There are many reasons smartphones are practical. The most common reason is e-mail. It can be really annoying to constantly log on to a computer to check e-mail, especially when waiting for a specific message. It is so much easier to get all of your e-mails to your phone so that any message sent you will receive immediately, and important messages won't sit in your inbox for days. One example of this feature was my experience on Wednesday. When my alarm on my phone went off Wednesday morning for class, I saw that I had several missed messages from the night. One of them was the announcement that school was cancelled. It would have been horrible to go to class only to find out it was cancelled. I probably would have checked my laptop anyway, but this saved me time.
Another useful application of smartphones is GPS. Everybody has those times when they are driving home from a concert, a sporting event, a college visit, and they get lost. It is so nice to have a map readily available that can tell you where you are and how to get home. It's so much better than pulling over, reading a map from the glove compartment, trying to find where you are and plot the best way home.
Without sounding like a promoter for smartphones, I really do suggest that everyone gets one. I will admit, they are expensive, my bill is thirty extra dollars a month to have internet access, which must come with the phone. However since I got my phone my laptop time has been cut in half. The link attached compares different versions of smartphones.
