Gen Z Is Ditching iPhones and Galaxies — For BlackBerrys? Yes, Really!

Nick Papanikolopoulos

June 21, 2025

By all accounts, BlackBerry should be buried by now. The company abandoned smartphones years ago. Its final attempt at a comeback—a 5G device promised by a startup called OnwardMobility—collapsed in 2022 without shipping a single unit. The platform is dead. The apps are no more. The ecosystem doesn’t exist. And yet, here we are. In 2025. Watching Gen Z—the most digitally fluent generation in history—flock to secondhand BlackBerrys as if they’re the next big thing.

They’re not, of course. But something else is happening here, and it’s worth paying attention to.

What TikTok Started, BlackBerry Resurrected

The spark, unsurprisingly, was TikTok. Videos tagged #blackberry have surged past 125,000 posts. Many show creators holding up BlackBerry Curves, Bolds, or the white Classic model, usually accompanied by confessions like: “My iPhone is ruining my life.” That particular line came from a TikToker whose post racked up 2.7 million views. It’s not an isolated sentiment. Another creator—@notchonnie—showed off her device with the caption, “Is it practical? No. Is it fun? Yes.” Four million views later, a narrative was taking shape: not just nostalgia, but resistance.

Resistance to what? The infinite scroll. Notifications. Algorithmic overload. The slow erosion of attention that comes from living inside Apple and Samsung’s tightly choreographed ecosystems. BlackBerry—flawed, archaic, obsolete—represents the opposite.

Gen Z chooses BlackBerry: Less Function, More Focus

BlackBerrys don’t try to be everything. They can’t. Most lack modern apps. Their browsers barely render modern sites. And yet, that’s the point. This isn’t a return to QWERTY keyboards for productivity’s sake. It’s a retreat. A digital deceleration. A way to stay in contact without being constantly connected. No TikTok, Instagram or Threads. No ads disguised as content disguised as life.

Some users even go dual-device: a BlackBerry for communication, a muted iPhone kept in a bag or drawer for when they want “real” access. A kind of firewall for the brain. Ironically, this mimics the original BlackBerry demographic—executives who used the device to stay focused before smartphones became social casinos.

An Anti-Status Symbol?

There’s something else at work here too: aesthetic rebellion. Modern smartphones all look the same. Slabs of polished glass. Bezels vanishing into the void. Marginal updates dressed as innovation. For a generation raised on this sameness, a BlackBerry—with its buttons, its LED light, its unapologetic clunkiness—is visually disruptive. It breaks the pattern.

That disruption signals something. To some, it’s quirky. To others, contrarian. But in a social feed flooded with sameness, even bad taste can be a brand.

And yes, Kim Kardashian was spotted holding one. Whether that legitimizes the movement or marks its death knell is up for debate.

A Revival Without a Roadmap

Here’s the thing: there’s no future-proof BlackBerry coming. The brand’s hardware rights were passed around and eventually dropped. The OS is obsolete. BBM is gone (unless you’re digging into old APK archives). And carriers are gradually cutting off support for the 3G and legacy networks these devices relied on.

Still, refurbished models are finding new homes through eBay sellers, marketplace listings, and niche Reddit threads. Many cost under $100. Others are being customized—painted, hacked, given new life as minimalist communication tools. It’s unlikely to scale. This isn’t a mass-market comeback. It’s a pocket-sized protest. And in a way, that makes it more interesting than any foldable or AI-infused slab of glass launching this year.

Final Thought

BlackBerry didn’t plan this. There’s no marketing campaign. No influencer partnership. The company has moved on. But what’s happening here isn’t really about BlackBerry. It’s about Gen Z—tired of infinite feeds, tired of software updates disguised as progress, tired of phones engineered to make attention a transaction. They’re opting out, not because they want to go backward, but because they want to stop going nowhere.

And sometimes, the best way to feel human again is to use something just basic enough to let you think.

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