iPhone Snags 60% of Japanese Smartphone Market

[MacbookSwitcher]

Most of the Japanese "dumb" phones are smarter than American "smart" phones.

This is an utter lie. As someone who lives in Japan and owns both a Japanese "dumb" phone as well as an iPhone, I can attest to the fact there there is no Japanese "dumb" phone anywhere near the level of sophistication and advancement of the iPhone.

Japanese dumb phones have awful menus, poor user interface design, and are not fun to use. The only reason they sell is because of momentum and people don't know anything else. Also, for the Japanese, suffering is a cultural value, so they prefer to "gaman (我慢) - persevere" through awful user interfaces and suffer together with everyone else.

Finally, as a daily train rider in Tokyo, I can attest to the fact that the number of iPhone 4's and iPhone 3/3G's seen daily is just staggering. Apple has really made a huge impact here.

 

[TheMacBookPro]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_0_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8A306 Safari/6531.22.7)

The posts from TheMacBookPro and BBCWatcher really were nice to read. It's good to know that it's possible for people to know what they are talking about around here

Japan really is a very different market, for the reasons both posters pointed out. I'm moving to Japan in January, and I will be selling my iPhone 4 I use in the UK currently, and I will be buying whatever new Docomo or Softbank (not decided yet though maybe Docomo) phone there is with a 10MP+ CCD sensor so I don't have to take my DSLR everywhere with me.

Flip phones are popular - touch screen typing in Japanese is rather painful. Anyone that does it on the iPhone will know it's quite fiddly really. The large buttons on flip phones are easy to use, and don't impact on the gorgeous screens donning most keitai these days.

Flip phones also protect the screen, and mobile phone straps and charms are hugely popular in Japan. The iPhone is certainly popular, but there is a place for the (arguably) smarter looking keitai and the more internet driven iPhone. There's no decent QR reader for the iPhone, no saifu keitai and no 1seg TV. These are all things I will at least use daily when I move to Tokyo

皆様、よろしくお願いします！

Go with docomo. The coverage is superior compared to Softbank. Unless you plan on staying only in urban areas- in which case pick the phone you like

I once travelled from Tokyo to Kawagoe- one or two bars (940sh) while my docomo phone (sh-06a) held on to 3 bars constantly.

Once I got there though coverage/signal strength/3G speeds was roughly the same.

Only reason I stay w/ Softbank is bc their roaming packages are cheaper, haha.

 

[Sn00py]

Docomo has a stronger overall coverage than Softbank.

Still Japanese phone market is so monopolized.

 

[Sammyrea2010]

I think the Smartphone market in Japan is a bit confusing. The typical phone in Japan has many features a typical smartphone has, but yet is considered a regular phone. And they have for years. So I'm not sure what this article really means, but I think it's good.



Option Poppers

 

[Apple Hero]

This is an utter lie. As someone who lives in Japan and owns both a Japanese "dumb" phone as well as an iPhone, I can attest to the fact there there is no Japanese "dumb" phone anywhere near the level of sophistication and advancement of the iPhone.

Japanese dumb phones have awful menus, poor user interface design, and are not fun to use. The only reason they sell is because of momentum and people don't know anything else. Also, for the Japanese, suffering is a cultural value, so they prefer to "gaman (我慢) - persevere" through awful user interfaces and suffer together with everyone else.

Finally, as a daily train rider in Tokyo, I can attest to the fact that the number of iPhone 4's and iPhone 3/3G's seen daily is just staggering. Apple has really made a huge impact here.

Japan has lots of good phones, and to have an iPhone means Apple has created something really big. I don't live in Tokyo like you, but I have researched a lot about Japan, and I know that their Cell Phones are ADVANCE!