There are plenty of other, equal options that work better.

I've started to think the reason companies offer phones like this, is to encourage people to go to smartphones, as feature/basic phones haven't really improved by much in the past few years, but smartphones have diversified exponentially.

The Hotshot is one of the many attempts of manufacturers to find a hybrid phone that fills the demand of a better "basic" phone while giving benefits of newer technology reserved for smartphones, to give an "almost smartphone" experience.

Finding this balance is hard, and every attempt has fallen short of what demand has wanted. Sometimes due to poor marketing, others, due to the phone itself. The Hotshot is no exception.

The concept is not bad, but the phone fails on one key area that dooms any other minor fault to kill the product as a leader as a feature phone.

The processor. Because the processor is too slow, the phone does EVERYTHING slowly. No one wants to take a 5 second picture. No one wants to take 5 seconds to correct spelling on a text, even the mistake-prone. No one wants a phone that sometimes takes forever to respond on its touchscreen, lags, hangs up, or doesn't respond at all.

If they had allowed a faster, or simply more powerful processor on this phone, many of the complaints that ruins the experience for many people would be minor quips you would expect on any phone.

It has good features.
It has a nice touchscreen.
It isn't oversized.
It has the "smartphone" look.
It doesn't cost 30 more dollars a month.
It has a decent interface.

But, because the manufacturer wanted to skim a few bucks off of making the product, and placed a slow processor into the phone, they turned a decent product into a substandard one. Sadly, this phone offers no benefit over any other "basic" phone.

If this comes out as a block of text I'm sorry, I proofread it, but it didn't show in the preview.

A huge inconvenience and a bother to use.

My most hated phone ive ever used.

Laggy response when i touch the screen, not smooth at all.

The phone is the oppposite of intuitive. It doesnt have SEND or END buttons, requiring you to navigate the slow touchscreen to end a call (which may require a few steps mid-call to see the end call option), or to see your recent calls, or to send a text message without having to navigate to different screens.

The phone is just a big inconvenience to use.

My biggest complaint is the t9 text prediction is the stupidest and most frustrating i could ever imagine. Typing the word WHAT results in WHAU. Or typing OH results in OG. Why are those the predicted words?? There are hundreds more words it gets Way wrong for no reason. THEN!! To change the word to the right way you want it spelled, you cant just click a NEXT option, you have to click a drop down box to choose the one you want, especially annoying when you have to do that everytime you want punctuation other than a period.

Not to mention you cant even use BACKUP ASSISTANT if the phone has had a previous owner.

...just awful

Not The Best Phone... I Don't Recommend It!!!!!

I bought this phone for a nice user-friendly phone, but the phone is horrible. The touch screen is very sensitive. If I try to touch Message then it slides over to the next screen. My sister also got this phone and it was great for about five months and then it started to get really sensitive. When I turn my phone on sometimes it just randomly turns all the way off and then turns itself back on again. If I try to text someone and I try to say 'Hey' it will end up saying 'hst' or something. When you call someone and you want to hang up you have to touch the end button on the screen. When you are listening to your voice-mails, you have to click on keyboard which will show you the numbers that you type your password in to then when you go to hang up you can't press the button in the bottom-center of the phone you have to click keyboard again so it will go away. This phone has some good qualities and it looks cool but there are so many querks in it. This phone is very hard to buy accessories for. you usually have to buy them online.

Good "Basic" Phone for calls and text!

I was wanting a phone with a touch screen and to play my music. THis phone was suggested to me by the Verizon rep. The phone is cool. THe touch screen is really touchy, sometimes to a fault. I am not a techy at all! THe main thing I use the phone for is my music, phone calls and to take pictures of my kids - I would give the camera a -1 star if I could for the camera. I cannot get a picture to save my life. It has a very slow response time. THe MP3 player is missing the mark a little on quality but for a basic phone with the look and feel of an Iphone I would give it a 4 star.

THIS PHONE SUCKS!

This phone is only good for talking. The virtual keyboard is so non-precise that I have to text with 1 finger which is VERY annoying. I also cannot sync to my computer to download my music or ringtones. It doesn't have wifi which is just so ancient. VERY limited use. I'm getting a different phone, and giving this one to my husband who only uses his phone to talk. DON"T BUY ONE. You will be very sorry. Spend a little more and get a real phone. If I could give it ZERO stars, I would!