Samsung removing headphone jacks too, have Apple set a trend?
Following Apple’s heavily criticised decision to ditch the headphone jack on the iPhone 7, Samsung now look to be taking their initiative and ditching 3.5mm jacks too.
Clearly having missed the backlash that Apple faced, or just not caring about it, Samsung are reportedly omitting standard headphone jacks on the Galaxy S8. That means that any headphone using 3.5mm jacks, which is pretty much all of them, will no longer work on the smartphones without an adaptor.
The details were first reported by SamMobile and, assuming they’re true, mean that bluetooth headphones are about to get a lot more popular. The report suggests that the only input will be USB Type-C meaning that if you do want to use your old headphones with an adaptor you won’t be able to charge your Galaxy S8 or plug anything else in, though this issue will probably be solved with an ugly clunky multi-adaptor like how Apple ‘solved’ their input issue.
Samsung wouldn’t create the first Android phone without a headphone jack but with a market of billions and as Apple’s main competitor in smartphones it will definitely be the most notorious 3.5mm jack removal for Android smartphones.
Advantages of removing the jack input on smartphones don’t only include better phone accessory profits. As phone’s continue the battle to become slimmer the jack prevents them from being thinner than 3.5mm whilst no headphone jack also increase the battery power slightly.
Whether these improvements will be enough to save Samsung from the same criticism as Apple will have to be seen. Whilst it’s not necessarily a bad move it’s the inconvenience of converting from an established format, one that is still almost universally used outside of smartphones. The news hasn’t yet been confirmed by Samsung itself so we could still be in luck that Apple are the odd one out.