Can You Use the BlackBerry KEY2 in 2023

Can you still use the Blackberry Key 2 in 2023?

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The answer is yes you can. 😀 😀 😀

This is one of the last best-case scenarios for using a Blackberry in the year 2023. This phone is almost five years old now. It came out in the summer of 2018. Now we are in 2023. It just amazes me that time has gone by so quickly, if you've got one and you're still using it, you probably realize some of the limitations. It's running Android 8.1. It basically never got an Android system update. It got security patches for a couple of years. Blackberry is already sailing off into the sunset, this was made with the licensing agreement to TCL under Blackberry mobile. They made a handful of phones a Blackberry mobile the key 1, the key 2, the key 2 Le, and the Motion and they were all in their own rights mostly decent phones nothing groundbreaking they kind of took an approach of let's make some good like multitasking mid-tier handsets. We know people aren't going to spend eight nine hundred dollars on one of these phones. We don't want to sell them for that price right, so at the time it was a decent phone and it was a good phone if you wanted a keyboard like of course there were other phones that were out there that were better when it came to the camera when it came to the hardware when it comes came to the speed gaming performance you know multimedia but this was built from the ground up around the keyboard.

But historically yeah looking back and now bringing it forward if you've been using one this long yes the keys probably have some wear and tear. You might have had to replace the battery on it. I have people that reach out to me like "Hey you know what's a good battery to replace this with or what do I do if this has gone out. I even know somebody who's charging connector went bad and they had to buy a new USBC Port take it to an electrician and have them re-solder it. Like there's people that really love these phones really really bent on hanging on to them and some people that are still interested in them now. Like I know some folks still using like a BlackBerry Classic or a passport. It's possible but it's for something it's for somebody who really just does phone calls and text messaging at that point.  In blackberry key 2, you still have largely have most things that are supported, like I haven't run into anything that I use on a daily basis that isn't supported so it's nice. I can still use my banking app. You can still use Chrome. You can use Firefox. You can use Edge. You can do ChatGPT on it. I mean you can do whatever you want, but the limitations of course there's a 3500 milliamp battery that's showing some signs of wear and tear if you've got one, you've been using it for a while, if you can find one new in the box then it's going to give you a whole lease on life for a couple of years with these things and of course that's subject to pricing.

 

Using Blackberry key 2 now, the biggest concern I have is security stuff like there have been so many security vulnerabilities and issues that have happened in Android for the last five years or probably the last three years that you're just not covered on. You can get some security software on it. You can get some McAfee. You can get some other security Shield stuff. You can use a VPN, any of that stuff will help limit your liability ultimately a lot of times when it comes down to security vulnerabilities. It's a lot of phishing attempts. It's a lot of stuff that even newer phones are still going to be just as vulnerable to because it doesn't matter how good your security is if you're opening email attachments, downloading PDFs, clicking on on Google links that go to Google Drive stuff to download a zip file, then your security is screwed anyway so a lot of it comes down to if you feel confident in using it as a daily driver and you know yourself well and you feel pretty confident you're not going to be like compromising the security of your phone it's probably mostly okay.

I think it's got some good things going for it the camera not really being one of them but it does have the 12-megapixel camera on the back it takes okay pictures out in the sunlight the speaker is just okay. It does have a headphone jack so a lot of people who are into the old productivity live, still have your wired headset you can still use that, of course, it's got the ever-so-awesome keyboard of course you got the speed key, you've also got all the shortcut keys, long press shortcut short press, you've got the swipe stuff and the keyboard itself is nice. It's nice to type on and that's the thing that's really the whole reason you're buying this phone nowadays. I mean it's not like you're buying it back in the day for all it's robust security you're buying it because you want to use a Blackberry keyboard and you still want to hang on one of those phones. I mean there's not a whole lot of options out there right now like I've got the Universe Titan pocket and the Slim and those are okay. Those are kind of modern updated OS all alternatives to an extent, but it's not a Blackberry the keyboard's not as good it's not as thin it's it's not built quite to the same standards. It just doesn't do it for me like the universe phones are fine, but for me it was always the Blackberry keyboard the Blackberry experience the Blackberry security, it was all in one thing. I still remember back in 2005 when I got my first Blackberry and I use it all the time it was amazing being outside the office like oh I can stay connected, I can do my email, I can send my text messages, I can access the internet, like there was so many nice things about it was way ahead of its time and I still hope that one day maybe somehow we'll find some way to get a new handset. But in 2023 not a whole lot of options and there's certainly not a whole lot of Blackberry options that have held up I mean the the last best operating system any Blackberry phone has is Android 8.1, which is what this has and it's okay but I mean it's Oreo right. I mean we went through Android 9 10 11 12 13. Android 14 is already in developer mode like it's going to be out this fall so yeah this thing got left in the dust software wise but it's still there. I mean you still have your Android you saw at the Play Store you still have some of the Blackberry app stuff on here it's still something that's usable like if you are a person who really just doesn't care about having a big gigantic phone like if you don't want the fold four if you don't want the pixel 7 Pro if you don't care about the camera if you don't care about having two three day battery life you don't care about playing video games if you just want a physical keyboard and you feel pretty comfortable with yourself and how you use the phone as far as security concerns it can still be a decent phone and I mean it's there's just nothing else really 

I mean of course you can use the key 2 Le which is very very similar but it kind of has some dumbed down like processor and spec stuff on it so I mean that's even still an option if you can find one but there's just not a whole lot left and I really wanted to address this in 2023 because I still get people who want to pick one up who miss them who want to carry one around as a second device or some people some people carry two phones I mean I carry like three but some people carry two and would use this for like a primary daily driver like phone calls text messaging emails and then have a secondary phone like an iPhone or have like a Samsung phone or whatever for like multimedia games watching YouTube and stuff like that so there are still ways you can make this work you can still use it as a daily driver for all the stuff that you want to use it for like of course you're texting your emails and and that's what's so great about this like being able to type on the physical keyboard it's so nice having the tactile experience like there's just nothing if you came from having a Blackberry there's just nothing in this world that can replicate that experience even using other typers even you other phones that have keyboards like it's just not the same and there's only so many more years these are still going to be good because they don't support 5G they top out at 4G LTE so once 4G finally gets shut off one day in a few years these will go the way of the dodo you'll never be able to use them again so if you want to use one you've got a couple years left when it comes to this window of opportunity because once everybody goes all in on 5G and 4G goes away these are done like you can't you'll never be able to use them again so for the next couple of years probably still viable and definitely if you talk about like that two phone usage scenario like I mentioned yeah there's an opportunity there where you could maybe have this as a secondary Sim or a primary Sim use it for your work your business your typing all your multimedia like all your multitasking and performance stuff and still get to enjoy these great ivories that you have on the key 2 it really was a good keyboard.