Gionee D999 Squeezes Android 13 Into a Phone Built Like a Nineties Brick

Sellers in Aliexpress spent the past year listing a handset called the Gionee D999, and the first glance does most of the selling. Long, narrow, black, and topped with a stubby antenna, it reads as a direct copy of the brick phones that sat on car seats in the early nineties. Open the box and the story changes. Behind the rubber keys and a slide of thin plastic sits a full Android phone, sold for about a hundred dollars and aimed at anyone who wants WhatsApp on a device an older relative can still hold without squinting.

The hands-on footage shows a body that appears heavier than it actually is. The thin plastic casing is the one thing that makes it feel heavier than it is. The back cover pops off to reveal a SIM tray and a memory card slot, and the whole thing remains lightweight enough to carry even with a battery the size of a book, which is scarcely discernible against the rest of the box. Volume keys are located on one edge, a flashlight is tucked away toward the top, and a full-fledged physical number pad rests beneath a little touchscreen, so why not have it all? Pressing the keys still opens the dialer in the traditional fashion, and sliding a finger across the display still launches apps in the new way. Both inputs have the same face, which is largely responsible for their unique shape.

Hardware claims are consistent with what is listed in the store and in the review. We’re talking about an MT6762 (or MediaTek Helio P22, if you want to get technical) handling the workload, with 4GB of memory on the basic edition and storage options ranging from 64GB to 256GB. The screen is a fairly ordinary 4 inches, with a resolution of 1168 by 540 and an LCD panel that refreshes 60 times per second. To be honest, it won’t blow anyone away in terms of brightness. Text appears soft, games barely fit, and the on-screen keyboard shrinks to the size of a torture device. For a hundred dollars, you can still get it to launch Subway Surfers, Stumble Guys, and TikTok, which aren’t the most demanding apps, but the chip will still cause some obvious lag and generate enough heat to warm up the plastic after only a few minutes of camera use.

Battery capacity is the number sellers lean on hardest. Listings quote 10,000 milliamp hours, and the cell inside is large enough that the claim feels plausible rather than printed for show. Charging is limited to 10 watts, thus full fills can take an evening or more. In return, standby time is extended for days, which is most likely the main reason salespeople are recommending the D999 as a backup phone for students and elderly buyers, because they can’t go wrong with a few days of standby time.

A loud speaker lies behind a grille and produces a solid, if slightly hollow, rich tone that carries across a room just fine. Sellers call it a hi-fi speaker, but it’s really just designed to get your music across the room without any extra effort. They don’t expect you to listen to it in a quiet setting by yourself.

The software is running on Android 13, with a skin that borrows a few rounded icons from a well-known fruit company and then just fills out the rest with a bunch of usual suspects like Google Maps, WhatsApp, and TikTok, a couple of games to round things out, and the Play Store (which is still pretty shaky at times, first tries at installs can stall). Cameras perform as expected of a cheap phone. According to the listings, there is an 8 megapixel sensor on the back and a 5 megapixel sensor tucked away in a little slot at the top of the screen. Sample photos from the back lens appear dull and murky.