Before the iPhone, There Was IBM Simon: A Look Back at the First Smartphone
A recently resurfaced ad for the IBM Simon Personal Communicator is making the rounds on Hacker News, showcasing what many consider the first true smartphone. Released in 1994, the Simon combined a phone, fax machine, pager, and PDA into a single touchscreen device—over a decade before the iPhone redefined the category.
The ad itself is a time capsule, pitching features like email, a calendar, and a notepad as futuristic conveniences bundled into one device you could carry around. Weighing over a pound and priced at $899 with a service contract, the Simon was a commercial footnote, but its core idea—one device replacing many—proved prophetic.
The device sold only about 50,000 units before being discontinued, but it laid conceptual groundwork that companies like Palm, Nokia, and eventually Apple would build on.