It was in 2016 that Apple announced it would be

ditching the headphone jack.

It really comes down to one word. Courage.

And for the smartphone industry, it was the shot heard 'round the world.

There are several reasons why Apple removed the

headphone jack from the iPhone 7, and

surprisingly, courage is not one of them.

Samsung also just removed the decades-old

technology from its phones, even though it took

every opportunity to ridicule Apple for the

headphone jack's removal in the past.

Do you want to know what else it comes with?

An audio Jack. I'm just saying.

With the launch of the Galaxy Note 10 in August

of 2019, Samsung ditched the jack, too.

Samsung, was definitely one of those companies

that criticized the rest of the industry for not

having headphone jacks and conveniently forgot to

mention that they got rid of it in their newest Note 10.

The headphone jack has been around for more than

a hundred years.

So why are companies increasingly removing them from our phones?

It wasn't a pro-customer move.

It was it was a way for them to make more money.

Let's start with a brief history of the

components needed to make mobile music what it is

today, starting with the beloved audio jack.

The grandparent to the standard 3.5mm

jack, the quarter-inch jack was used all the way

back in the late 1800s by switchboard operators.

The larger jack continued its reign until the

1970s, when Sony released the Walkman, the first

widely available mobile music device.

The Walkman was also the first successful

commercial example of the same 3.5mm

jack we use today.

An obvious next step was the rise of the MP3 and

the MP3 player, popularized by Apple's iPod.

It was 2001 when Steve Jobs took the stage to

announce the iPod.

This amazing little device holds 1000 songs, and it goes right in my pocket.

The Siemens SL 45 was released in 2001 and was

the first phone that was also a mobile music

device, and that set off a trend in the mobile

world. Music was now a must.

But the SL 45 was not the first phone with the headphone jack.

My first phone was a Nokia 3310 and that had a

headphone jack. Back then, there wasn't really

any wireless communication standard that was

acceptable enough to do good headset phone calls.

So it was kind of born out of a necessity to

deliver high quality, you know, headset calls.

By the mid 2000s, there were many phones that

could also play music, but were still limited by

storage and battery life.

Bluetooth grew in popularity around the same

time, and that spelled the beginning of the end

for the headphone jack now that wireless

listening was possible.

While wired headphones may seem antiquated, most

audiophiles prefer the sound quality from this analog port.

The reason why you want to go wired over wireless

is that compression that you get over Bluetooth.

All the Bluetooth standards for the most part

have some kind of compression, which then affects

the actual quality of the audio.

But that wire can be really frustrating,

especially when you're working out or need mobility.

Most the time when I use headphones, I'm at the

gym and have wireless phones.

I mean, it's not that important to me, but the

few times that I do need wired headphones, like

when I'm traveling or something like that, it is

super inconvenient not to have a headphone jack.

And while Bluetooth technology has come a long

way, it still has its pitfalls.

Bluetooth sucks right now, but the optimist in me

hopes that removing the headphone jack will act

as a springboard for companies to work harder at

integrating Bluetooth and wireless audio technology.

Most cars have Bluetooth audio, but a lot of

people, like, all new cars within the last five

years, cars before that have the aux cord that

you plug into, you know.

So why did Apple decide to remove the jack from

the iPhone 7?

Maintaining an ancient, single-purpose, analog,

big connector doesn't make sense because that

space is at a premium.

It's the mental shift that, you know, flagships

have had for the last couple of years.

It's like, it's not a flagship unless the

headphone jack is gone. And that's kind of, you

know, Apple's fault. Premium phones are now

associated with no headphone jacks.

See, there's not a whole lot of space inside of a

smartphone. Tech companies have crammed more and

more into that incredibly limited space, and when

something becomes antiquated, it's got to go,

making the phones thinner and allowing for other components.

The thickest part of the phone is that headphone jack.

I think it was a decision of, OK, we have to use

this space for other components because we've

used so much of the phone's overall size as

screen that we just don't have room for other

components in other places and we have to get rid of the headphone jack.

The removal of the headphone jack also helped the

iPhone 7 receive its IP 67 water-resistant

rating. So there were some good reasons behind its removal.

As much as I do appreciate being able to plug in

a pair of headphones and just have them work out

of the box, I also appreciate engineering in the

technological space.

Most companies have been moving away from the

headphone jack, partially because a lot of the

wireless capabilities of earbuds today have

gotten much better.

The quality is not perfect yet.

There's still lots of room for improvement, but I

think for most people it's pretty good and it

satisfies their needs.

But some folks don't agree that the headphone

jack had to go at all.

When you're designing the circuit boards and

stuff like that, you can make as much room as you

want. I mean, I've taken apart phones that have,

like, projectors inside of them, and there's room

for a projector, there's room for an S Pen, you know, there's room for a headphone jack.

You could look at any tear down that doesn't have

a headphone jack and say, oh, yeah.

There's no way that there could be room in there.

But then you look at a tear down of a phone with

a headphone jack and it's there.

This choice to leave off the audio jack came

simultaneously with the announcement of Apple's

$159 Air Pods, which called into question Apple's

real motives behind the exclusion.

Personally, I do think that it was monetarily

motivated, at least in some way.

It wasn't a coincidence that they released the

AirPods at the same time they took away the

headphone jack. It was something that wasn't

making them money, so they got rid of it so

people would buy the AirPods.

Not to mention the fact that the Lightning port

is a proprietary connector, meaning companies

have to pay Apple just to make a compatible device.

Apple charges a fee to license their Lightning

port. They can get more money if you have to make

a Lightning accessory, whereas the 3.5mm

jack, just anybody can make.

I think there are going to be people scrambling

to license it, and if they can't afford that

Apple license, essentially there's gonna be

headsets that work well with iPhones and there's

gonna be headsets that don't work well.

And when Apple kills something, it usually

creates a domino effect in the tech world.

They removed the floppy drive, they removed the

CD-ROM drive from their Macs.

And people went crazy.

Right? But people kept buying the devices and

their competitors, quite frankly, followed their

direction only two or three years later.

So, slowly other larger companies started to follow suit.

But Samsung kept its grip on the audio jack.

Whether you're listening to the S9's amazing new

speakers, or on your own pair of headphones by

simply connecting them to the convenient

headphone socket at the bottom of the device.

Can I still use these headphones with the X?

Yeah, but you'll need an adapter, or as most

people like to call it, a dongle. A what?

But, with its most recent phone release, Samsung

finally left out the headphone jack without

mentioning anything during the keynote about why

it left it out and even took down some content

that challenged Apple's decision.

If you are going to take such a solid stance

against Apple for not putting a headband jack in

the phone, at least own up to it, I feel like, in the moment, you know?

There could have been a story where, "This is the

best, most compact device we can make.

There's some compromises.

If you don't like it, we have a bigger version

for you. If you don't like either, you can still

get an S10." But the fact that they didn't even

address it was a little bit not great.

Samsung did tell CNBC it removed the headphone

jack to make more room for its powerful battery.

There are still some brands, like LG, that find

the space for a headphone jack, whether it be for

its audio phile customers or its customers who

don't want to, or can't afford, the switch.

In, you know, other markets like China and India,

the headphone jack and actually micro USB are

still important because people can't get rid of

their old chargers or can't afford them.

Luckily for those who want to keep their

headphones, many of the big phone makers are

coming out with lower-cost models of their

flagship phones like the Google 3a and 3a XL,

which include a headphone jack.

There's still a considerable amount of people

that want the headphone jack because they can't

afford, you know, wireless earbuds that are good.

There are so many awesome phones at the $500

level that still have the headphone jack because

people who are buying cheaper phones probably

don't have an extra $100, $200 bucks to throw

down on some wireless headphones.

But those $500 phones are, they do 95% of what a

$1000 phone does.

Like it or not, it looks like the headphone jack

is gone for good when it comes to the top-end

flagship phones.

I think they are going for the portless phone and

they won't stop until they get there.

In fact, some speculate we might not even get

buttons in a few years.

There is no fingerprint sensor, no buttons and,

you know, charges wirelessly.

So it might even be, you know, no more USB port.

So what can you do?

You can go spend $1000 every year if you really

want to, but you're not getting a return on that

$1000. A $500 phone is more than enough for the

average person. And whether it has the headphone

jack or not, I would just say, you know, use your

phone as long as possible because there's no

reason to upgrade. Which is kind of strange

coming from a tech reviewer who makes a living

off of reviewing cellphones.