A good even faster speed, the battery life is better. The iPhone 11 Kokoro camera is an excellent new night mode and an ultrawide angle camera that can add extra detail in photos. Fantastic video camera.
Model Bad Only Pro Kokoro Tele 2x. Ultrawide angle cameras Do not add night mode. There is no USB-C port. Mobile Pro has a faster 18 watts charger but the iPhone 11 does. Still has a good look (but not OLED).
Bottom Line Apple might skip the extra flashy on mobile this year, but iPhone 11 is the best Midtier model the company has ever made.
The first time you hear the name of the new iPhone Apple-iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 Pro Max-You may have some questions. Where is the iPhone X? And what makes the iPhone Pro… Pro? What happened to XS and XS Max last year? The new phone this year was a polished sequel (literally and figuratively) to the three we had last year. For some people, iPhone 11 only needs to be better than XS. And it is so. But for others, glad to know where Apple stands in the larger mobile landscape. There’s a wild 5G speed on the horizon, plus weird and expensive folding phones such As Samsung Galaxy Fold. And there is a more expensive $799 (£669, AU $1,049) Google Pixel 4, which actually makes $699 (£729, AU $1,199) iPhone 11 look like a better value.
Apple does a great job with new features, including some serious camera improvements like Night Mode to take photos in dimly-lit situations and Deep Fusion, a new way for iPhone 11 and 11 pros to process photos taken in situations where lighting is bright enough. For you to see, but not like being outside on a sunny day
But there are good reasons why this company calls mobile “Pro ” more expensive and more fancy this year: price. Apple intelligently targeted the iPhone $6 699 as a phone for most people, in the same print as iPhone XR ($599 at Apple) last year.
Basically, iPhone 11 and 11 Pro is 85% the same exact phone. If you want a dedicated telephoto camera with 2x optical zoom, a different size option, the screen is better and finished, you will pay 30% more. That does not mean $999 iPhone 11 Pro and $1,099 11 Pro Max is not a good phone. Just that the iPhone 11 is actually a good one.
Editor’s note, March 30: Five months after Apple launched the iPhone 11 and 11 Pro, the phone is still representing the best two you can buy today. In February, the Galaxy S20 was launched starting from $999. Technically it is the most affordable phone in the current Samsung generation
Still starting at 64GB
The iPhone Model $11 699 gets 64GB storage, which may be good for many people – and this is a price drop $50 from the base model of iPhone XR last year. 128GB for $749 may make more sense if you record any video and 256GB for $849 should only be a consideration if you record a lot of video. Your Pro phone adds a 512GB level that you don’t need unless you’re shooting in 4K for a livelihood. See the graphs at the bottom of this review for full pricing details, including UK and Australian prices.
Color: iPhone 11 is a fun phone
For any reason, Apple still makes the iPhone 11 at a lower price, which comes in pleasant colors. There are two new colors, called green and Purple, which are more like green mint and lavender. These new pastel colors replaced blue and coral options from last year.
I have an iPhone 11. The colour green is pleasant, and the color of the aluminium case is much closer to the glass color. The back of the glossy glass feels equal to XR last year. Likewise with the rest of the phone-except for the two cameras, which are lifted from the back and placed in a frosted glass camera box.
On the contrary, the iPhone 11 Pro models all have metallic shades: silver, outer space grey, gold, and a midnight green military style. All three cameras seem more industrial (perhaps impressive). Matte back glass instead of shiny. They are made of steel, not aluminum. And the Pro phone feels more dense. They pack a larger battery, and the steel adds weight.
I love that iPhone 11 follows the trail of iPhone XR and is a medium size phone again with a screen of 6.1 inches – compared to two iPhone Pro models at 5.8 inches and 6.5 inches. I came to support the smaller iPhone 11 Pro, like iPhone XS last year.
Camera
Over the past few years, Apple has made impressive steps in camera quality, but so are many other mobile makers like Samsung, Huawei and Google. The camera arms race is something that hard-core photographers learn, but I think this is beyond what most people need. The iPhone 11 camera is some of the best for photo and video capture that you can buy today.
11 comes with a new ultrawide angle camera, night Mode for low-light photography, Deep Fusion processing for better indoor shooting, faster autofocus and sharper image overall with more accurate color reproduction. For a deeper look at the camera differences between the iPhone this year and last year, read our iPhone camera comparison between iPhone 11 with Deep Fusion and iPhone XR. Ultrawide offers radical changes in perspective that can be very dizzying visually. It won’t be the camera of your choice, but it’s just a blast to use.
Night Mode is a key feature that helps Apple pursue similar capabilities from Google, Huawei and Samsung. And so far, Apple’s version is impressive.
Night Mode, how it works and when not
Like the Google Pixel 4, Huawei P30 Pro and Samsung Galaxy Note 10, taking a surprisingly low-light photo seems to be in the steering Chamber of every mobile maker’s computing now. Apple’s version brightens photos, reduces image noise and does all this automatically. The way it works is when you open the default camera app, the phone determines when it’s dark enough to get into night Mode. Currently, there is no manual way to trigger the mode.
Night Mode uses adaptive brackets and takes a series of photos, some with a longer shutter speed, others with shorter ones. The IPhone then combines all the photos to reduce the motion blur and brighten the shadows. When I take a handheld night Mode shot, the sequence will take about 3 to 5 seconds. When I put my iPhone on top of my tripod it got 10 seconds and can even overwrite it manually for a 28-second night Mode shot.
I took a photo of a tree in my backyard that was pitch dark. Below is a shot with an iPhone 11 using Night Mode and another with iPhone XS last year.
Photos that feel like HDR keep some night effects, but at other times the photos can end up like daylight. Night Mode can be turned off by tapping an icon and sliding the timer to off, but so far it’s been an improvement in almost every instance.
It’s not a perfect tool: faces can be blurred, details can be lost. But still, I’ve been fascinated. The Night Mode effect works similarly on iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro, but the pros also get a telephoto camera that can use it.
You cannot use night Mode in ultrawide angle mode. The camera eventually seemed much darker, and had no optical image stabilization. That goes for all models this year.
Ultrawide angle = Play camera
The latest cameras have a 13mm-equivalent ultrawide lens that is just fun to use. If the main wide camera such as business suit and lens “Tele ” is a sporty blazer, then it is ultrawide equivalent to a Hawaiian shirt. Obviously different and completely change the way you shoot. It won’t be great in any situation, but it can be a similar piece of useful, such as when shooting in smaller, and artistic spaces, adding drama to worldly scenes.
Apple balances the distortion so there is little (which you want for ultrawide display) but not terrible. I immediately found an angle on my subject that made it look larger than life. Best of all, you can use a ultrawide lens while recording a video. In fact, during recording you can switch between cameras. Apple even puts cool zoom effects for transitions between lenses.
Without a doubt, this can result in stunning shots. Ultrawide camera is a new trend in phone camera. Apple promises some additional benefits here. IPhone 11 Gets an improved Ultrawide-angle portrait mode that can work with close-ups of your pets and other things. All phones get an expanded view viewfinder that now previews what’s out of the shot, which can help you know when to use an ultrawide lens.