Courtesy The Light Phone

Light co-founder Kaiwei Tang used to work for Nokia, but “I quit my job because I don’t see the point of making a new phone every six months,” he says. Light makes minimalist devices. Its previous phones could do little more than make calls or texts, with an e-ink display and multi-day battery life. Launched in April, the Light Phone III also pares back functionality to minimize distractions, but has more of the features customers expect from a modern-day phone, including a camera, basic GPS navigation, 5G hotspot capabilities, and a Yellow Pages-like directory—but no browser or social media apps.