Lumia 1020 in 2025…barely working but nice trip down memory lane

My kids found the “old phone drawer” in my house and were very curious about the Lumia 1020. It was slow to get restarted, but after a few reboots it functioned okay.

Just had to double-check; this phone is around12 years old!!! Never officially received a Windows 10 for mobile version, so it was on Windows Phone 8.1 (apologies if I didn’t get the product names quite right).

I have it in airplane mode. I imagine that due to certs expiring, the phone being years out of support, and several services no longer existing in 2025.

What outright failed:

• Onedrive
• Here Maps
• Here Navigation
• Outlook (loads but won’t sync)

What still worked:

• Camera
• Photos
• Flappy bird (clone version of the game that existed in the store at some point)
• Internet Explorer (though many sites refused to load)
• Battery still in good shape

What I noticed that was ahead of its time:

• Address bar in the bottom of the browser tab
• Keyboard responsiveness
• Full-featured detailed camera settings
• light & durable feeling
• OLED screen

What’s puzzling me:

• I’m having trouble connecting the phone to a Windows 11 PC and viewing contents via file explorer (will try on a Windows 10 box later, maybe also a different micro USB cable)

Anyway, it’s mostly a curiosity now. I wouldn’t mind playing with the camera more but I need to find a reliable way to get pictures off the phone.