Compare the New iPhone Models

They’ve been doing this for, what, 14 years now since Jobs passed. I fail to see anything substantially new since then. They’re quite literally milking the cash cow at this point. They became the company the old Apple fans despised.

> I fail to see anything substantially new since then.

I'm inclined to see Apple's M series chips as pretty substantial.

I don't know that phones need massive innovation right now.

So what would you expect them to do, create a new market every ten years?

Faster horse situation. I'd take one that was slightly larger that could plug into a monitor and replace my desktop/laptop. But then that would be 1 or 2 less devices I would buy.

I don't understand the Air model. It's cool, but just a different price point. The thickness of a device means nothing to me anymore, they're all close enough.

Their phones are so good they don't have much they can do at this point to make them better. You can have a 5 year old iPhone right now and it's probably still a very good device, assuming you swapped the battery since purchase.

It's a pretty good problem to have.

If you're looking for something truly new, have a look at Librem 5 running desktop GNU/Linux with no walled gardens included, able to become a PC with a screen/keyboard.

> They’re quite literally milking the cash cow at this point.

Figuratively, not literally. Otherwise I agree.

They're incrementally better each cycle. I don't want something radical.

For me, and a lot of people, we get a new phone every 2 years and hand the old one down to family. I've got 3 kids and 4 iPhones in service that get handed down every 2 years. Equivalent in the UK of about $80 a month to run 4 iphones including phone service contracts is pretty cheap.

That's definitely not what I've seen from people around me with an iphone.

Almost all of them complain about the device getting hot, batteries being short lived (even when replaced) and apps being sluggish.

Interesting. Can it use not-Gnome?

I choose Apple over Android precisely because it feels like a device, not a computer.

233g for pro max, 206g for pro, 165g for the Air. That's a big difference. I figure the Air will be a more compelling in person.

It also replaces the worst selling model of the four. The 15 plus and 16 plus models did not sell very well. The pro max is the top seller.

https://9to5mac.com/2025/01/22/this-iphone-16-model-got-sale...

Previously, the fourth iphone was the mini, which did not sell well in the 13 series:

https://www.macrumors.com/2022/04/21/iphone-13-mini-unpopula...

Yes, you can install postmarketOS [0] with, e.g., SXMo [1] or KDE Plasma [2].

[0] https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Purism_Librem5_(purism-li...

[1] https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Sxmo

[2] https://wiki.postmarketos.org/wiki/Plasma_Mobile

What do you mean by "feels like a device"? Any phone feels like a device to me.

Android has always felt like a computer to me- too many customizations; too many technical decisions I have to make, too complicated. I can see why many people would like that; I don’t.

This is a very subtle point to try and get across, because it’s scattered across 1 million different design decisions. For example, since the beginning of iPhone, I don’t have to remember to save anything, when I open an app it usually remembers whatever state I need if applicable. Android has moved this direction, but iOS was always that way. Likewise, I do very little customization to my phone other than rearranging icons or changing the wallpaper.

I don’t want to think about the security implications of all the different permission grants when I install an app. iPhone apps ask me for a permission in context, and I can decide at that moment whether or not I want to share my photos or whatever.

Again, I gave two examples, but the thinking behind this is pervasive in the operating system. There just are not many sharp edges.

I am happy living in my walled garden, and I am generally satisfied with the capabilities that the phone gives to me. I am scared of apps because they are potential vehicles for malware, and Apple has a much better track record there than android, much less rooted android.

Librem 5 doesn't run Android and doesn't ask you for permissions. It runa ordinary, desktop GNU/Linux with the Debian repositories, which contain virtually no malware. It's a completely different approach to security.