There were a lot of little things that aren't relevant today but were a big deal at the time. For example it had a web browser that actually worked to view the real internet, even though 99% of webpages were designed for screens the size of 30 iPhones.

Today all webpages are designed to work well on small screens - but that never would have happened without Apple. Or at least it would have taken a lot longer to happen. They got enough people using the internet on a phone to force web developers to support small screens. That was a big achievement - even today it's a massive amount of work to design a webpage that works well with a mouse and with your thumbs. The tools we have now didn't exist back then, and before Mobile Safari there weren't any users of small screens anyway so why would anyone put in all that work?

Phones with web browsers predated the iPhone. They were completely unusable.