All posts

I Gave In and Bought a Deep Purple iPhone 14 Pro Max

7:12 video

I said I wasn’t going to get the trendy new color of the year. I went all in on dark colors, picking the Space Black 14 Pro and the Midnight regular 14, and I love both. But I could only read, watch and listen to so many people say how good the Deep Purple looks, so I bought a Deep Purple iPhone 14 Pro Max to see for myself.

The color

I also picked up the Apple leather case in Ink for it. Out of the box, I have to admit it looks pretty good, but it doesn’t look deep purple to me, more a shallow purple. On my monitor it just looks gray, and next to the leather case they both look like different grays. Under the right light you can see a purple tint, but it has to hit the light just right. That’s slightly disappointing: I expected a much richer color. Maybe it’s better outside.

The Ink case, though, has a much deeper purple undertone than the phone itself, and I love the deep dark purple on its buttons.

Why a Pro Max when I have a 14 Pro?

  • Battery. I’m told the 14 Pro Max battery is way better than the regular Pro’s, and I want to test that. I get an irrational battery anxiety: I work at home, have MagSafe in my vehicle and a Lightning cable in my wife’s car, and can charge nearly anywhere, yet I still worry, and my screen time can be 6 hours or more a day (I know that’s insane). I want to see if the Pro Max gets me through a full day without thinking about it. TBD.
  • My eyes. As I get older, my eyes are changing. They’re fine now, so this reasoning is sketchy at best, but I want to see how a bigger display feels and whether there’s less fatigue or strain at the end of the day.
  • Next year’s rumors. There are rumors of an iPhone Ultra that would turn the Pro Max into a new tier with extra features, maybe the periscope camera we’ve seen rumored. If features are exclusive to it, I’ll want them, and I’d rather get used to the weight, size and feel in the hand and the pocket gradually than be shocked by it.

This isn’t my first large iPhone: the last was the iPhone 6S Plus, followed by larger Pixels, Huawei phones and the Samsung S8 and S9 Plus, before I came back to iPhone with the standard-size iPhone X. It feels like a good time to try the Pro Max size again. I’m slightly concerned about the feel in the hand over time, especially with a case, any stress on my pinky, and the space it takes in my pocket.

What’s next

I’ll test it for a couple of weeks and compare it with the 14 Pro. One of the first things I’ll do is put an iCarez matte screen protector on it, the best matte protectors for the price, or any price, for the new iPhones.

Some links in this post are affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I may receive a small commission. See my ethics statement.

Watch on YouTube

Keep reading

Related posts