Mobile phone "Cell Phone" redirects here. For the film, see Cell Phone (film) . For the Handphone film, see Handphone (film) . The Qualcomm QCP-2700, a mid-1990s candybar style phone, and an iPhone 5 , a current production smartphone. A mobile phone (also known as a cellular phone , cell phone , and a hand phone ) is a device that can make and receive telephone calls over a radio link while moving around a wide geographic area. It does so by connecting to a cellular network provided by a mobile phone operator , allowing access to the public telephone network . By contrast, a cordless telephone is used only within the short range of a single, private base station. In addition to telephony, modern mobile phones also support a wide variety of other services such as text messaging , MMS , email , Internet access, short-rang...