Punkt MP02

The Punkt MP02 is not for a child’s first phone. At £295, it is too much phone. We list it second on Knock because it is the right answer for the families we hear from second most often: the teenager who has already had an iPhone, knows what they’re stepping away from, and wants the new thing to feel like an upgrade in design rather than a downgrade in capability.

It is also, in our flat at least, the phone we use ourselves.

What you get

A small, beautifully finished black slab. 88 grams. 2-inch screen. USB-C charging that does a day in twenty minutes. Calls and texts via the network. Signal Messenger as the one app, for the encrypted messaging some teenagers genuinely need to be reachable on. A 4G hotspot mode that turns the phone into a Wi-Fi point for a laptop in a coffee shop. Twelve days of standby battery if you don’t use it much.

No browser. No camera. No app store. No social media. No notifications you didn’t ask for.

Designed by Jasper Morrison, who designed the Vitra Cork Stool and a thousand other quiet, expensive objects. You can feel that the moment you hold it.

Who this is right for

A teenager stepping back from a smartphone they already have. Asking a fourteen year old to swap an iPhone for a Nokia 235 is asking too much. Asking them to swap an iPhone for an MP02 is asking them to swap a stressful object for a designed one. They notice. They tend not to mind as much as you’d expect.

A parent who wants to make the switch themselves and ask their child to follow. The MP02 is the phone that makes this credible. We hand it to parents in our workshops before we recommend it; we’ve yet to meet one who wasn’t surprised by how lovely it feels.

Anyone who needs a 4G hotspot occasionally. It is genuinely useful as a backup. A laptop, the MP02, and an unlimited Smarty SIM is most of an office.

Who this is wrong for

A child who has never had a phone. The 3210 is the better answer there. The MP02 is overkill on price and the social signals of the design (it is the kind of object adults notice) work against it for a ten year old.

Anyone who wants a camera. Even a basic one. It has none, deliberately.

Anyone who wants the phone in their hand this week. The MP02 ships from Switzerland and is occasionally on backorder. John Lewis tend to have stock most weeks.

The detail

Twelve days of standby battery, eight hours of talk. USB-C fast charge. 4G with VoLTE. Unlocked, works on any UK network. The included case is good. The included USB-C cable is good. The screen is e-ink-like but isn’t actually e-ink (a common confusion).

Signal Messenger is the only third-party app. There is no app store. You can’t add anything. This is the point.

The price question

£295 to £349 depending on retailer. It is a lot of money for a phone that does calls and texts. It is the right amount of money for an object you’ll use every day for five years and continue to find beautiful.

We list John Lewis first because Punkt has no direct UK affiliate programme. Buying through John Lewis gives you their returns policy and earns Knock a small commission (1 to 7 per cent through Sovrn or Impact, see the affiliate disclosure). Buying direct from Punkt is also fine, we don’t earn anything from that, and the support is excellent.

What we don’t love

The 2-inch screen is small. If your eyes are not what they were, the 3210 is easier to read.

The software is slow to update. Punkt is a small company and the firmware moves at a pace that suits its scale. This is not iOS.

Signal Messenger on the MP02 is reliable but slower to type on than on a touchscreen. Voice notes work well.

Pair with

A Smarty SIM for the connectivity and the hotspot. The £20 a month plan, unlimited everything, is what we run ours on. If the MP02 is going to a teenager and you want call-log visibility, ParentShield works fine on the MP02 too.

The honest summary

The MP02 is what we hand to teenagers who already have a smartphone and want a step out. It is also the phone we buy our parents. The design is the point. Once you have held it, the case for “basic phone” stops feeling like a downgrade and starts feeling like an upgrade in a direction nobody else is going.