iPhone 11 Pro Review - Is it worth Upgrading?
The new iPhone is out, so I bought it. I’ll make this quick: if you’re watching, you know what an iPhone is and the specs (the A13 processor, a 5.8-inch OLED display, a new triple camera setup and a better battery). I only cover what’s different and matters to me.
Design
The design isn’t as bad as leaked images and rumors suggested. The frosted back glass has a sleek look and feel and feels premium, if a little slippery. The green-coated stainless steel of the Midnight Green Pro is beautiful and clean, with slightly different button placement compared with the iPhone XS. The screen has a higher max brightness and a contrast ratio up to 2,000,000:1. The back has the new triple camera, which includes an ultra wide lens for a fun new way to frame shots, and the camera bump looks indented from some angles.
How it differs from my last iPhone
“Not much.” How I use my iPhone may differ from how you use yours:
- The A13 is up to 20% faster than last year’s A12; I can’t say I noticed, mostly because the A12 was already more power than I needed.
- The screen is more power efficient, brighter and better, but I don’t watch HDR movies on my phone (the only time I watch video on a device is on a plane, and I usually use my iPad).
- The new U1 chip will, at the moment, only make AirDrop transfers better.
Cameras
The one thing I do appreciate. With the telephoto, wide and ultra wide lenses, you can get a lot of fun new shots: I show three shots from the same spot at a community fireplace, another from the side of my pool (the ultra wide has some distortion around the edges, as expected from any ultra wide), and a low-light example in my daughter’s playroom.
Night mode is the other main feature. Apple has substantially improved the ability to create close-to-true images in dark environments without making them look artificial. Depending on the available light and camera steadiness, the exposure can be up to 30 seconds and produce an image you wouldn’t expect from an iPhone. Examples: a photo of my daughter strumming without night mode and with it at 3 seconds (much better contrast between colors and shadows), a streetlight-lit parking lot, a table centerpiece at about midnight with night mode at 2 seconds, and a trinket shelf at a restaurant.
The cameras also improved video on both the front and rear (including 4K 60 and slow-mo), which I won’t demo: I record my YouTube videos on my iPhone, so videos after this will be shot with the iPhone 11 Pro.
Battery
It gets me through the day comfortably, every day, with no anxiety. Apple says it added four hours over the XS, and it shows.
Should you upgrade from an iPhone XS?
Unless you care about the camera, no. If you care about having the best pictures from an iPhone (and this blows all previous iPhones away), yes. If you don’t, this won’t change how you use your device in any significant way.
Links
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