Thin is in! Here is how flagship smartphones compare in thickness

A thin smartphone is a hot smartphone, there's no second opinion about it. Slimmer handsets are more attractive visually and easier to slip into pockets of all sizes. Yet designing an exceptionally slim smartphone without that having a detrimental effect on its functionality or battery life is a job tougher than one might think. Each component has to be selected carefully and positioned optimally in order for the targeted thickness figure to be achieved. 

Nevertheless, it looks like the record for the world's slimmest smartphone is about to be broken once again. The soon-to-be-announced Gionee GN9005 is expected to be only 0.2 inches (5 millimeters) thick, as indicated by its certification documents. If the figure is accurate, it would make this the new thinnest smartphone in existence. In comparison, the current holder of the title is under 0.22 inches (5.55 millimeters) thick. That's the Gionee Elife S5.5, which we had the chance to get our hands on earlier this year.  

So, how do the flagship smartphones from leading companies rank on the chart? How do they compare when stacked against each other? Long story short, most flagships don't get even close to the thinness of the S5.5. Actually, the average thickness of a flagship smartphone hovers around the 0.35-inch mark (8.9 millimeters), with the Moto X being nearly twice as thick as Gionee's fashionable handset and the iPhone 5s ranking among the thinnest top handsets around. 

To give you a broader perspective on the matter, we've prepared a visualization comparing the thicknesses of flagship smartphones, and you can take a look at it in the slideshow below. Also, make sure to flick through the following slides and learn more about the thinnest handsets produces by the most popular companies in the smartphone business.