What year did you have your first mobile phone?

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I think I had my first ever mobile phone (The Brick) in 1998 when I was 32. Checking through photos, I think it was a Siemens S6 and me and my partner got one each (our phone numbers were 1 digit apart) because I was pregnant and he worked away a lot.

I loved that phone. It was pretty sleek feeling.

When did you get your first mobile and how old were you?

Wow spooky!

Exact same as me! 1998 I think. I was 14.

My ex had one of those and I still remember his phone number!

Oh yeah, mine and DH's pagers AND old tiny basic mobile phones cost around £50 each - between 1998 and 2001. That's like £150 now. The little phone hardly did anything. Texts with only around 150 characters: hence doing stuff like L8r, and CU soon. And a tenner for about 10 phone calls and 30 texts. No internet on it, no camera, nothing. There was a few funny little games - one called frog or snake or something. And Minesweeper!

Awww, I've gone all nostalgic now! 😢

2000, I shared it with my mum as I was only 14. I think it was a Nokia 3310

1996/97 I was a student teacher so did a lot of motorway driving. Im almost certain it could run on normal duracel batteries if it was out of charge, so kept a spare couple in the glovebox. DH is adamant that I'm making that up/misremembering/didn't have a clue, but I'm 99% sure I'm not!

I think my second phone was a Nokia 3210, when we progressed to a phone each, followed by a silver flip phone (can't remember the make) by the millennium.

1997. Still got the same phone number!

1992/93. We also had one in ex husband’s car that was wired in and looked just like a landline phone.

A Nokia, Christmas 1999, I was 18.

I went travelling a year or so later, didn't take it with me and couldn't find it when I got back. I didn't bother getting another as I was happy to still use landlines. Didn't really use the internet then either.

My boyfriend at the time eventually bought me a mobile as he got fed up of not being able to text me. I still have the same phone number—he paid extra for a memorable one.

Good times. I'm trying to detach from my phone a lot more these days and it's nice. I don't take it with me if I'm going out for the evening, or out in the garden, or walking the dogs.

1997, I was 17 and just started a Saturday job during A levels. Nokia 3210. You could change the cover and that was pretty wild back then. Oh and snake, best phone game ever!

1997 it was a Nokia with a really bulky battery and a fixed aerial. None of my friends had one so I didn't use it much, just kept it in my glove box for emergencies. Had my first contract phone for Xmas 2003 it was a Sony Ericsson and I still have the same number to this day.

My first phone was this beauty in 1998, You could also put normal AA batteries in it if it ever ran out of charge ( which it never did 😆 )

I also still remember my very 1st mobile number. Also I remember when my dad got his first phone the number actually started with 06. And was 10 digits then they ran out so changed a mobile to 07 and 11 numbers.

@Magicmagician the aerial was the best!

When I went to university in 1999 - I was on a plan where you could get free calls to one landline number so used it to call my parents!

Christmas 1997, I was 13. (I think. Maybe 1998)

Similar to @TeenLifeMum, my mum bought me a phone, can't remember which one. But it was not what I wanted. And in a rare moment of spoiled bratness, I moaned and she agreed we could go and change it for the Nokia providing I paid the difference. Luckily I had money from Dad so that wasn't an issue. It was on Vodafone and I had the same number for 6/7 years when they fucked up my bill and disconnected me. I still miss the number and wish there was a way I could get it back!

I had that with my bt cellnet. I set it to my best friends number so we could talk for hours after school and at weekends.

I had one of those. The SIM card was the same size as a credit card!

1996, BT Cellnet, and I had a brick style Ericsson phone. I think my fav one was probs one of the cool Nokias from the late 90s, but it also had a cool Alcatel phone that was black and white…and took AAA batteries :)

Three years ago. I was in my 60s.

1999
121 mobile.

Nokia 5110 in 1999, and I was a student doing my MA. I loved that phone and even had a utility bag with a special phone pouch on the strap, how 90s 😆

I’d actually worked in London before then for a while and earned quite a bit more, but it honestly never occurred to me to buy a mobile phone, even though I was always trying to find people I’d arranged to meet up with in central London! Somehow none of us thought to get mobiles? I have no idea why not, except that it was still totally normal to just go about organising your life, meeting up with your friends, etc., with just landlines, phone boxes, answering machines and email. Sometimes you’d even ring a bar to ask the staff to pass on a message to your friends that you were running late. Seems like another world now!

99, I think. I was definitely a late & reluctant adopter. I finally gave in when I was in an unfamiliar city & needed to ring someone but couldn’t find a functioning pay phone. I persisted with dumb Nokias for many years, only getting my first smartphone in, I think, 2015. It was an iPhone 5S, and not the latest model at the time. This was the point at which life without one had become a nuisance.

I remember the marvel and utter sense of NEED I felt when I saw my first touch screen smart phone when DS3 was small. Must have been 17 years ago maybe, the small girl I was in the 70's that loved tomorrows world still finds her iPhone today an absolute marvel, to have all the books and information in the palm of my hand makes me so happy.

@Throwawayagain1234 yes, I have always been fairly impervious to advertising and a bit of a late adopter. I didn’t even get a BlackBerry when everyone had one, rarely texted and had a little flip Motorola that hardly did anything. I didn’t even have an MP3 player in the 2000s, and never got new tech.

But I vividly remember the sheer shock at seeing one of the first iPhone adverts in 2007, and just the overwhelming sense of “I absolutely HAVE to have one of those!”

I rushed out and got one as soon as I could. Nothing since has really wowed me in tech terms in quite the same way to be honest.