Review: HTC Touch 3G

Phone rating:

In a nutshell: The HTC Touch 3G is a compact touchscreen smartphone equipped with a 3.2 megapixel camera, MP3 player, FM radio, GPS, HSDPA, WiFi and Bluetooth. It's a very lightweight smartphone, but we feel that the display is too small and the battery life is poor. Check out the top 10 independent deals for the Touch 3G below, or click to read the full review and user reviews.

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HTC Touch 3G Review

Review: April 2009.

The HTC Touch 3G is the most compact version of HTC's touchscreen smartphone range. It's very compact indeed and weighs just 96g, making it one of the lightest smartphones currently available. But it's small size means that it has a small display, and this is bound to be bad news for a touchscreen phone.

The Touch 3G isn't light on features. It includes most of the features of its big brother, the HTC Touch HD. The list includes the Windows Mobile operating system, GPS, MP3 player plus radio, HSDPA 7.2 Mbps and plenty of memory. The compromises that have been made to fit everything into the small form factor are threefold: the display, the camera and the battery.

The display is disappointingly small. At just 2.8 inches across and with a lowly resolution of 320 x 240 pixels and 65k colours, it just isn't quite big enough for either the touchscreen UI or the web browser.

The camera is a let down too, being 3.2 megapixels and fixed focus. It's really just a toy camera.

The battery life isn't the worst we've seen - not by a long way! But it certainly isn't the best, and it isn't really enough to power the features of this phone. If you use the WiFi, the Bluetooth and the GPS, you'll drain the battery rather quickly.

Don't get us wrong - the Touch 3G isn't all bad. The TouchFLO 3D user interface is a great UI, but you'll need to be careful and patient to use it on this screen size. We also like the Windows Mobile OS. Web browsing is fast, using either the HSDPA 7.2 Mbps connection or the WiFi, but again, it's compromised by the screen size and resolution. It's the same story with the GPS and Google Maps.

The audio capabilities of the Touch 3G are good however. It's equipped with a music player capable of playing all the main digital formats - MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+ and WMA - and is easy to synch with Windows Media Player on a PC. The phone comes with plenty of built-in memory and can take microSD cards too.

HTC have tried hard to produce a feature-packed yet compact device, and they have succeeded. But having used it, you understand why most smartphones are so much larger.

Features of the HTC Touch 3G include:

• 3.2 megapixel camera
• Video recording
• Display: TFT, 65k colours, 320 x 240 pixels (2.8 inches)
• GPS receiver
• Music player (MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WMA formats)
• Stereo FM radio
• Messaging: SMS, EMS, MMS, Email
• Ringtones: 40 voice polyphonic ringtones / MP3 ringtones
• Wallpaper
• Java
• Internet: GPRS, EDGE, HSDPA (7.2 Mbps)
• Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.0 with Enhanced Data Rate, mini-USB 2.0, Wi-Fi
• Memory: 192 MB RAM plus microSD memory card
• Vibration alert
• Quadband GSM (850/900/1800/1900 MHz) plus HSDPA/WCDMA (900/2100 MHz)
• Size: 102 x 54 x 14.5 mm
• Weight: 96g
• Talktime: 360 - 400 minutes
• Battery standby: 365 - 450 hours

HTC Touch 3G Consumer Reviews

Love your mobile? Hate it? Please share your experiences to help other people choose the phone that's best for them. Please do not review this phone if you have not used it. This is a review site, not a forum, so please don't just ask questions. Please do not use swear words or offensive language, and please, no advertising!

Average rating from 21 reviews:

Reviewed by chris from uk on 6th Feb 2010
Im sorry but who ever reviewed this made the mistake like me when buying this phone of reading the box and thinks this phone has fm radio. THERE IS NO FM RADIO ON THIS PHONE. Its running system is a bit strange, maybe me being used to sony's . Would not buy this phone if i knew how difficult it would be to get used to, much prefere a phone with an actual keyboard rather than touch screen as this activates when your on the phone. Also very little storage on phone so you have to buy a card for the phone and can only use the headphones supplied with the phone due to mini usb . These head phones are not great. compared to the set i had on my sony .
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Reviewed by James Tetley from UK on 4th Nov 2009
This phone is the biggest Pile of junk iv ever used in my life, thank you very much for the amount of money you have made me loose, thank you very much for the amount of stress you caused me just trying to senda simple txt message, thank you for all the times it crashes and i loose my contacts and then have to make a face book page to get them back. thank you for all the times when i charge it over night and it runs out of battery 4 hours later. Thank you for the amazing cammera that takes pictures that are black and pixilated. If i ever get my hands on the phone developer I will make him eat this phone. I recon there should be a minus star system cos I hate it so much
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Reviewed by indybones from uk on 18th Oct 2009
I wish I could put zero stars, this phone SUCKS SO MUCH.. There is not one good thing to say about it apart from the fact that I look forward to the day my contract ends and I can dump this awful phone into the darkest deepest lake where it belongs. Please please if any one is considering getting this then DONT, it has almost seen the hard side of numerous concrete floors and brick walls on many occasions. It doesn't deserve the time spent for me going through all the pros and cons because there are no pros what so ever... IT ALL JUST SUCKS AVOID LIKE A BAD CASE OF EBOLA! Two plastic cups tied together with string would be better than this.
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Reviewed by Jack from india on 20th Aug 2009
-NOT user friendly -Connectivity issues & complications with bluetooth -Nokia PC suite makes life so simple, HTC's active sync sucks -terrible battery life -GPS good on google maps -hangs -voice reception bad -prefer E71 or 63 as its so so so user friendly and useful, can store sms, send sms using pc suite, it ROCKS... HTC SUCKS!!!
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Reviewed by KJ from UK on 14th Aug 2009
Great phone from HTC BUT (and its a big one) this phone (from Orange) DOES NOT allow you to connect to your own wireless router at home to access the internet. In Orange's own documentation (once you buy it) it says: "When you browse the internet on your phone, your service plan data charges will apply, even if you are connected using the Unique service. Unique is designed to boost your mobile call coverage and wont connect you to the internet through your home broadband" Orange have basically disabled the standard Windows Mobile WIFI programs and replaced it with their own "Unique" software. Great phone from HTC but BADLY let down by Orange's own software. On top of that the TouchFLO weather applet is very disappointing since the choose of cities/town to select is very very limited. They could easily have written the selection list as an XML file and given out that information so it is easy for most people to amend it and add their own place when we know the Accuweather supports all places. This issue has been outstanding for YEARS. So many great things but very let down by extremely poor thoughts to the TouchFLO and Orange Unique software.
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Reviewed by Peter from London on 12th Jul 2009
This is a rubbish phone. Does not work as advertised.
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Reviewed by Loosekonnection from UK on 24th Jun 2009
richie, How the hell does it kick the iphones bum????? have used both exstensively and the iphone by far one of the best devices on the market, granted a little expensive but still far more advanced. Being an MCP, every day I'm being drawn towards Apples technology more & more every day!! Oh no theres a problem??? Microsoft's answer: lets create an app that appologises for this problem.. Apples answer: lets fix the problem..
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Reviewed by Jason from England on 5th Jun 2009
Best phone ever made.
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Reviewed by JR from Belgium on 2nd Jun 2009
Unfortunate the reviewer did such a poor job on this fantastic phone. Where did you get the FM radio from? If you want all the WM functionality and not to have to travel with a clunker (like the Omnia i900 I also have) get this beauty.
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Reviewed by chris from cyprus on 26th May 2009
buy yourself a couple of spare batteries cos these guys drain in no time at all. I was getting about a day out of the battery with normal useage. Good looking compact phone but the virtual keypad is a bit on the small side so you will need to use the stylus most of the time.
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Reviewed by Andy from UK on 10th May 2009
Great phone. Unfortunately on Orange the Unique software cripples the WiFi and orange refuse to provide any technical support because Wifi (advertised feature) is only supported if you are connecting to an orange brand router. (p.s. wifi works fine if hard reset and connected through normal windows network connection manager)
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Reviewed by rob from England on 19th Apr 2009
I agree with Tim on the ear touching the touch screen cutting you off from your call and putting it into flight mode, highly annoying. have had 7 already, thanks to my network for having cheap insurance. Cant wait to upgrade. lots of geeky features rubbish camera and not user friendly especially after a few drinks when you trying to type in a random girls no.
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Reviewed by Vishal from UK on 16th Apr 2009
I've had the phone for a week on orange as a free upgrade. Great phone feels and looks good. Got all the essentials, Wifi, gps, windows mobile etc. Used to have a brick in the htc tytn ii which messed up all the time but this seems more robust. So far so good!
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Reviewed by Tim from UK on 13th Apr 2009
To Bod, The flight mode problem was a major fault I found with the original Touch, it's your ear touching "comm manager" and then pressing the flight mode button during a call. Sad to hear that the 3G is plagued by the problems of the original touch.
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Reviewed by S from UK on 12th Apr 2009
A good phone for the price, having email on the move is great and easy to set up. Touch screen can be a bit hit and miss at times when texting but is generally ok with a choice of full qwerty, compact qwerty (like blackberry) or standard phone keyboard. Google maps can be downloaded which is useful, then if you have the address in your contacts from the menu you can select 'locate in google maps' and even get directions to take you there. Camera is adequate but not great, but overall I would recommend it.
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Reviewed by bod from wales on 10th Apr 2009
just couldnt stand the thing! im always on the move so texting was a pain, signal strength very poor , dropped 8 buisness lead calls in a week. also kept switching to flight mode while in a call. il stick with a less techi thing that works as a phone first with gadgets later. by the way with bluetooth on battery life was just a working day if not used much
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Reviewed by Polly from Scotland on 7th Apr 2009
Can't handle this phone, maybe just me but rather slow and not as slick as it was made out to be. Temprementle to the touch and stylus. What phone next? Don't really know? Applications work well but slow to save, store and move between programmes. Not a bad phone just not as great as it was made out.
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Reviewed by Tom from uk on 30th Mar 2009
What! U still use an iphone and its last century tech? ROTFLMAO :D:D:D:D:D: haven't you heard the HTC Touch 3G is now available with todays most cutting edge tech THAT ACTUALLY WORKS as stated !!!!
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Reviewed by richie from uk on 25th Mar 2009
this kicks the iphones bum.
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Reviewed by Andreas from CH on 23rd Feb 2009
Great phone. Love it.
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Reviewed by kk from somewhere on 4th Feb 2009
1st :-)
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HTC Touch 3G links