Announcing the finalists for the GSMArena 2026 End-of-Year Awards | Infinium-tech

2026 brought us some incredible smartphones, tablets and other gadgets and we wanted to recognize the best of them – here are the GSMArena 2026 End-of-Year Awards Nominees. There are thirteen categories and the winners will be decided in the coming days.

Our team of expert reviewers has tested over 200 devices over the past twelve months. We focused mainly on phones, but we will also be awarding the best tablet, smartwatch and smart accessory from this year.

We have already decided on which devices get a nomination and are currently deliberating on the winners for each category. In the meantime, we wanted to hear your opinions on which models deserve to win.

First, a quick introduction of the categories. The grand prize is the Phone of the Year, but there are categories for different price ranges and different niches – for example, the phone with the best battery life or the best gaming device. We also have nominations for the design excellence in 2026 and best hardware innovation of the year.

Without further ado, we present the finalists for the GSMArena 2026 End-of-Year Award in each category. Note that they are not listed in any particular order.

Table of Contents:

Phone of the Year 2026

This is the big one – the award will go to the best of the best. Unfortunately, this year was marred by skyrocketing memory prices, which pushed the prices of flagships to previously unheard-of levels. So, you may have to break the piggy bank to get one of these, but it’s worth it if you can afford it.

As you may have noticed, there are no foldables here – the technology has improved at a rapid pace, but the vast majority of people still use slab phones and for a good reason. These four phones offer the best balance of performance, endurance, display quality and camera prowess.

Oppo spared no expense when designing the Oppo Find X10 Pro Max and equipped it with three 200MP sensors, the top MediaTek chipset, plus high-quality components including a chart-topping battery. It also proudly wears the Hasselblad logo as the legendary camera maker had a hand in tuning the camera and its features.

The vivo X500 Pro Max has an exceptional camera with ZEISS T* coated lenses. It performed great in all our tests, but it was the video stabilization that blew us away – it has no equal. The Dimensity 9600 Pro chip and a large Si/C battery deliver great performance and endurance and the display is superb.

While many of its rivals chose the MediaTek chip, the Xiaomi 18 Pro Max chose the Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6. There are two 200MP cameras (wide and telephoto) and one 50MP ultra-wide on the back, which can be used with the rear display for spectacular selfies. The large display on the front is spectacular in its own right as is the large battery.

If there’s one chip that can beat MediaTek’s and Qualcomm’s best, it is the Apple A20 Pro inside the iPhone 18 Pro Max. While Apple didn’t do anything too wild this generation, the years of polish show through. The battery seems small next to those of the Chinese competitors, but the efficient hardware makes it last longer than expected.

Oppo Find X10 Pro Max • vivo X500 Pro Max

Xiaomi 18 Pro Max • Apple iPhone 18 Pro Max

Best Value 2026

The world of electronics has gone from one calamity to the next over the past decade, so many who previously had a “flagship at all costs” mentality ended up switching over to phones that offer better value for money.

The top-of-the-line flagships no longer have exclusivity on the premier chipsets, 200MP cameras or huge batteries – these four phones have them too and they won’t shrivel your wallet. They don’t have everything, but you might not even notice the things they miss compared to the phones in the category above.

You don’t need to pay a flagship price to get the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 – the Poco F9 Ultra has it too. The phone punches above its weight in other categories too, e.g. it has one of the brightest displays we have ever tested and battery life is among the best.

While the term “flagship-killer” is outmoded, phones with the letter “T” fill in the same role – Xiaomi 17T Pro offers near-flagship features at lower prices. The premium design houses an excellent display and camera and a large battery with fast wired and wireless charging.

Speaking of labels, there are a lot of “Pro Max” phones here. But labels are just labels, the Honor 600 Pro pairs a performant Snapdragon 8 Elite with a large, fast-charging battery and a mid-sized 6.57″ display.

The OnePlus 15R is another “don’t call it a flagship killer” phone. It has a large, bright, Dolby Vision-enabled display, class-leading battery life and enough performance to stay close to more expensive phones. The lack of a telephoto camera will hurt its chances of winning, but the main camera produces excellent photos and has superb video stabilization.

Poco F9 Ultra • Xiaomi 17T Pro

Honor 600 Pro • OnePlus 15R

Best Budget 2026

As a sign of the times, the budget phone category is one of the more important ones on the list. The top models will always have a magnetic pull, but mid-rangers sell more units – not everyone needs the full power of a flagship and not everyone is willing to pay the flagship tax.

We have nominated three phones that will breeze through daily tasks and will last you for years. Workhorse smartphones deserve recognition too.

It looks like a Galaxy S phone, but the Samsung Galaxy A57 is much more modest when it comes to pricing. It’s a solid all-round phone that will be chosen by millions who want a familiar user interface experience and long software support.

Whether you get the Iron Man Edition or not, the Poco X8 Pro is one telephoto camera short of perfection. The cameras it does have are surprisingly good, while the display and battery life are outright great. That Dimensity 8500 Ultra kept performance up even after sustained load.

The Nothing Phone (4a) has a love-it-or-hate-it design and we are in the love it camp (well, we prefer the Pro – see below). The (4a) does have a telephoto camera, which is a rarity in the budget category. Also, while the Snapdragon 7s Gen 4 is not the fastest chip around, it experiences basically no throttling under load.

Samsung Galaxy A57 • Poco X8 Pro

Nothing Phone (4a)

Best Foldable 2026

Arguably the hottest category of the year – foldables are rapidly closing the gap to slab phones in many aspects and with Apple’s arrival to the scene will inevitably conquer more market share. But these are the four models that did the most to address the three major concerns around foldables – durability, bulk and battery life.

Let’s address the elephant in the room – the iPhone Duo didn’t get the nod. In fact, none of the wide foldables did. This is the hot new category of 2026, but those phones had too many compromises to claim the title of best foldable. In that respect, they are similar to flip phones, which also didn’t get nominated.

8.9mm thickness and 215g weight are pretty okay for a large flagship – if we were talking about regular slab phones. These measurements on a book-style foldable are nothing short of extraordinary. The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold8 Ultra brings a larger battery with faster charging than its predecessor and an anti-reflective coating for the inner display.

Moto finally ventured out of its flip phone comfort zone and the Motorola Razr Fold was well worth the trip. We loved its grippy design, both screens are excellent and the battery lasts a long while. The non-Elite chipset isn’t the fastest, but it’s fast enough and we got great photos from all three cameras on the back.

The Honor Magic V6 is the only phone that challenges the Galaxy in terms of size – it measures 8.8mm thick and weighs 219g. This is with a noticeably larger battery too, which can be seen in our battery life chart (the fast charging is worth a mention too). The bright cover and inner displays support stylus usage and MagicOS is infinitely customizable. The rear cameras delivered top-notch photo and video quality.

The vivo X Fold6 was either the best book-style foldable or close to it in all the categories we test. OriginOS 7 Fold is a standout with its many foldable-oriented optimizations and PC integration. While foldables don’t have the best reputation when it comes to cameras, the X Fold6 is one of the phones that is changing that perception and is giving slab phones a run for their money.

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold8 Ultra • Motorola Razr Fold

Honor Magic V6 • vivo X Fold6

Best Gaming 2026

Some of the hottest gaming titles today are mobile-first and boast player counts that will make many PC and console titles jealous. You don’t have to buy a gaming phone to play, but some phones are clearly better than others – that said, the best way to play those games might be a compact tablet instead of a phone.

The Apple A20 Pro inside the Apple iPhone 18 Pro Max can put even some laptop chips to shame. Combined with a large LTPO display and a huge user base, this is one of the top gaming platforms today.

Unlike gaming PCs, dedicated gaming phones like the RedMagic 12 Pro offer top performance for less money than the mainstream models – the actively cooled Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 warps performance-per-dollar charts. The large, uninterrupted display, shoulder triggers, support for PC games from Steam and the ability to play on an external monitor make this into a pockable console.

Here’s a curve ball – the RedMagic Astra 2 tablet is something you might get in addition to a phone. It’s compact, so it’s easy to take on a trip and it offers a 9.06″ 185Hz OLED display to play on while you travel. And when you arrive, your phone will still have charge in its battery.

Apple iPhone 18 Pro Max • RedMagic 12 Pro

RedMagic Astra 2

Best Compact 2026

Miniaturization hasn’t been in vogue for over a decade – and while many love the larger screens and extra battery capacity, there are those who refuse to use a massive phone. They want something that is easier to handle in one hand and that doesn’t feel like a rock in the pocket.

All four of these have XL-sized siblings, but here compactness is a virtue.

Apple remains one of the few companies that take small phones seriously. The iPhone 18 Pro is on the heavy side for a 6.3″-class model, but it’s a lot lighter than its Pro Max sibling and it has all of the same great features as the larger phone.

The vivo X500 Pro packages a trio of ZEISS cameras in a pocket-friendly format. The shrinking process cost it the 200MP telephoto of the Pro Max, but the chipset remains just as potent, it’s the Dimensity 9600 Pro.

200MP telephoto camera on a small phone? “Yes, we can!” said Xiaomi – the Xiaomi 18 Pro has one 200MP sensor in its periscope and another one in its main camera. Like its larger sibling, it has a rear display, which can be used for main camera selfies. The phone is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6.

The Samsung Galaxy S26 is the only small flagship that can match the global availability of the iPhone – even the Pixels leave plenty of gaps on the world map. It’s a competent phone, though its shortcomings may be hard to ignore in countries where the Xiaomi or the vivo are available.

Apple iPhone 18 Pro • vivo X500 Pro

Xiaomi 18 Pro • Samsung Galaxy S26

Best Battery Life 2026

Is the rechargeable lithium battery the invention that defines the 21st century? With the rapid rise of not just smartphones but also EVs and other battery-powered gadgets, it just might be. And while we keep hearing about salt batteries and what not, the recent arrival of Silicon-Carbon tech has enabled battery capacities that we could only dream of before.

We should also commend the ever-improving efficiency enabled by shrinking semiconductor nodes – two of these four nominees have flagship chipsets inside them, but the other two show that you don’t need to break the bank to get the best battery endurance.

At the time of writing, the Realme P4 Power sits on top of our battery chart. This alone guaranteed it a spot here. However, this is a battery-focused mid-ranger.

The Poco X8 Pro Max is only 13 minutes short in our Active Use Score rankings and is a better phone overall with features like the near-flagship Dimensity 9500s chipset.

Besides competing for the top prize, the Oppo Find X10 Pro Max is also one of the phones with the best battery life this year – it took the #2 spot between the Realme and the Poco (it beat the Poco by 2 minutes).

The Poco F9 Ultra fills another price point – it costs more than its X-series sibling, but it’s not “flagship expensive” like the Oppo. Its Active Use Score is exactly 60 minutes short of that of the Realme P4 Power, but it does beat it in the charging speed test.

Poco X8 Pro Max • Oppo Find X10 Pro Max

Realme P4 Power • Poco F9 Ultra

Best Camera 2026

You may not know this, but many on our team got into photography long before phones could snap a photo, so this category is near and dear to our hearts. Anyone with a passion for photography and videography – and the budget to buy the necessary hardware – will be best-served by one of these.

With two 200MP cameras and two 50MP cameras on its back, the Oppo Find X9 Ultra leaves nothing to chance – it will have the right focal length to capture every special moment, even if it happens far away (that 10x/230mm lens has a long reach).

You don’t need a 1″-type sensor to compete in this category, but it sure helps. That’s not all, the Xiaomi 17 Ultra also equips its 200MP telephoto camera with a variable focal length lens (75-100mm, 3.2-4.3x) for continuous zoom.

While the Oppo and Xiaomi excel at photography, their video recording skills left something to be desired. The vivo X300 Ultra is loaded with video features, including Dolby Vision recording and superb stabilization.

Oppo Find X9 Ultra • Xiaomi 17 Ultra

vivo X300 Ultra

Design Excellence 2026

While it is true that the smartphone era has been defined by the “black rectangle” design, there are a few brands that went above and beyond to make their phones stand out. Here are the four phones that have a unique look.

The Nothing Phone (4a) Pro is instantly recognizable to everyone familiar with the brand – everyone else is sure to ask you what phone you are using. In a time when smartphone makers rush to copy every single design cue from one another, having a unique look is rare.

Car buffs know the name Pininfarina well and every time the design studio puts its spin on a smartphone, the results grab attention. That is the case for the Infinix Note 60 Ultra, even if you don’t go for the Lamborghini edition.

What’s your favorite color? When it comes to the Oppo Find X9 Ultra, ours is Tundra Umber. It’s even a different design to the other X9 Ultra color options, with the subtle changes going a long way towards making this feel like a crossbreed between a phone and a Hasselblad camera.

The gaming aesthetic of the RedMagic 12 Pro gives it a futuristic look and transparent panels offer enticing glimpses of the unique components inside, including a micro-pump that moves real cooling liquid.

Nothing Phone (4a) Pro • Infinix Note 60 Ultra

Oppo Find X9 Ultra • RedMagic 12 Pro

Innovation of the Year 2026

It feels like smartphones pull the rest of the electronics industry forward – they drive innovations in semiconductor, display, camera and battery tech along with other fields like sensors. These are the phones that brought something new, something that we might (and probably will) see in future smartphones and, perhaps, in other electronics too.

The Honor Robot Phone looks like CGI in videos – did they really build a retractable gimbal for the camera? They really did! We’re not sure whether all the AI features are just buzzwords, but the gimbal allows this phone’s camera to do things no other phone can.

Your phone may be the most secure device you own. This is why curious eyes might be tempted to peep at the verification code you just received – the Privacy Display on the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra will keep your secrets, though.

Foldables looked impossibly futuristic, now they are quite common. What’s next – tri-foldables maybe? Well, maybe, maybe not. But if tri-foldables are the future, this is where they started – with the Huawei Mate XT 2 Ultimate.

The bezels around smartphone screens are a modern retelling of Zeno’s paradox – they get slimmer but never disappear completely. But what if they can? The Tecno bezelless concept explores ways to do just that.

Printing a document on paper is outdated and wasteful, but it is kinder on your eyes than typical digital displays. The TCL P80 Ultra adapts the company’s long-running NxtPaper technology to AMOLED displays to bring the best of both worlds.

Honor Robot Phone • Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra

Huawei Mate XT 2 Ultimate • Tecno bezelless concept

TCL P80 Ultra

Best Tablet 2026

Tablets have carved several niches – media consumption, work and learning – that aren’t covered by either your phone or your laptop. These are the three best all-round tablets of the year.

It’s big, it’s powerful, what more can you want? The Samsung Galaxy Tab S12 Ultra benefits from the highly developed DeX software that offers desktop-like multitasking, which pairs perfectly with the optional keyboard and maybe even external displays. The Tab S12 Ultra can handle anything you throw at it.

The Honor MagicPad4 strikes a good balance between price and performance – it costs less than half as much as the Galaxy and while it can’t match it on screen size or performance, it gets close enough for most use-cases. It can handle up to 20 windows running simultaneously!

The OnePlus Pad 4 is what we loved about OnePlus in tablet form – it’s sad to see the company leave the global market since now most people around the world will be missing out on devices such as this. It’s sleek, powerful, well-priced and we liked the new keyboard and stylus that the company designed.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S12 Ultra • Honor MagicPad4

OnePlus Pad 4

Best Smartwatch 2026

Smartwatches are indispensable for anyone who wants around-the-clock health tracking, who exercises regularly and/or who must have instant access to their notifications even if their phone is in the other room. So, in a way, your choice of smartwatch is more personal than your choice of smartphone – these are our top five picks, but only one will be chosen as the best.

The nano-crystal ceramic bezel was a great addition to the recognizable octagon design of the Huawei Watch GT 7 Pro as it enhances the premium look that the GT series is known for. It’s a daily-wear watch that lasted us 15 days in testing while tracking all our exercise sessions.

Of the three classes of smartwatch that Samsung makes, the Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra is both the most rugged and the most capable one. It has a rich set of health-tracking features and the excellent Samsung Health app and is perfectly equipped for any outdoor adventure.

Wear OS watches are packed with features, but watches that use simpler software offer longer battery life. What if you could have both? The Xiaomi Watch 5 lasted a full 5 days with all-day health tracking and notifications in our testing. It does so with one simple trick – a massive 930mAh Si/C battery (we’ve owned phones with smaller batteries!). The watch has a premium, understated design and a secondary OS for lower power operation if you need to go more than 5 days between charges.

While the Oppo Watch X3 doesn’t have the huge battery of the Xiaomi (it has 646mAh capacity), it consistently lasted 4 days of use with AOD enabled. The fast 10W charging system gets it to around 50% in 15 minutes and to a full 100% in under an hour. This one also has a simple secondary OS for longer operation when you don’t need the full Wear OS suite of features. The X3 isn’t all about battery, the premium titanium body and sapphire glass, plus the cool Dynamic-Link strap elevate it above your typical smartwatch.

Huawei Watch GT 7 Pro • Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra

Oppo Watch X3 • Xiaomi Watch 5

Best Accessories 2026

There is a rich ecosystem of accessories that surrounds the smartphone market. This is in part the result of manufacturers stripping the retail package to the bone – all you get these days is a USB cable, if that – and in part because some of these accessories enable unique features. Here are the ones that we think would add the most value to your smartphone experience.

Unless you have one of the phones in our Best Battery category, battery anxiety is still around. The Xiaomi UltraThin Magnetic Power Bank 5000 is the most compact way to alleviate it – it measures just 6mm thick (compared to 7.7mm for Apple’s Air MagSafe battery) and weighs 98g (vs. 126g). The 15W rating only applies to Xiaomi phones, everything else gets 7.5W. Still, it brought a nearly dead iPhone 15 Pro to 91% before depleting its charge.

Chargers can be something that hides under your desk or behind your nightstand or they can be something that’s full of character. Now, we’re too old to be playing with Tamagotchis, but the TORRAS FlashEye Dot Smart Display Charger 45W is undeniably cute. And it’s a compact, relatively fast charger that you can use for phones and tablets at home or while you travel.

Geeks tend to have a lot of devices that need charging – some of them pretty power-hungry too. The UGREEN Nexode Pro 300W Smart Display Desktop Charger has six ports and can output a combined 300W with its top USB-C port reaching 100W. This can charge a house worth of gadgets all at once.

If you have fewer gadgets or need more power for one beefy gadget, the Anker Prime 160W offers three USB-C ports, one of which can deliver 140W. While the UGREEN is very much an at-home charger, the Anker is compact enough to travel and will feed even a top-end MacBook at your hotel.

Speaking of Tamagotchis, cough, speaking of travel, the OPPO Bubble Mag E-Badge is a tiny vlog and selfie helper – it’s a display that can mangetically attach to the back of your phone, acting as a viewfinder for the main cameras. It also works as a remote control from up to 10m away, giving you complete freedom to frame your shot. And, you know, the custom Vibe E-Badge designs are pretty fun.

• Xiaomi UltraThin Magnetic Power Bank 5000 – slimmest in its class
• TORRAS FlashEye Dot Smart Display Charger 45W – full of character
• UGREEN Nexode Pro 300W Smart Display Desktop Charger – pro charging gear
• Anker Prime 160W – high-end, smallest in its class
• Oppo Bubble Mag E-Badge – a unique camera viewfinder

Xiaomi UltraThin Magnetic Power Bank 5000 • TORRAS FlashEye Dot Smart Display Charger 45W

UGREEN Nexode Pro 330W Smart Display Desktop Charger • Anker Prime 160W

Oppo Bubble Mag E-Badge

Stay tuned!

These were our nominations for the best smartphones and related devices for 2026. Now our editorial team will gather once again and make the final decision of which models will claim the title in each category – there are heated debates going on at the office on just that subject.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on the matter too, so leave us a comment – which nominees do you agree with, would have done differently? Also if you believe we’ve missed a category important to you let us know – we’ll certainly consider it for next year.

We will announce the results soon – stay tuned!