Snapfon ezTWO 3G - Review 2022

The $79.99 Snapfon ezTWO 3G is a bit of a flashback: a voice-only telephone, targeted at seniors, that's expressionless simple to use for actual phone calls. Information technology works with super-low-price, prepaid carriers, too. But it'due south a strictly voice phone, which limits its utility in an age when your grandkids want you to text them.

Blueprint

The ezTWO 3G is an sometime-school, processed bar-style phone (4.0 past 2 by 0.6 inches, HWD) with large, rubbery number keys on the forepart. The LCD is white on black for good visibility, and shows battery, indicate strength, the time and date, and caller ID. On the sides, there's a volume rocker, a lock switch, a flashlight switch, and a camera button. It charges via micro USB, and has a standard headset jack.

Bluntly, the build quality feels a bit flimsy. The phone is calorie-free at two.8 ounces, the plastic feels slippery, and the diverse side buttons and switches are a piffling loose and wiggly—when y'all shake it, yous tin hear the buttons rattle a fleck. That may be so weak, elderly hands can work them, but it also gives the feel of a device that isn't rugged. Several drops didn't injure it, still, though you definitely shouldn't get it moisture.

Snapfon ezTWO 3G

The telephone is quad-band GSM and dual-band (850/1900) 3G. The 3G is the big departure betwixt this and the earlier ezTWO, which was 2G only. Since AT&T turned off its 2G network, the older phone doesn't work on AT&T any longer.

With 2G and 3G, the ezTWO 3G works on AT&T and T-Mobile, only not with their best coverage—that would take an LTE telephone with the 700MHz ring besides every bit the 3G 850MHz band, which ways you need a smartphone. On the AT&T network, nosotros saw the Snapfon'due south reception was a bit weaker than a Milky way Notation 8, which has all of AT&T's bands, only it wasn't awful.

Performance and Vocalism Quality

This is a very easy to use phone, in that you pick it upward, punch a number, and hitting the Phone call fundamental. If you expect to use a phone the fashion you did in 1973, the only matter missing is a punch tone.

You can choose from nine retro-sounding, very loud ringtones, likewise as a vibrate option. You tin can't add whatsoever more than ringtones.

Voice quality isn't the sharpest (there's no HQ Voice similar you observe on LTE phones), simply it's loud. The earpiece hither blares—we had to turn it downwards from its maximum book—so it'southward perfect for people who have difficulty hearing. The phone is too hearing assist compatible. The speakerphone is surprisingly not all that loud, and a scrap thready; it will be fine at a desk, but it'southward not useful outside.

Transmissions from the mouthpiece are quite articulate. Information technology doesn't totally abolish groundwork racket, just voices are sharp throughout.

Equally for battery life, nosotros got 4 hours, 31 minutes of talk fourth dimension on 1 battery charge.

Snapfon ezTWO 3G

For people with failing vision, there'southward a "speaking keypad" option that says all the numbers as you printing them, loudly. There'southward no voice dialing or voice commands, although you tin prepare speed dial numbers. Bluetooth pairing with a Plantronics Voyager Focus UC headset went smoothly, although sound quality is, like the speakerphone, a little thready. At least at that place are no pops and clicks on the Bluetooth 4.ane connection.

On the back of the phone, there'southward a bright crimson SOS button. That will call an SOS contact of your choice, and likewise make a piercing siren-like dissonance.

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The address book is bones, and numbers need to be punched in painstakingly using triple-tapping for names. Texting is painful. Receiving basic texts isn't bad: a loud audio happens, and the text automatically pops up. Simply sending a text takes many steps, with no predictive text. The phone cannot send or receive group texts, images, or emoji.

The ezTWO 3G has a camera, and it's very easy to use: launch it using a dedicated hardware push, and take a photograph with that button or by hit the zippo fundamental. The photos are predictably atrocious, and 640-by-480 resolution to kicking. You need to use a USB cable to get them off the telephone, using Mass Storage mode. (The phone has 80MB of available memory, just you can also add a microSD card under the battery.) In that location'southward a gallery app to bear witness your photos, but no music thespian, radio, or anything similar that.

The camera has one actually good apply: pressing the star and pound keys turns it into a magnifying glass. Considering information technology'southward low-res to starting time with, information technology's going to magnify into some pretty blurry images, but I establish that it tin can bear witness small text at 2x comfortably. You tin't combine the flashlight and magnifier to read menus in the night, however, because they betoken in dissimilar directions.

The two other non-telephone features are an alarm clock and a weak LED flashlight.

Snapfon ezTWO 3G

Conclusions

As mentioned, the unlocked Snapfon ezTWO 3G works with both AT&T and T-Mobile, and a range of inexpensive, voice-but virtual carriers. Ting, Tello, Twigby, and The states Mobile, for example, all accept inexpensive, express plans that are great for this phone. 500 vocalisation minutes with Twigby costs $11 per month. 500 minutes on US Mobile is just $eight per month. If you like the senior-focused customer service of Consumer Cellular, 250 minutes costs $fifteen per month.

The big buttons, loud earpiece, and very elementary user interface make the telephone a very practiced choice for people looking for a low-cost, voice-only solution. The ezTWO 3G is absolutely no-nonsense—it's a perfect phone if y'all're nonetheless working out of a little black address book of phone numbers written in ballpoint pen.

But information technology'south 2022, not 2003, and we call back that fifty-fifty elderly folks are going to be getting picture messages and emoji from the kids, and mayhap fifty-fifty sending their ain photos back. And so nosotros're non going to requite the Snapfon our Editors' Choice endorsement for senior phones—that honour remains with the more flexible Jitterbug Flip. And if you want an piece of cake-to-employ, more versatile device, accept a wait at the Doro SmartEasy smartphone.