to weather the storm.
The knock-on effect was a calendar year of phones that, on the whole, looked a lot like the previous year’s crop of contenders. The margins that separate good phones from great ones have become thinner than ever, but there are nevertheless some clear highlights to be found from the class of 2022.