It was yet another Apple event during the pandemic. I’m sure if you’ve watched at least one you will have a feeling about how it went.
iPad
Although updating the “no description iPad” iPad is great – it is an astonishing value for money, what surprised everyone was an updated iPad mini. It got an iPad Pro like design – doesn’t have home button, supports 2nd generation Apple Pencil and is available in a couple of different colors. This is iPad I’ve been waiting for and will definitely be getting one.
Apple Watch
It’s funny how wrong rumor sites were. It’s a nice upgrade with a bigger screen, I actually noticed a couple of months ago how big the bezel around the screen is in the current version and it looks like the Series 7 will solve that.
What I don’t like are the colors. I need to see them in person, but from the photos I only like stainless steel ones and they are either not available in Latvia or are ridiculously expensive.
I think Apple Watch is a perfect device for a two year upgrade. The battery in my Series 5 is sure ready to be replaced. I just need to choose the version.
iPhone
Although it might look like nothing much on the outside, it seems to be totally reworked on the inside. I love the bigger battery and updated cameras. I didn’t care much about Cinematic video, since it looked like the first Portrait mode version (not good).
The blue Pro looks okay, but I will need to see it in person. Pink non-Pro model looks amazing, I would get it if I was buying one.
I will be upgrading to the 13. This time just a regular Pro, since Pro Max doesn’t offer anything better in terms of camera.
I know a lot of people are somehow disappointed by the event, but I thought it was a strong one. There were no boring demos or store updates, we’ve got some new devices and even a surprise. You can count it as a success in my book.
Long time since the last event and finally, we got one in 2021. There were many rumours, so let’s see what came true.
Services
The first and the most boring thing announced — Apple Card Family. You can now share credit as a couple and you can order a card for your 13-year-old. If you are in USA, that is.
Apple also announced Apple Podcast subscriptions. There were no details shared, except that you will be able to subscribe for ad-free listening, early access and more. What’s good — it will be available in 170 regions and countries from the start, which will be next month.
iPhone
Apple
It was surprising to hear “iPhone” as a part of the spring presentation, but there is just the new purple color for iPhone 12 and 12 Mini. Looks good and I like the precedent of updating colours. They did this with red before, but this is more similar to seasonal Apple Watch band additions.
Find My — AirTags
AirTags are released. Finally. Although not sure if many people are waiting for them. They use Find My network, you can personalise them with text or emoji. There are cases, including $300 — $400 Hermes ones.
If you have iPhone 12 with U1 chip, you can use Precision finding which shows you the precise location of the tag and navigates you to it. They cost $29 for one and $99 for the pack of four. Available April 30.
What’s good is the battery is standard and replaceable, so after more than a year of promised battery life you still will be able to use your AirTags.
Apple TV
Apple TV+
The only TV show trailer was of course for Season 2 of Ted Lasso, which can’t come soon enough. Apple shared the date of the release of the second season — July 23rd.
Apple TV 4K
Update to the same old Apple TV box. Now it will have A12 Bionic, which will enable to play High-frame rate HDR content.
They also added a cool Color Balance feature, which uses camera and sensors on your iPhone to calibrate the picture of Apple TV.
New square-sided remote, with a 5-way navigation click-pad, which is also touch enabled and has a circular gesture for rewinding (like an iPod). There is a power button to control TV and Siri button is on the side now.
It still costs $179 for 32 GB which is too much.
iMac
Apple
When they showed the new iMacs with M1, the first thought was — why did they leave the chin?! We’ve quickly learned that the whole computer fits into the chin, but I would rather have a thicker device and a display with a smaller bezel than this.
There are seven different colours, muted in the front, joyful in the back. It has an iPad Pro inspired design which makes it very thin, wiith 24” screen size in just a bit bigger body than 21.5” iMac.
1080p camera, together with M1 image-processing potentially will produce a great picture. New 6-speaker system is able to support Spatial audio.
I don’t understand why a desktop computer needs a magnetic connector, which is also attached such that it would be inconvenient to put it against the wall. On the other hand, ethernet port in the power brick is a nice touch.
There are also some new accessories. Magic Mouse and Magic Trackpad are now white with color accents matching new iMacs. Magic Keyboard on the other hand, got the biggest update. It also matches the color of the iMac, but now it comes in three versions. First, similar to the old one, but with a couple of new buttons (like emoji-picker). Second, with added Touch ID and third with Touch ID and number pad.
There are two main configurations — $1299 which comes in 4 colors and $1499 which comes in 7 colors. But it is not the only difference, the more expensive one has 8-core GPU instead of 7, two additional USB 3 ports (lower-tier has only Two Thunderbolt ports) and it comes with Magic Keyboard with Touch ID.
iPad Pro
The most surprising announcement was that iPad Pro has an M1 in it, which makes it 50% faster than previous iPad Pro. It also has a higher tier 8-core GPU and new 2 TB configuration. New Thunderbolt port with USB-4 now supports Pro Display XDR in full 6K resolution.
Speaking of the display, 12.9” iPad Pro will now have the display similar in performance to the Pro Display XDR. It uses Mini-LED technology and now has both outstanding brightness and contrast ratio.
Of course, it has 5G, so you can have fast internet access whenever you go (in ideal conditions).
Moreover, a big update to the front facing camera, it now has Ultra-Wide sensor. Apple presented the Center Stage feature, which keeps you in the center of the picture and if you move it will crop accordingly. Looks nice in the demo.
It will be available in the second half of May for $799 for 11” and $1099 for 12.9”.
Now that iPad Pro is more powerful than ever, there still is a question of software. Even with M1 in May, it will power iPadOS 14, which won’t be able to use all this power. Some hope for the WWDC in June?
And at the end, I will leave you with two questions which popped to mind when they announced M1 in iPad Pro:
It was another instalment of the beautiful commercial made by Apple, filled with amazing transitions and views of the Apple Park.
The presentation was short with a couple of minutes of recap by Tim Cook of all the products announced in the last 8 weeks.
This time there was a lot of background music when presenters were talking and I didn’t enjoy it, as it portrayed the ad vibe even more.
In the end they showed a bit with a PC guy from the old Mac vs PC commercials, it was OK. Judging by Twitter old-time Mac fans enjoyed it.
One More Thing — The Mac
Right at the beginning Tim Cook emphasised that One More Thing this time was relating to THE Mac. So, no AirTags, AirPods Studio or other devices.
I was surprised to learn that over 50% of Mac buyers are new to the system. On the other hand, with such a strong quarter for Mac, it is not a surprise that those weren’t only those who updated their computers.
They’ve made a commercial (yes, a commercial inside the commercial) showing many celebrities with Macs and a lot of those were with glowing logo. In black and white it was noticeable that they made focus on that, as it looked cool, but Apple doesn’t make such laptops anymore…
MacOS Big Sur
What they couldn’t show before is how macOS is better with Apple Silicon. It is more similar to the iOS and iPadOS in some regards. I know the internet is all about scores for CPU, but everyday little things are more important for the experience, especially on the types of machines Apple introduced. It launches apps instantly and more importantly it instantly wakes from sleep, just like iOS.
M1
This is the start of the next generation of Mac. First System on a chip for low-power Mac computers. It has 8-core CPU (4 High and 4 Low performance cores) and Apple says the High-performance core is the fastest core in the world right now.
All the new Macs
Apple introduced 3 new Macs, and they are similar to each other — MacBook Air, MacBook Pro and Mac Mini. For the first one it is a complete transition — you can’t buy Air with an Intel processor anymore. For the latter two it is the mainstream, low performance models, with Intel laptop and Mac mini still being sold as an option.
What they have in common is that all three have the same M1. You can choose up to 2 TB of SSD and 16 GB of RAM.
What is different is battery life in case of MacBook Pro and continuous performance. What that means is although the processor is the same because MacBook Air doesn’t have a fan and other two models do, they can not only reach the same speed as Air, but sustain it for longer periods of times.
It’s a shame that they didn’t update the camera in laptops. It is still the same 720p, very mediocre camera. Although the picture will be improved by the SoC thanks to Machine Learning.
Because Apple doesn’t sell any other display, it was funny how in every picture or video of people using Mac mini it was standing right on the stand of Apple XDR monitor, the stand for which costs $300 more than the computer itself.
I was blown away by the numbers provided regarding the battery life and am very optimistic about Mac lineup and will probably end up buying one of the laptops introduced (most probably MacBook Air). But of course the more exciting things will come out, when Apple will show iMac and Mac Pro with Apple Silicon inside. I can’t even imagine what will be possible with M1X (or whatever it will be called) where because of no thermal limitations there could be 16 cores and most of them would be High-performance.
As other companies are trying to repeat the success of Apple presentation from June, they are going to the next level with the production of their events. This time the focus was even more on transitions and again, the event is much shorter, clocking at 1 hour and 10 minutes.
HomePod mini
Source: Apple
The smallest announcement (no pun intended) was HomePod mini. Apple claims that it will have an amazing sound and for $99 it will be a very compelling device.
Two notable things — when talking about 3rd party services, Apple didn’t mention Spotify — the most popular music streaming service, but it will be supported in the new OS.
Second, Apple please stop showing HomePods without cords in the middle of the room, it’s misleading.
The Intercom feature could be potentially interesting, with the ability to ask Siri to communicate something to everyone in your family. What’s important it works not only on HomePods, but on iPhones, iPads, Apple Watches, Macs and even CarPlay.
iPhone
Watching presentation, you could have missed that the main feature of the new iPhones is 5G (powered by Verizon). It is fast (in ideal conditions), reliable (in ideal conditions), has low latency (in ideal conditions). Oh, and did I mention? The new iPhones will have 5G (powered by Verizon).
The 5G was all over the presentation in partnership with, you guessed it, Verizon. Nobody knows how much Verizon paid Apple for that commercial inside the commercial, but it was bad. It was the worst presentation for a long time because of that. One would think Apple is above such things, but no, today was the very low point in the history of Apple events.
The one good thing in Apple implementation of 5G is Smart Data Mode, which will use LTE to preserve battery when the high speed is not essential.
iPhone 12
Source: Apple
The main difference from the iPhone 11 is of course the new flat design, similar to the iPad Pro (and iPhone 4 and 5).
There are 5 colors — black, white, red, green and blue. And the screen is a bit bigger at 6.1”, but it has smaller borders, so the difference in the physical size is non-existent. The screen itself is OLED now, instead of LCD in the previous year model. It has a new technology which Apple calls Ceramic Shield, which is new material for the screen for dramatical improvement in toughness. Apple claims it has 4x better drop performance. We’ll have to wait and see if it will improve scratch resistance.
The new A14 Bionic chip is better and faster and will be faster than competition for years to come, that is everything you need to know.
The main camera is a bit better, the processor also allows for Night Mode on all cameras including front one. And you can also shoot Night Mode Time-lapses now.
MagSafe
Source: Apple
There are magnets in the iPhone and it looks very interesting. You can attach wireless charger (similar to the Apple Watch), Apple cases will now have magnets to easily snap on and off.
And Apple introduced wireless charger for Apple Watch and iPhone.
Oh, and there won’t be a power adaptor and headphones in the box.
iPhone 12 mini
The smallest iPhone in the lineup. Physically it is even smaller than iPhone SE, but it has 5.4” display.
It is the same as the iPhone 12 except for the screen, so you won’t compromise on anything, just need to choose the size.
iPhone 12 Pro
Source: Apple
Pro phones also feature a new design, although the band is from stainless steel and there are 4 colors — Silver, Graphite, Gold and Blue.
The displays got a bit bigger 6.1” (instead of 5.8”) for iPhone 12 Pro and 6.7” (instead of 6.5”) for iPhone 12 Pro Max. As with the iPhone 12, the bezels are smaller, so the physical size of the phone is just a bit bigger.
The biggest improvements are with the camera. Deep Fusion is now available on all 4 cameras (including front one).
There is LiDAR for depth data. The biggest improvement is in low light autofocus. The camera will find focus at night 6x faster. It also allows making portraits at night.
Apple will now support RAW photography right in app and what is more importantly there will API for Apple ProRAW, which will help 3rd party developers (like Halide) to improve their processing.
The iPhone Pro Max will have even better camera sensor. Starting with a bit better Telephoto sensor, which will allow using up to 2.5x optical zoom. And the main camera will have a Sensor Shift technology, which shifts the whole sensor instead of the lens for more precise image stabilization.
Prices for the Pro models will remain the same, but it will now start at 128 GB storage capacity. The iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro will be available in a week, while iPhone 12 mini and iPhone 12 Pro Max will be available in a month.
Although it is strange to watch September Apple Event and not see new iPhones, we do live in different times, so here we go. The presentation itself was good, the same style as WWDC 2020 and I enjoyed watching it (in case you are wondering, I realize that it is an hour long ad by a trillion dollar company).
Apple tried to manage expectations when it announced the event (a lot of journalists covering Apple immediately said there won’t be new iPhones) and at the very start of the presentation Tim Cook said they will talk Apple Watch and iPad today.
Apple Watch
Apple Watch Series 6
Same design as last year, although they’ve added three new colors – Gold, Blue and Red. I think they look good, especially the blue one (it will look great with the new blue iPhone).
There is a new sensor which will measure your blood oxygen levels. The manual measurement takes only 15 seconds and it does periodic background measurements, even at night if you sleep with your watch on. Although Apple didn’t say it, but it is helpful for the COVID-19.
The Always-On display got 2.5 times brighter outdoors.
Starting price remains the same at $399 in the US.
Apple Watch SE
The same display size and design as a Series 6, but without Always-On display and with an older S5 chip, which is 2x faster than Series 3. It is available both without and with cellular.
The price starts at $279 and Series 3 still remains in the lineup for $199.
Right now, if you are able to find discounted Series 5 it will be a much better deal – it has an always-on display, more health sensors and the same processor and design.
Solo Loop and Braided Solo Loop
New bands for Apple Watches that don’t have a clasp or a buckle. That means you have to buy one that fits you, it has a lot of different sizes. What interesting, it says on the ordering page that it is not compatible with Series 3 and older watches, but I always thought the band connectors were identical.
Family Setup
You can now use your iPhone to set up an Apple Watch for someone in your family, who doesn’t have an iPhone. They will have a dedicated phone number and cellular connection. This is an amazing feature for kids or older family members and another step to the iPhone-less future for the Apple Watch.
Apple Fitness+
“First fitness service built around Apple Watch.”
Interesting how they presented it as something only possible with an Apple Watch. There will be 10 types of workouts, provided by world class trainers, with Apple Music (you don’t need a subscription for the service to work). New workouts will be added every week.
The new service is available on the iPhone, iPad and Apple TV. It will show all the metrics during the workout on the screen and when a trainer will remind you to check your heart rate, the metric will get bigger.
When you start your workout on one of your devices, it will automatically start the workout on the Apple Watch.
There is an absolute beginner program, with all the basics covered and personalized recommendations in the app.
It will cost $9.99 a month or $79.99 a year (Family Sharing included) and you will get 3 months free with an Apple Watch purchase. Unfortunately service is available only in handful of countries, so we will have to wait for it’s launch.
Other
There are a lot of new watch faces, including GMT which shows multiple time zones at once, typography with a lot of combinations, Chronograph Pro and a lot more.
Apple also announced that it will remove power adapter from the box, basically trying to present the cost-saving measure as an environmental thing.
Everything else that will be changed and added in watchOS7 got covered in the WWDC2020 presentation.
Apple One
The long rumored bundle from Apple is here, but unfortunately it’s not that simple. First, the name – Apple One. There are actually Three different bundles and only Two available everywhere.
First one – for $14.95 you get Apple Music, TV+, Arcade and 50GB of iCloud storage.
Second – for $19.95 you will get the same bundle, but with 200GB of storage.
And Premier – for $29.95 you will get 1TB of storage and News+ and Fitness+ as additional services.
The Premier one is available only in the countries where Apple News+ and Fitness+ are available and there are not a lot of those.
Because of the iCloud storage, the only one that makes sense for me is Premier, which will be unavailable. It is possible to add more storage to the first two, but at that point I’m not sure it will be a good deal. So no Apple One for me.
iPad
8th generation
This is the same plain iPad with a better processor (A12 Bionic), which means it will be more powerful. The design remains the same, with Touch ID button and screen bezels. It will still only support 1st generation Apple Pencil. But for the price of $329 it is an amazing value.
iPad Air
The iPad Air on the other hand got a complete redesign, it now looks the same as 11” iPad Pro, with rose gold, green and sky blue options available.
For the first time in a very long time, iPad gets new SoC before iPhone and iPad Air has A14 Bionic, which is industry leading 5 nanometer processor.
It also has a Touch ID sensor which is now in the Top Button (yeap, they’ve renamed Power Button in this one).
What is similar with the iPad Pro, except for design – it now has USB-C connector, support for 2nd generation Apple Pencil and Magic Keyboard.
What it lacks is Pro Motion (120Hz) display, FaceID, camera array and microphone and speaker system.
For $599 right now it looks like a much better purchase than 11” iPad Pro and Apple tablet lineup remains weird and complicated.
On March 18th Apple surprised everyone with the announcement of new and updated products.
It was rumored long ago that there was an Apple event planned for the end of March, but with the COVID-19 going around the globe everyone understood that it wouldn’t be possible to organize. So they’ve published the press release and it looks like either press only got the devices now or are still under embargo.
Let’s go through the products starting from the least important and moving to the most interesting one.
“Mac mini Also Updated Today”
The only update was the storage, it now starts at 256GB, which is the bare minimum today. As someone with the 256GB on all three of my Apple devices (iPhone, iPad and MacBook) I can’t understand how anyone would survive with less.
MacBook Air
Everyone was waiting for an updated keyboard making it’s way through the whole lineup and not just being in the 16” MacBook Pro, this day has come. With the new keyboard, 256GB storage as a base and a new (old) starting price of $999, this is again the best default computer there is. Except, we can’t be sure what a computer is right now…
iPad
Apple unveiled the new iPad Pro, of course it has a new chip, which is faster and more powerful. As a previous generation iPad Pro owner I can’t see how you would be able to see this, as the tablet is fast as hell still.
It has two cameras now, adding the 10MP Ultra Wide to the back, making it look like an iPhone 11. In a year, I am pretty sure that I didn’t take one photo with my iPad Pro. I know there are people who like to hold huge tablet in front of their face at schools and in touristy places, but I’m not one of them. I love editing photos on my 12.9” iPad Pro, but I would probably miss the shot before reaching for the iPad in my bag.
LiDAR Scanner is the weakest point in todays announcement, not from the technology point of view, but from the delivery. If you read everything Apple has provided, it just makes AR a bit better and promising a lot. Knowing Apple there should be a lot more information, either with the announcement of iOS 14 or more likely iPhone 12. It just made sense to include the hardware right now, but the software story is not yet ready.
Magic Keyboard and Trackpad Support
This is the biggest news, not only for me, but reading tweets for a was majority of potential or current iPad Pro users. Seeing videos, it looks like pointer support in iPadOS got much better. And the most interesting thing – it happened today, not in September with the release of iOS 14, but in March with iOS 13.4 (public release in a week).
The best news is that new keyboard with the trackpad is compatible with the now previous generation iPad. The worst news is the price – $299 for the 11-inch and $349 for the 12.9-inch. That is a lot of money, it is actually more than the price of the standard iPad itself. It looks nice, I’m sure the trackpad will be amazing, as Apple always excelled in making those and they now come in different colors. I’m not sure I would buy one yet, will try out pointer support first.
Pretty strong announcement from Apple, if they won’t surprise us again with the everyday announcements, I’m not sure this would be enough for the whole event, but it is more than enough for the press release.
I’m not in the market for a new iPad, as my previous generation 12.9-inch one is fast enough, screen and design didn’t change much and I don’t use cameras. Thankfully, Apple made the new Magic Keyboard for iPad compatible with the older models. Oh, and regarding the MacBook, I have one MacBook Pro already lying around not being used for months, so who need those, right?
Although there was a loot of interesting stuff presented, something was definitely amiss at the latest Apple Event. First it was half an hour too short, leaving time for at least one big thing. Second, different release dates for iOS and iPadOS don’t make sense and actually will be messy.
Regarding the first issue. There were a lot of rumors about Apple bringing the reverse wireless charging to the iPhone. This would give the ability to charge the AirPods from the iPhone. It is now rumored Apple scraped this feature as it didn’t hold up to the high standards (Apple and wireless chargers, am I right?).
There were also a lot of rumors about some kind of Tile device, which you could track. Apple didn’t show anything like that. It even added new processor to the iPhone and didn’t bring it up. How un-Apple is it? This U1 chip is specifically designed for proximity based navigation and right now the only feature it will have – you can AirDrop to the specific person by pointing iPhone at them. Imagine this technology used in retail. This could be a game changer – you point your iPhone at something, it shows you the price, you pay with Apple Pay and you are done.
There was absolutely no mention of AR. Again, this is unlike Apple in the recent years. There were rumors of AR headset, I wouldn’t say it should have been shown in this event, but still, no word? Especially considering, that in the GM builds of iOS 13, people are already finding a lot of new mentions of AR.
Regarding release dates for the OS’s. In the new version redesigned Reminders app uses a different format, so if you update your iPhone on September 19 and use this new format it will stop syncing to the iPad, which will still have old Reminders app and old format.
Also, if you use Shortcuts and change anything in one of them on iOS 13, it will stop working on iOS 12. What about universal apps? Can you update your app for iOS 13, while still supporting iOS 12 for the iPad.
There are a lot of questions, which make this event a bit weird. Remember the tag line for the event was By Innovation Only and there was nothing Innovating in that event (except of course Pro font in the camera app on the Pro iPhone).
I hope there is a second event in October, where Apple will be able to bring some light on the features it didn’t show us in this event or should we wait another year now?
Yesterday Apple held its biggest event of the year. As was rumored we’ve seen three new iPhones, watch and so much more. Luckily this time not all rumors came true, we’ve had a couple of surprises. On the other hand, some were expecting too much, so as always my strategy of not reading rumors before the event pays off.
Arcade
If you didn’t notice, Apple is services company now, so it started with two of them. Apple Arcade is gaming service, starting from 100 exclusive high quality games. You will pay the subscription fee and play whatever game you want on iPhone, iPad, Mac or Apple TV. The games in the trailer look amazing. Considering that Apple announced support for xBox and PS4 controllers, this could be a very big deal for many.
As it often is, game demos are the weakest part of Apple presentation, after Tim Cook said “I won’t waste your time with usual updates” we’ve watched three game demos in a row with one of them being Froger, in 2019.
It will be available September 19 in over 100 countries around the world for a price of $4.99 per month for the whole family. And Apple will give 1 month free trial.
Considering the price, I feel like this is the one to at least try. As I said games look good, the lineup of developers looks strong with some big names and indie.
tv+
As every company under the sun Apple is launching original content. tv+ will have three shows at start adding more every month. Tim Cook was so excited that the trailer for the Morning Show was “one of the most watched trailers ever” it wasn’t even funny.
We also saw a trailer for the TV show See, which looks very promising.
It will cost $4.99 per month for family and will be available in over 100 countries. What was surprising, you will get 1 year of the service included with the purchase of any Apple device. Considering Apple only has a couple of shows at the start and doesn’t have any backlog this is very smart strategy.
iPad
This one was a surprise. There were some rumors about new iPad, but most thought it would be shown in October event later this year.
What Apple did is update it’s most popular iPad, the original size one. It is now 7th generation iPad, they’ve changed screen size a bit, increasing it to 10.2 inches (instead of 9.7). It has updated specs and is shipping on September 30 starting from $329.
Interesting how Apple doesn’t compare it to other tablets (because that market doesn’t even exist), all of the comparisons were with top selling PC and of course iPad beat it in every aspect.
Up until now, this was The iPad to get, considering the price and power you get. It remains the one device in Apple lineup which you can consider inexpensive and well worth every dollar you spend.
watch
Tim Cook started with the video showing how Apple Watch save lives with its ECG function. What was nice this time – it also showed how Apple Watched helped get healthier by asking you to close your rings or stand. Those videos are always Apple at its best.
There will be three new studies – Hearing, Women’s health and Heart and movement study. Those are great, but unfortunately available only in the United States.
And here is the announcement I was most surprised by – new Apple Watch. Watch Series 5 will have THE feature, the one many asked for from the very beginning – always on display, while still having all-day 18 hour battery life.
All the watch faces were optimized for low-power mode when it shows time, so you don’t have to tilt your wrist or tap the screen. This is the feature for getting a new watch, especially if you didn’t upgrade to the Series 4 last year.
As everything in the US, Apple Watch now has a compass. As most of the cities in the US were built considering the directions, this will be helpful to Americans, but also around the world, Maps app will now be able to show where are you heading more precisely.
There will also be international emergency calling in more than 100 countries if you have cellular Apple Watch. Amazing feature, which I hope nobody has to use.
This year Series 5 is available in a couple of new finishes – two Titanium models and white Ceramic. They look great, but will cost accordingly.
Apple Watch Series 5 will start at $399 for GPS model and $499 for cellular. You can already order one and it will ship on September 20.
What also interesting, Apple leaves Series 3 in its lineup for $199. It is great entry price, but only if you don’t care about the look and newest feature. By itself it is ok, but if you ever come across Series 4 or 5, two year old model looks very old and dated.
iPhone
The main star of the event – iPhone. Last year, I think Apple confused buyers with releasing three models which were hard to differentiate for average consumer (believe me, I know, the amount of questions I got about which one should someone buy was like a customer sat – through the roof). Fortunately this didn’t stop iPhone XR to become the most popular iPhone and smartphone in the world.
This year the lineup is much more clearer. First, there is iPhone 11. Which you can consider the standard one – everyone who wants to buy an iPhone this year should get this one. It has 6.1 inch display, Haptic Touch and Spacial Audio.
It also has two cameras this year, but instead of adding telephoto, the second camera is ultra-wide. This will allow you to switch to x0.5, which means you will be able to capture 2 times more of the scene from the same point.
This is also shown in the new camera interface. When you launch it, it will look more immersive, showing you the whole available picture instead of black bars.
Although there is no telephoto camera, Portrait mode is still made using hardware, so it will work on animals, unlike the iPhone XR.
Apple also showed Night mode, which in presentation looked great, but we will need to see comparisons with Google Pixel, where night mode is just out of this world. Hope Apple delivers.
If photography is something Android manufacturers, especially Google, mastered, in videos Apple is still unbeatable. Adding to that ultra-wide and cinematic stabilization, makes it even more impressive.
Front camera was also updated, it is now wider 12MP sensor which will take normal selfie, until you rotate it sideways and it will get wide.
Apple also added 4K video support and slo-mo to the front camera and invented the word Slofies – which is probably officially the worst word of 2019.
A12 processor leads the industry, the overhead it has is not even funny, it is still faster than all the newest Android phones and Apple made it even faster. A13 Bionic is the new processor inside iPhone. It is so ahead, it will take Android manufacturers a couple of years to catch up.
What iPhone XR did have, was amazing all-day and then some battery life. In iPhone 11 it was improved – adding 1 hour.
It will be priced starting from $699 and as I’ve already mentioned, this is the one to get.
iPhone 11 Pro
As Phil Schiller said – this is the first phone Apple called Pro and it is worthy of its name.
There are four new colors – Midnight Green, Space Grey, Silver, Gold. And at least on photos the green looks amazing, I will be surprised if it will be available on first day in enough quantities. The back has a nice matte finish now, which doesn’t even look like glass anymore.
There are two phones iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max, with the same sizes as last year of 5.8 and 6.5 inches. It will also have A13 Bionic processor, but one of the biggest improvements is battery life. 4 hours more for iPhone 11 and 5 hours more for iPhone 11 Pro Max. As a XS Max user I can tell you this will be amazing, it will bring phones closer to the main iPhone 11. It will also have 18 watt adapter in the box, so you will be able to charge it faster.
There is now three cameras. The ultra-wide was also added to the Pro models. One amazing thing 3rd party developer Filmic Pro demoed, was shooting video with two cameras at the same time. So you have more different footage for the same moment.
Apple also showed sneak peak for a feature coming later this year called Deep Fusion. What it does is it takes 9 photos (8 of them before you even press a button) and combines them to bring a lot of detail. On stage it looks great, we will have to wait for it to come out.
The iPhone 11 Pro will start at $999 and iPhone 11 Pro Max at $1099 with pre-orders this Friday and shipping on Septemver 20th.
Apple will also keep in it’s lineup iPhone XR for $599 and iPhone 8 for $449.
Some already are saying this was the weakest Apple event in recent history, but I think it was good. Making already great iPad even better, always-on display on the Apple Watch making it even better in the market with almost no competition. And iterative update on the iPhone, which should be expected, as this is a mature market already.
