At last week’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, some of the new announcements revolved around the comebacks of (quite) old mobile technology features. BlackBerry announced its KEYOne, which features a sophisticated take on an old-school QWERTY keyboard. And what’s more, Nokia brought back its beloved 3310, all spruced up for 2017 while remaining true to its turn-of-the-century roots.

In honor of old favorites winning back some of the limelight, we decided to take a look back at the brief but sensational life of the mobile phone.

The first mobile phone call was made on April 3, 1973, using a prototype of the Motorola DynaTAC 8000x. At almost 2 whopping pounds and a price tag just shy of $4,000, it took another 10 years before this brontosaur was sold commercially as the world’s first handheld cellular device.

Text messaging was born into the world on December 3, 1992, and by 1993, user-sent SMS capability was included Nokia’s handset lineup.

Though the IBM Simon, released in 1993, had the first touch screen, it was not until much later that modern touch screen technology came to the forefront.

On January 3, 1996, the Motorola StarTAC became the world’s first clamshell (flip) phone. This same phone was used by entrepreneur Philippe Kahn to create the first camera phone; this feature, however, was not available to the public until Samsung released its SCH-V200 in June of 2000, and even then users had to connect to a computer to access their photos. It was not until the following November that the Sharp J-SH04 enabled users to send their phone pics electronically, right from their phones.

In the meantime, Nokia was hard at work with their Nokia 9000 Communicator, released in August of 1996, which was (arguably) the first true smart phone and boasted a QWERTY keyboard and mobile web capability.

As Y2K rolled around, we saw what for many in the music world has become a life-changing technology: the first mobile phone MP3 player, courtesy of Samsung’s SPH-M100 Uproar. Though it only held about an hour of music, people could now carry their favorite songs in their pocket without bringing along a separate device.

On January 9, 2007, Pandora’s box was opened yet again with the release of the soon-to-be-ubiquitous iPhone. The race to be the fastest, smallest (no, biggest), sleekest device has not ceased to this day. Though it took some time for software development to catch up with the vision, anyone on the subway can now tell you of the formerly unimaginable capabilities of the device in their pocket—from managing bank accounts to watching sporting events to applying for mortgages to speaking face-to-face with someone on the other side of the world in real time.

Today, we look back at what may be considered the meteoric development of mobile phone technology, from clunky prototypes to everyday devices found no farther than arm’s reach from most users. And while nostalgia may linger, with old styles coming back into the forefront, one thing is certain: mobile phones are gonna be around for a while.

This is why Adva Mobile is focused on making the most of the technology at hand, bringing you mobile marketing solutions for today that will grow your brand and fan base into tomorrow.