Touchscreen Taking over Smartphone Design; Keypad Losing Ground

According to the market research company Canalys, touchscreens have become the dominant interface of cell phones, while the number of handsets equipped with traditional keypads has dropped significantly over the past year.

The research by Canalys focused on analyzing the primary input methods of cell phones. The results show that touchscreen devices are taking off a big way with growth of 283%, accounting for over 15 million of the 38.1 million handsets sold during the second quarter of 2009, compared with just 3.9 million of the 33.6 million units sold in 2008 Q2.

Meanwhile, keyboard-centric handsets have increased by 29%, accounting for 10.7 million shipments (24.7% of total shipments) in the quarter. Sales of keypad devices, on the contrary, has dropped from 21.4 million units in Q2 2008 to 12.3 million units this year, losing about 42% to both touchscreen and keyboard.

The main driving force behind the surge of touchscreen interface, according to Canalys, is Apple’s successful iPhone series, which fully utilizes the cutting edges of touchscreen in a wide range of features, such as virtual keyboard, Internet surfing and numerous applications. On the other hand, the growth of keyboard-based phones can be attributed to Research In Motion’s BlackBerry devices, as well as the popularity of messaging and social networking sites, like Facebook and Twitter, which require fast and accurate typing. These reasons also explain why keypad handsets are the big losers, as they are neither designed for inputting lots of text nor web browsing.

In fact, as the main smartphone interface, touchscreens can be divided into two types: resistive screens and capacitive screens. Resistive display works with a stylus for precise control. It can be found on handsets like HTC Touch Pro2 and Samsung A887 Solstice. There are many kinds of styluses for these handsets: a Bluetooth Stylus Pen with the functions of Bluetooth headset and stylus, a 4-in-1 PDA Stylus Pen that also works as a pen, a Finger Stylus that lets you use your finger to tap the screen, or simply a Universal Retractable Stylus Pen.

On the other hand, capacitive touchscreen phones like iPhone and T-Mobile myTouch 3G interact with the electric signals in our fingertips, meaning you will have to tap the screen with your finger, or use a specially designed stylus.

As smartphones continue to boom in the cell phone industry, touchscreens and keyboards are probably going to appear in a large proportion of the upcoming handsets. In order to stand out from the crowd, handset makers will have to focus on optimizing the interface design to make sure it is user-friendly and comfortable to use.

Tags: iPhone Accessories, BlackBerry Accessories, BlackBerry Tour 9630 Accessories, Palm Pre Accessories, HTC Touch Pro2 Accessories, Touch Stylus Pen For Apple iPhone, 4-in-1 PDA Stylus Pen