Abstract: A system and method is disclosed for converting smart cell phone applications to applications that operate on basic cell phones. The invention has a classifying process that classifies one or more functions of a cell phone application into those functions capable being performing by a basic cell phone and those functions, missing functions, that can not be performed by a basic cell phone. Substitute functions for the missing functions are developed. An emulator monitors the execution of the cell phone application and provides the substitute cell phone functions at points in the execution where a missing function is to be executed. Therefore, the smart phone application is converted into a basic phone application that can be executed by the basic cell phones with reduced functionality. The invention can run on a smart phone or a server. The invention can also be provided as a server based service for basic cell phone users.