Ring ring ring ring ring ring ring BANANA PHONE
The Nokia 8110, also known as the banana phone, is a whale of a time.
It’s funny to look at, it feels ergonomically pleasing in your hands and reignites some of the passion left in days of yore when flip phones existed, thanks to its nifty little sliding cover.
But how does it compare to an actual banana? Sure, both are important pieces of modern technology, tirelessly working to make life easier for us all. But which one would you rather die for? A phone that merely looks like a banana, or a literal banana?
Strap yourself in because things are about to get weird and very, very, very, very stupid.
WEIGHT
The Nokia 8110 weighs 117 grams, which is the same as six and a half Freddo bars, for context. It fits snugly in your palm thanks to its subtle banana-like curve.
The average banana weighs 183 grams unpeeled and 116 grams peeled, putting it at 1 gram less than the Nokia 8110 in its naked form. It too feels good in your hand, like it belongs there.
There’s no outright winner here. Both weigh the same. Onwards.
PRICE
As of today, you can purchase the banana phone for £69.99 (nice). With that, you get the phone, charger, battery and a headset for audio purposes.
Banana prices vary, so you can end up paying anything from 10p – 25p depending on your choice of provider. For the price of one banana phone, you could walk away with a minimum of 700 bananas.
Bananas win here. They are cheaper.
CAMERA
Nokia’s banana phone boasts a 2MP rear camera, foregoing the option to add a front facing camera. With its inability to grasp an internet connection, I was unable to send an image taken with the banana phone, so had to take a photograph of the screen. Look, I’m not happy about it either but I spent ages trying to get the damn thing off the phone, okay.
A banana does not have a camera, but can still make memories that will last a lifetime.
Banana phone wins here, but barely.
STORAGE
You’re getting 4GB of free storage with the Nokia 8110, along with an optional MicroSD card that carries up to 32GB of memory.
Bananas famously have very good memory. If you were to accidentally drop a banana, not only would it carry that memory with it forever, it would also display some evident bruising on its skin to remind you of your carelessness. Taunting you, forcing you to become more careful when handling delicate fruits.
No outright winner in terms of memory, both have their advantages.
BATTERY
Right, this is absurd, but one charge of the Nokia banana phone gives you 25 (twenty-five!) days of battery with its Li-Ion 1500 mAh battery. That’s practically a month, if you blackout a few times.
But get this. Bananas don’t even need a battery. You can use them without having to find a pesky cable and power source. Truly, with a banana, you are free.
Tough competition, but bananas win. A lifetime is indeed longer than 25 days, usually.
PORTABILITY
The Nokia 8110 fits snugly in your pocket, with its ergonomic shape moulding to the contours of your body. Its slick finish means the banana phone is just as easy to slip into your pocket as it is to retrieve.
Bananas fit in pockets, that is a universally acknowledged fact. However, it’s not a snug fit. They’re bulky items, depending on the size you purchase. For research purposes, I spent an entire day walking around with a banana in my pocket and seven people in the office asked if I was happy to see them. I was not. Also, I am a girl, so the jokes were null and void.
The Nokia 8110 wins this round.
ACCESSORIES
The Nokia 8110 comes with a headset and FM radio capabilities. It also has Snake, email, 4G, WiFi, a clock, Google Maps, unit conversion and many other applications included. For a smartphone, it’s admittedly a sleek little number. The supplied headphones are basically trash, but you can just swap them for your own.
Per 100g of banana, you’re getting 89 calories, 1.1g of protein, 22.8g of carbohydrates, 12.2g of sugar, 2.6g of fibre and 0.3g of fat. You’re also getting a decent hit of potassium, vitamin B6 and vitamin C. As well as that, you’re joining Donkey Kong in selecting his favourite fruit! Fun!
Winner undetermined. Both contain some good shit.
HAZARDS
If you slip on a banana phone, it’s likely that the phone is going to suffer the consequences far more than your body. I went through six Nokia 8110s for the benefit of this experiment, each one shattering on impact. The casing cracked on both sides and the screen was obliterated every time. Also, the subject suffered an embarrassing tumble, but no broken bones.
Slipping on an actual banana is quite different. While the peel got significantly smushed into the ground, it was the subject who sustained more severe injuries. Broken collarbone, shattered pelvis, broken coccyx and the inability to trust potassium-laden fruit ever again were among the doctor’s reports. We wish him a speedy recovery and thank him for his assistance.
In terms of being most hazardous, real bananas are lethal. Nokia wins this round.
SUSTAINABILITY
Nokia’s 8110 banana phone, according to the box, was manufactured in Vietnam. It runs on an operating system called KaiOS and uses a Qualcomm 205 CPU. It’s man-made and there’s a small crossed-out wheelie bin symbol on the box, which means it must be taken to a separate collection area at the end of its life, rather than being dumped in a regular bin.
Bananas are often mistaken for trees, but they are actually herbs. A banana is a perennial plant that replaces itself. It grows from a bulb in 9-12 months, with the actual banana flower appearing in the sixth or seventh month. They are then harvested and sent out for sale. For legal reasons I must explain that neither grow on the fake tree in our office.
Which is better for the environment? Probably bananas, by small margin.
WATER RESISTANCE
Not a lot of detail required here. A banana can go in water, but the Nokia 8110 cannot. Well, technically it can, but I can verify that it will not work afterwards.
Banana wins.
PROTECTION
With any new tech device, it’s important to keep it safe to prolong its lifespan. There’s no use spending £69.99 (nice) on a Nokia 8110 only for it to get scratched by the keys in your pocket or your pet raccoon’s sharp nails when he’s texting. The back panel comes off the phone, which allows customisation, but it would look less like a banana if you were to do so.
Bananas already have a protective casing – their peel. But with increased handling of the fruit, you can expect it to get bruised and even tear its skin. Luckily, the banana guard (available at your local discount store) keeps it fresh and dent-free in your bag. Plus, it looks exactly like a banana, in case you forget what you’ve put inside.
Bananas win here.
NUTRITION
A banana provides enough fuel to power a small plane across the Atlantic. Just kidding, but it does make a delicious snack! You can eat it on its own, make a sandwich, add it to some pancakes, even make a smoothie if you’re feeling fruity enough. The benefits of bananas are endless, giving your heart health a boost, easing digestion, lowering your blood pressure and helping that pesky fight against anaemia. Plus, stick one in a pair of pyjamas and you’ve got a hit television show on your hands.
You cannot consume a Nokia 8110. Well, technically you can, but it won’t give you any health benefits, unless your pancreas needs a speedy WiFi-accessible device to check its emails! No, you should not eat the banana phone, in spite of its alluring shape and texture. I contacted a health expert and when I asked him whether a banana phone would make a good snack, he replied “Oh fuck off”.
Ergo, bananas win this round.
ABILITY TO WATCH THE GREATEST MOVIE EVER MADE
You can watch Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp’s Adventure in very small increments using the YouTube app on the Nokia 8110 when the WiFi decides to work. It’s unlikely that you’ll get the entire movie due to the site’s famously strict copyright policy, but you can get bits here and there, eventually culminating in an informed sense of what the entire movie is about (Scamp goes on an adventure).
Regrettably, you cannot watch a movie using a banana. Sure, you could buy a projector and then somehow scale it down to be visible across the surface area of the fruit, but that would be chaos for all involved, no less the person that finds you engaging in such a heinous act. You could also use the banana for sustenance to fuel your walk to the cinema, but that’s a technicality and won’t hold up in this extensive piece of research.
Nokia wins here.
Final Tally
It’s hard to pick an outright winner here. Sure, the banana phone is hysterical to look at and makes a very decent novelty device, but bananas are tight as hell with endless health benefits.
Based on the tasks listed above, the banana wins 6-4, however, there were many unreliable factors involved, so the conclusion cannot be taken as gospel.
If anything, the true winner here is content. But also bananas.
Treat yourself to a banana today!
