Like its predescessors in Nokia's Nseries of smartphones, the N79 emphasizes high-end multimedia capability with a streamlined design. The lack of a QWERTY keyboard on the handset would hinder email and mobile document editing, but it does allow for a comparatively small form factor for a smartphone. With its relatively small size, it still includes a five megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics. This picture resolution is a significant upgrade from the 3.2 megapixels of the N79's immediate predecessor (the N78) and gives the N79 camera abilities comparable to some stand-alone digital cameras. Internet features also follow the Nseries style and include Nokia's Ovi lineup, which can access sites like MySpace, Flickr, Friendster, and Facebook, Nokia's Music Store, maps, and the N-Gage gaming platform. The maps power a GPS system, complete with turn-by-turn directions.

As with the N73 and N93, this model implements the Symbian mobile operating system, which includes a unique gimmick for this particular model. Swap in a different back cover to the handset (there are several colors to choose), and it will read a tiny chip on the inside of it, which will automatically change the color and layout theme of the display.