Waterproof phones are all the rage. But for Japan, they’re old news for a very bizarre reason.
People in Japan have been used to their devices being able to take a dip for over a decade already, way before Western counterparts.
Why, you ask? Well, manufacturers had to make phones waterproof because Japanese women were so attached to their phones they brought them into shower.
Yup, apparently they couldn’t resist the urge to ever put them down so much that Japan decided to give the handsets a complete lifestyle overhaul.
As a result, nearly every phone in the Japanese market has been made waterproof to meet standard expectations. Even Korea’s LG, which doesn’t make its phones waterproof for the global market, has been doing so in Japan.
This is why the company didn’t bring its heavily promoted modular G5 phone to Japan, because you can’t have a sealed device with removable parts, Mashable reports.
If making phones waterproof so I can shower with them is a ‘standard expectation’, I’d expect phone manufactures in the West to up their game and make smartphones indestructible so it doesn’t break when I drop it two feet off the ground.
And they’ve been making phones better in Japan for a while. The first waterproof feature phone was way back in 2005 – the Casio Canu 502S. Later, Motorola launched its Android-based Defy in 2010.
As more phones came out with removable batteries, Samsung’s Galaxy S5 in 2014 set the precedent for high-end waterproof devices.
Ken Hong, LG’s global communications director, said:
In Japan, being waterproof is far more important than being able to remove your phone’s battery.
For a smaller Korean brand like LG, we need to be able to check all the key boxes to be as attractive as possible to Japanese consumers.
Might be a good idea to buy your next phone from Japan…
