Songfacts®:

• While defending himself in the "Thinking Out Loud" copyright lawsuit, Ed Sheeran was asked to hand over his old electronic devices. This included a smartphone he'd switched off in December 2015.
  
  When he turned it on again, the phone coughed up a digital avalanche: unread texts, forgotten photos, ghostly remnants of a previous life. The first message was from his late friend, Jamal Edwards. The second from an ex-girlfriend. The third from a long-lost family member. Each ping a small, piercing echo from the past.
  
  Sheeran described the experience as "stepping into a time machine," finding himself scrolling through conversations with people who were no longer in his life, either due to loss or drifting apart. The emotional impact of this digital time capsule led him to write "Old Phone" alone at 2 a.m. while jet-lagged in India, where he was finishing his Play album.
• "Old Phone" is Sheeran at his most Sheeran: strumming like a campfire bard, balancing heartbreak with cozy sentiment. He mourns the drift of time, lost friends, family fallouts, the melancholy weight of growing up, wrapping it in a warm, rollicking acoustic arrangement.
• Sheeran co-produced the song with Ilya Salmanzadeh (Ariana Grande, Tate McRae) and Blake Slatkin (The Kid Laroi, Lizzo). It was Sheeran's first release with Slatkin, although he and Ilya had previously teamed up on Play's lead single, "Azizam."
• Sheeran debuted "Old Phone" on the May 1, 2025, episode of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, performing it live and discussing its origins.
• To accompany the release, Sheeran launched a new Instagram account (@teddysoldphone), sharing over 200 throwback photos from the device that inspired the song, including selfies with Taylor Swift and other celebrities from his early touring days.
• "Old Phone" is part of Play, an album Sheeran describes as a reaction to the most challenging period of his life: the death of Jamal Edwards, his wife Cherry Seaborn's tumor diagnosis during pregnancy, and the never-ending legal squabbles over his music.
  
  After weathering that emotional hurricane, Sheeran made a conscious decision to seek joy - to create something vibrant and borderless, inspired by the many cultures he encountered while touring the globe. The album was recorded all over the world and completed in Goa, India, a place where many people go to find themselves - or at the very least, a decent curry.
• The music video for Ed Sheeran's "Old Phone" is a nostalgic and emotionally resonant visual directed by Emil Nava. We see Sheeran create a unique pop-up venue called the "Old Phone Pub" in Ipswich, Massachusetts. We see the setup of the pub and Sheeran's interactions with fans - greeting people outside, performing impromptu on the street, and visiting local spots to promote the event.
  
  Fans submitted videos and messages from their old devices, which were projected onto the pub's walls and exterior.
• Ed Sheeran keeps his communication old-school, so much so that he hasn't carried a phone since the mid 2010s. The only way to reach him is by email. "People's opinions are my choice to listen to," he told Audacy Music, explaining that living this way helps him stay grounded as a dad and a musician.