The HMD company presented at the MWC exhibition in Barcelona a new budget smartphone Nokia G22, the main feature of which is the possibility of quick repair by the user thenselves. As the manufacturer notes, the device was designed to simplify the most common types of repairs – replacing a broken screen, charging port and battery.

HMD says it’s working with electronics repair company iFixit to provide customers with the necessary replacement parts, tools and instructions.

The Nokia G22 will go on sale on March 8 in the UK for £149.99 and in the EU for €179.

To highlight the ease of repair, Adam Ferguson, Head of Product at HMD, successfully replaced the battery in the Nokia G22 right during the launch of the smartphone. Ferguson had to open the smartphone with a plastic tool that looks like a guitar pick and disconnect the cable to remove the battery – but the whole process took about five minutes. According to him, a similar battery replacement in previous Nokia smartphones or in many competing models would have taken about 90 minutes.

According to him, repairing the Nokia G22 screen “may take about 20 minutes.” Prices for Nokia G22 parts from iFixit range from about $23 for a new charging port to about $54 for a replacement display.

HMD notes that the Nokia G22 got a built-in rather than a removable battery simply because that would limit either its total capacity or maximum charging speed, and would lead to an increase in the thickness of the model. The Nokia G22 is 8.48mm thick and packs a 5,050mAh battery that supports up to 20W fast charging.

While HMD hopes that repairability will extend the life of the Nokia G22 thanks to a five-year spare parts supply, the company will nevertheless end software support for the model earlier than Samsung and Google do with their smartphones. The Nokia G22 will receive 2 years of Android updates and 3 years of security updates. And another unfortunate twist – the device will come with Android 12, an operating system released in 2021.

In addition to repairability, the technical specifications of the Nokia G22 are not unique. The smartphone received a 6.52-inch display with a resolution of 720p and a frequency of 90 Hz and a teardrop-shaped cutout for an 8-megapixel selfie camera, as well as a trio of rear cameras, including a 50-megapixel main, a 2-megapixel depth sensor and a 2-megapixel macro camera. The device is based on the Unisoc T606 processor and has 4 GB of RAM and 64 GB of ROM. Unlocking is done via a side-mounted fingerprint scanner, and the Nokia G22 is IP52 dust and water resistant.

At MWC, HMD also made a new announcement that it is taking “first steps” to start manufacturing some smartphones in Europe, which it says will help improve the security and stability of its devices. However, the company did not reveal details, in particular, which models this applies to or in which European country the production will take place. HMD-owned Nokia devices have historically been manufactured in partnership with Taiwan-headquartered Foxconn.