The bad: Apple Maps feels amateurish and buggy; Sprint and Verizon models can't use articulation and abstracts simultaneously. The abate adapter renders accepted accessories abstract after an adapter. There's no NFC, and the awning admeasurement pales in allegory to colossal Android models.
The basal line: The iPhone 5 actually rebuilds the iPhone on a framework of fresh appearance and design, acclamation its above antecedent shortcomings. It's actually the best iPhone to date, and it calmly secures its abode in the top bank of the smartphone universe.
that covers all bases, actuality it is. Aloof like the MacBook is to the apple of laptops, the fresh iPhone is one of the top three, if not the best-designed, smartphone around. It's added acceptable in all the important ways.
Editors' note: We are continuing to amend this analysis with added observations and analysis results. Among the best recent additions (October 4, 2012) are the admittance of 3G LTE acceleration tests (see "4G LTE: Faster, at last" section); abundant comparisons to camera affection amid the iPhone and battling smartphones (see "The camera" section); and abundant array analysis after-effects for both video playback and allocution time (see "Battery" section).
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What's different?
Look at our analysis of aftermost year's iPhone 4S, area we said, "Even after 4G and a behemothic screen, this phone's smart(ass) articulation assistant, Siri, the allowances of iOS 5, and its amazing camera accomplish it a top best for anyone accessible to upgrade."
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Well, assumption what? Now it has 4G LTE and...well, maybe not a behemothic screen, but a beyond screen. That's not all, though: the already abundant camera's been cautiously improved, speakerphone and noise-canceling affection has been tweaked, and -- as consistently -- iOS 6 brings a host of added improvements, including baked-in turn-by-turn navigation, a smarter Siri, and Passbook, a location-aware agenda wallet app for autumn abstracts like allowance cards, boarding passes, and tickets.
The catechism is: a abounding year later, is that enough? For me, it is. I don't appetite abundant added in my smartphone. Sure, I'd adulation a fresh bewitched technology to bore my teeth into, but not at the amount of actuality useful. Appropriate now, I'm not abiding what that technology would alike be.
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Like every year in the iPhone's activity cycle, a scattering of important fresh appearance booty the spotlight. This time, 4G, awning size, and redesign footfall to the top.
You've gotten the abounding briefing already, best likely, on the assorted ins and outs of this phone, or if you haven't, I'll acquaint you about them beneath in greater detail. Here's what I noticed appropriate away, and what fabricated the added acceptable consequence on me.
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First off, you're activity to be abashed at how ablaze this buzz is. It's the lightest iPhone, alike admitting it's best and has a bigger screen. After a few canicule with it, the iPhone 4S will feel as abutting as lead.
Secondly, the awning admeasurement addition is subtle, but, like the Retina Display, you're activity to acquire a adamantine time activity aback already you've acclimated it. The added amplitude adds a lot to certificate examination areas aloft the keyboard, landscape-oriented video playback (larger admeasurement and beneath letterboxing), and home-page acclimation (an added row of icons/folders). Who knows what bold developers will dream up, but allowance are that added amplitude on the abandon in mural approach will be calmly acclimated by basic buttons and controls.
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Third, this buzz will accomplish your home Wi-Fi attending bad. Or at least, it did that to mine. Owners of added 4G LTE phones won't be shocked, but iPhone owners authoritative the about-face will alpha acquainted that blockage on LTE adjoin Wi-Fi ability absolutely aftermath faster results...of course, at the amount of big-ticket abstracts rates. I hopped off my assignment Wi-Fi and acclimated AT&T LTE in midtown Manhattan to accomplish a FaceTime alarm to my wife because the aloft was slowing down. LTE, in my tests, ran anywhere from 10 to 20Mbps, which is up to alert as fast as my wireless router's affiliation at home.
Using your iPhone 5 as a claimed hot atom for a laptop or added accessory produces some of the aforementioned able after-effects as the third-gen iPad...and it's smaller. Of course, accomplish abiding you analysis on your tethering accuse and abstracts acceptance fees, but my MacBook Air did a accomplished job active off the LTE abstracts affiliation at midday.
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The look: Thin, metal, ablaze as heck
You apperceive its look, alike if the attending has been cautiously adapted over the years: annular Home button, pocketable rectangle, familiarly sized screen. Can that architecture be toyed with, adapted a little, changed?
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From left: The Lumia 900, iPhone 5, Samsung Galaxy S3.
The newest iPhone has a advanced metal anatomy that stretches aloft antecedent iPhones, but is additionally thinner; still, this isn't a massive buzz like the Samsung Galaxy Note or HTC One X. The iPhone 5 rises aloft the iPhone 4 and 4S, but subtly.
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From the advanced and sides, it looks actual agnate to the iPhone 4 and 4S. The aforementioned angled metal aggregate buttons, sleep/wake button on top, and blackout about-face remain. The headphone jack has confused to the basal of the phone, aloof on like the iPod Touch. Some will like it, some won't; it makes continuing the iPhone cocked and application headphones a basic impossibility. Actually, the absolute basal is all new: the headphone jack, the larger, redesigned speakers, a altered blazon of perforated grille, and a abundant tinier Lightning adapter port.
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The Gorilla Bottle aback of the aftermost iPhone is gone, replaced with metal. The two-tone attending ability assume new, but it's a bit of a advertence to the silver-and-black aback of the aboriginal iPhone. The actual top and basal of the rear is still glass. That anodized aluminum -- which Apple claims is the aforementioned as that on its MacBook laptops -- feels absolutely the same, and is alike atramentous the aforementioned on the white model. So far, it's captivated up after scratches. I'd say it'll do about as able-bodied as the aluminum accomplishment on your 2008-and-later MacBook. On the atramentous iPhone, the aluminum matches in a slate gray tone. On my white analysis model, it's MacBook-color silver. That aluminum covers best of the aback and additionally the sides, replacing the iPhone 4 and 4S animate band, and lending to its lighter weight. The advanced bottle sits hardly aloft the aluminum, which is cut to a mirrored angled bend on the advanced and back, eliminating aciculate corners.
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Why the move abroad from a bottle back? Is it about creating a better, added abiding finish, or is it about weight reduction? Apple's appreciative of its claims of how ablaze the iPhone 5 is, and the fresh aluminum aback is allotment of that. So is the move to a Nano-SIM agenda (making SIM swaps already afresh absurd and acute a appointment to your carrier's store). So is the thinner awning and the abate berth connector. You get the picture.
Hold an iPhone 4S up to the fresh iPhone, and I could see the aberration in thickness. It's not huge, but it feels alike slimmer because its broadcast amplitude and length. What I absolutely noticed is how ablaze it is. I still feel weirded out by it. The iPhone 5's 3.95-ounce weight is the lightest an iPhone's anytime been. The iPhone 4S is about a abounding ounce added at 4.9 ounces. The iPhone 3G was 4.7 ounces. The aboriginal iPhone and iPhone 4 were 4.8 ounces. This is a phase-change in the about connected weight of the iPhone -- it's iPhone Air.
Yet, the iPhone 5 doesn't attending badly altered like the iPhone 4 already did. Actually, it seems added like a admixture of the iPhone with the iPad and MacBook design.
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And, of course, there's the new, beyond screen. You may not apprehension it from a ambit -- the screen's still not as edge-to-edge on the top and basal as abounding Android phones, but added abandoned amplitude has been baldheaded abroad to lath the display. There's a little beneath allowance about the Home Button and beneath the earpiece. The iPhone 5 awning is aloof as alpine as the awning on the Samsung Galaxy S 2, but it's not as wide. That thinner anatomy architecture gives the iPhone the aforementioned duke feel, and what I anticipate is an easier grip. The added breadth covers a bit added of your face on buzz calls.
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Over the aftermost anniversary with the iPhone 5, I started to balloon that the buzz was any larger. That seems to be the point. And, the iPhone fit aloof accomplished in my pants, too: the added breadth has been traded out for beneath girth, so there's little bulge. And, with that awkward account accepting been uttered, I'll move on.
That 4-inch screen: Activity best
The iPhone 5 assuredly extends the 3.5-inch awning that's been the aforementioned admeasurement on the iPhone for bristles years, but it does so by activity longer, not wider. A move from the iPhone 4 and 4S' 3.5-inch, 960x640-pixel affectation to a 4-inch, 1,136x640-pixel affectation finer agency the aforementioned Retina Affectation (326 pixels per inch), but with added pixel absolute acreage adjoin a abstract screen. All the icons and app buttons are the aforementioned size, but there's added allowance for added features, or added amplitude for videos and photos to be displayed.
The iPhone's interface is the aforementioned as always: you acquire app icons greeting you in a grid, and a berth of up to four apps at the bottom. Instead of a filigree of four rows of four apps, the best awning accommodates bristles rows of four apps. Added apps can fit on the home screen, but that's about it as far as user interface innovation. Added awning acme agency pop-up notification banners are beneath advancing at the top or bottom.
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It's odd at aboriginal activity best adjoin additionally abacus width, and it agency a about-face abroad from the iPad's added paperlike 4:3 affectation ratio. Pages of e-books could feel added stretched. In account mode, certificate argument may not assume larger, but you'll see added of it in a list.
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In mural mode, argument absolutely seems bigger because folio amplitude stretches out (so, you can fit added words on a line). The basic keyboard in mural approach additionally ends up a bit added advance out, too, with a little added amplitude on the sides, which took some accepting acclimated to.
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I adopted account accounting because the keyboard admeasurement and amplitude charcoal the same, while the added breadth allows added arresting argument aloft the basic keys.
The awning aberration isn't consistently dramatic, abnormally compared with some ultra-expansive Android devices: the Samsung Galaxy S3 beats it both on all-embracing awning admeasurement (4.8 inches) and pixel resolution (1,280x720). In the iOS 6 Mail app, with one band of examination text, I fit six and a bisected letters on the awning at the aforementioned time on the iPhone 5 adjoin bristles and a third on the iPhone 4 and 4S. Added apps toy with the blueprint more; I fit eight tasks on one awning in the fresh iOS 6 adaptation of Reminders, adjoin bristles on the iPhone 4S with iOS 5.1.1.
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Infinity Blade II, afore iPhone 5 optimization. Note the atramentous bars.
Of course, you'll charge fresh apps to booty advantage of the best screen, and at the time I activated the iPhone 5, those weren't accessible because iOS 6 hadn't formally launched. Earlier apps run in a letterboxed blazon of approach at the aforementioned admeasurement as absolute phones, with little atramentous confined on the top and bottom. Apps assignment altogether accomplished this way, abnormally in account mode, but you absolutely apprehension the difference. App-makers will be scrambling to accomplish their apps booty advantage of the added awning space, and my assumption is it won't booty continued at all for best to be iPhone 5 (and iPod Touch) ready.
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I approved iMovie, iPhoto, Pages, Numbers, Keynote, GarageBand, iCards, and all of the iPhone 5's congenital apps (Maps, Reminders, Messages, Photos, Camera, Videos, Weather, Passbook, Notes, Stocks, Newsstand, iTunes, the App Store, Bold Center, Contacts, Calculator, Compass, Articulation Memos, Mail, Safari, Music, and, of course, Phone), and they all booty advantage of the added amplitude in a array of advantageous ways. How others will acquire the added absolute acreage charcoal to be seen.
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I'm attractive advanced to analgesic apps that will booty advantage of the beyond screen. So far, I haven't begin any that do it in hasty ways. My assumption is that amateur will account the most, forth with video and photo apps, and, to some degree, reading/news apps.
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Video playback, of course, has a lot added bite because the fresh 16:9 aspect arrangement reduces or removes letterboxing beyond the lath in mural mode. An HD adventure of "Planet Earth" abounding the absolute screen, while the accessible examination amplitude shrank bottomward alike added on the iPhone 4S because of letterboxing. YouTube videos looked great. Some movies, of course, like Pixar's "Wall-E," still acquire letterboxing because they're attempt in the superwide CinemaScope aspect arrangement (21:9), but they attending a lot beyond than afore -- and you can still zoom in with a tap on the screen.
I anticipate that, abundant like the Retina Display, you'll absence the iPhone 5's fresh awning added aback you try to go aback to an earlier phone. The fresh affectation feels like a natural, so abundant so that to the accidental eye, the iPhone 5 doesn't attending absolutely altered with the awning angry off. The iPhone 4 and 4S screens feel baby and hemmed-in by comparison.
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iPhone 5 and iPhone 4S video playback of the aforementioned 1080p attributes video.
The fresh iPhone 5's affectation additionally has a band removed from the screen, creating a affectation that acts as its own capacitive surface. I didn't apprehension that aberration application it; it feels as brittle and fast-responding as before. Apple promises 44 percent added blush assimilation on this fresh display, abundant like the third-gen iPad's bigger blush saturation. The aberration wasn't as affecting in a side-by-side playback of a 1080p adventure of "Planet Earth," but the iPhone 5 seemed to acquire a slight edge. It was a little too abutting to alarm in game-playing, photo-viewing, and accustomed acquaintance with the phone, alike captivated side-by-side with the iPhone 4S. The absolute difference, again, is the size. Autobrightness adjustments acquire additionally been tweaked a little, and I begin on boilerplate that the iPhone 5 begin more-appropriate accuracy levels for the allowance I was in.
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This seems like a acceptable time to altercate thumbs. As in, your deride admeasurement and the iPhone 5. Activity aback to the iPhone 4S, I accomplished that the phone's architecture has been altogether accumbent to acquiesce a adequate arch amid thumbing the Home button and addition all the way to the top figure on the iPhone's 3.5-inch display. That's not absolutely the case, now. I could, with some positioning, still deride the Home button and accomplish my way about the taller screen, but the iPhone 5's a little added of a two-hander. It ability animate added bodies and app developers to about-face to mural orientation, area the added breadth and pixel amplitude accommodate feel allowance on both abandon after abstraction the middle.
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Game developers are acceptable to angular adjoin the mural 16:9 orientation, because it added carefully matches a accepted HDTV's dimensions, and best animate games. The added amplitude allows advantageous basic button space, too.
4G LTE: Faster, at aftermost
Last year's iPhone 4S had a attenuate arrangement bang to 3.5G (listed as "4G" on the iPhone 4S afterward iOS 5.1), alms faster abstracts speeds on AT&T. The iPhone 5 assuredly adopts faster LTE, abutting best added smartphones on the bazaar and alike the third-gen iPad, with the bound to LTE aback in March. (On the top bend of the iPhone, the account indicator reads "LTE" aback it's up and running.) However, the attendance of LTE doesn't beggarly a apple LTE phone; currently, LTE adrift amid carriers across is impossible.
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There's additionally support, depending on the iPhone 5 adaptation you buy, for slower GSM (including EDGE and UMTS/HSPA) and CDMA/EV-DO networks. The iPhone 5's LTE uses a distinct dent for articulation and data, a distinct radio chip, and a "dynamic antenna" that will about-face admission amid altered networks automatically.
In the United States, AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon Wireless will backpack the iPhone 5. T-Mobile loses out. In Canada, it's Rogers, Bell, Telus, Fido, Virgin, and Koodo. In Asia, the providers will be SoftBank, SmarTone, SingTel, and SK Telecom. For Australia there's Telstra, Optus, and Virgin Mobile, and in Europe it will go to Deutsche Telekom and EE. On carriers after LTE, the iPhone 5 will run on dual-band 3.5G HDPA+. I didn't apprehension any problems aback switching amid LTE and 4G, but I tended to acquisition myself anchored in a abode that had LTE account or a abode that didn't, after abundant time to analysis the alteration midcall.
There's a catch, though: there are now two versions of iPhone 5 in the U.S., one GSM archetypal and addition adaptation for the CDMA carriers. You may not acquire your dream of a accepted LTE phone, but all-embracing adrift is accessible amid 2G and 3G. Also, get accessible to acquire that Verizon and Sprint iPhone 5s still won't be able to accomplish calls and admission abstracts simultaneously, alike admitting abounding added Verizon/Sprint LTE phones can cull this off. That's because those added phones use a two-antenna arrangement for LTE/voice (voice doesn't run over LTE yet), while the iPhone 5 alone uses one additional a activating antenna for what Apple says is added affiliation stability.
Nevertheless, abstracts admission via 4G LTE is stunningly fast. This is no affable upgrade. In my home on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, I activated both my AT&T iPhone 4S and the AT&T iPhone 5 at the aforementioned time. The iPhone 4S averaged a 2.4Mbps download speeds over "4G," admitting the iPhone 5 averaged 20.31Mbps. In comparison, my home wireless Internet via Time Warner averaged 9.02Mbps at the hour I activated (1:30 a.m.).
For a added academic rundown, editors Brian Bennett and Kent German activated both the Verizon and AT&T iPhone 5 models in San Francisco and Fresh York, and compared adjoin both the iPhone 4S and Samsung Galaxy S3.
Phones activated Download (average) Upload (average)
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iPhone 5 (AT&T) 20.44 9.39
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iPhone 4S (AT&T) 6.77 1.66
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Samsung Galaxy S3 (AT&T) 19.37 9.12
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iPhone 5 (Verizon) 9.78 7.47
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iPhone 4S (Verizon) 1.71 0.91
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Samsung Galaxy S3 (Verizon) 8.87 13.55
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The iPhone 5, in both instances, belted the Samsung Galaxy S3 in download speeds, but the Galaxy S3 was faster in upload speeds on Verizon.
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The aberration can be acquainted loading Web pages: the adaptable adaptation of CNET took 5.3 abnormal over LTE, adjoin 8.5 abnormal on the iPhone 4S. A graphically accelerated Web armpit like the desktop adaptation of Huffington Post took 16 abnormal to amount via LTE, adjoin 23.3 abnormal on the iPhone 4S in 4G.
Those who already use 4G LTE may artlessly be comatose their heads, but to iPhone owners attractive to upgrade, this is above news. For abounding people, LTE will be faster than their own home broadband.
Of course, that's a alarming seduction: with fast LTE comes big-ticket ante and abstracts caps. AT&T additionally requires a specific plan to alike accredit FaceTime over cellular. Accomplish abiding you don't abatement bottomward the aerial aperture of overusing your LTE, because accept me, you're activity to appetite to. I approved ambience it up a wireless hot atom for my MacBook Air, and the aftereffect was about excellent.
Outside above cities, it's not absolutely as agitative if you don't acquire LTE coverage. Application the AT&T iPhone 5 out in East Setauket, Continued Island, abstracts download acceleration was alone 3.5Mbps because of a abridgement of AT&T LTE service. Verizon's LTE advantage map is larger, but Sprint's LTE arrangement is baby as well. My acquaintance with AT&T and LTE may not necessarily be yours.
Wi-Fi has additionally gotten a bit of a addition via dual-band 802.11n abutment over both 2.5GHz and 5GHz. It should advice in the accident of arrest with added Wi-Fi devices, although I never encountered that botheration before, alike with bags of Wi-Fi accessories broadcast about my apartment.
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The camera
Something on the iPhone 5 has to not be new, right? Well, alike the rear iSight camera's been tweaked, but not absolutely as abundant as added features. It's still an 8-megapixel camera, but there's a fresh sapphire-crystal lens, and bigger accouterments enabling appearance like activating low-lighting adjustment, angel stabilization on the 1080p video camera, and the adequacy to booty still shots while cutting video.
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The camera takes accomplished pictures, a bit added so now than before. The iPhone 5 takes far clearer low-light pictures, but the result, while added coherent, is grainier and lower resolution than the affably abundant images taken in bright, absolute light. I ran about in caliginosity in my son's allowance demography pictures of his toys, and begin that the iPhone 5 was able to accomplish things out in places area the iPhone 4S couldn't. Read Josh Goldman's detailed, all-encompassing testing of the iPhone 5's camera adjoin the Samsung Galaxy S3 and HTC One X.
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Indoor attempt with the iPhone 5.
I acclimatized for some calm abode shots instead to appearance off how the camera works in dimmer conditions. Of course, you'll apparently use beam in those instances, but it can't aching to acquire it as a backup.
iPhone 5 camera, outdoors.
I took pictures outdoors and in, and the added acceptable differences I could acknowledge were the alarming fresh panorama approach and the alike faster picture-taking. One of these two appearance can be acquired on the iPhone 4S via an iOS 6 update. The added amounts to a bang up from the iPhone 4S camera.
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