A REAL Week with the iPhone 12 Mini (Review) By Brian Alex

If you know me, then you know that I'm normally an android user, which also has to do with the fact that there are just more android phones to test, but that doesn't mean that I can't appreciate what makes the iPhone good. So I used this opportunity to really spend time with the iPhone and especially the mini, iPhone, to see how it fares for me and also bring that maybe a bit more fresh perspective to you. So let's go. I am still a huge fan of the size of this phone and the way it feels in your hand, the design is also very nice, especially in this red, color and apple really. Has the haptics figured out the vibration motor in here is miles better than on any other phone. It's so small.

I even forgot that I had it in my pocket. Sometimes the fact that the new iPhones can stand on their own is also heaven for tech reviewers, but probably not at all important to you. The flat sides do feel nostalgic, but whether you actually prefer the way they feel, in your hand, will be subjective, as they definitely don't conform to your hand as nicely they are the only substantial design change, though the phone looks very similar to the 11. Apart from that, when you don't use a case, the phone rocks quite a lot when you want to type with it lying on the table. That's a bit annoying.

As I said, I do actually really like the vibrancy of the red color. The green and the blue didn't really win my heart this year, though, it's now the evening of the day that I unboxed this phone and what I said in my unboxing in regard to the size definitely is still true. I do really still like it in terms of its physical dimensions, but what you do notice when actually using the phone is that the screen definitely is small, there's just not that much screen real estate to work with you, for example, can't have the battery percentage up in the top right, because there just isn't enough space typing. Also, isn't that easy on such a small screen, if you're coming from something bigger and watching YouTube videos or reading text also isn't as nice? I definitely enjoy that more on my iPad now. If this phone screen is so small, so these are limitations that you definitely have to know before committing to such a small smartphone.

The display is small, a lot more so than I thought going into it.5.4 inches is almost as much on paper as the iPhone 8 plus, but because the screen is much narrower and taller, it just doesn't fit as much stuff. The display actually feels a lot smaller than the phone itself, if that makes sense apart from the size. This is a nice screen, though I am so thankful that apple finally switched their regular iPhone line to OLED on an OLED panel, every pixel lights up by itself, without the need for a backlight. That means that black pixels can fully turn off to create perfect blacks and save a lot of power in dark mode. It also leads to way more vibrant, colors and much higher sharpness.

This is the same quality of displays and the pro iPhones just a bit less bright, but I can tell you that even in bright sunlight, that difference is not something that creates a problem with visibility. While the display is a bit small to make that worthwhile. The speakers definitely should not be. What holds you back from enjoying a lot of content on this phone, especially for the size. They're surprisingly, good and rich sounding face ID is still very nice when it does work and actually very convenient for signing in to apps, such as banking apps, for example, because you just have to tap the app, and then it recognizes your face automatically, and you don't have to tap your finger on a fingerprint reader or something like that.

But of course when we're out and about we now have to wear masks all the time. So you pretty much can't use face ID when you go through shopping or something like that and when using Apple Pay, I always had to type in my pin. So I pretty much only stuck to using my card, that's actually pretty inconvenient, and I would have really liked to see a fingerprint sensor on the side or something to fix that. As I said in the beginning, I'm coming from android, which meant some getting used to things, but also that I may have a bit of a different look at iOS. I do really like the new widgets and the app library.

Yes, android has had this forever, but that doesn't make the edition less good. You can now finally put some glanceable information on your home screen and add more of a personal touch. Widget stacks are really handy in my opinion, by the way as they let you fit more into the same space and the app library finally lets you have just the things on your home screen that you need all the time with everything else of the way. What I still don't like is the way iOS handles notifications. I would like it more if they would not automatically vanish from my lock screen and more interactions would also be good, as I've already said, before, the difference between android and iOS really isn't that big in day-to-day use.

Just some apps are a bit more high quality on iOS when you're coming from android, though then copying data is still a bit of a pain, especially when it comes to things like WhatsApp messages, and when you used to use that sign in with Google feature on android a lot, then that becomes a bit of a problem when the same app doesn't offer that on iOS. What I did notice, though, is that animations are a lot smoother on the iPhone, even though this phone doesn't have a high refresh rate that feels like much less of a big deal than 60hz on an android phone. A lot of android manufacturers do include 90 or 120hz refresh rate screens on their phones at the same price. Point, though, apple also gives you a taste of it on their own iPad, pro with promotion and while iPhones do already feel very smooth at 60hz. That also means that apple's implementation of a 120hz display would have just made scrolling animations that much more fluid.

It really would have been nice, but if you want that in an iPhone, you'll probably have to pony up for the pro iPhone and wait until next year as not even that one has promotion this year. The new a14 obviously takes a large part in where the iPhone feels, so fast apple has had the fastest smartphone chips for a while. Now- and at this point it's basically just for show, but of course, this new chip also brings with that support for 5g the new 5g mobile network isn't everywhere yet, but when you can get a 5g signal, it definitely is a lot faster than 4g. Even if the true high speed, millimeter wave bands are not supported outside the US, I got a 5g signal, pretty often where I live actually, so for me, it would even be worth it today, I'd say, but if you don't live in a bigger town or city or are in a carrier that didn't invest that much into 5g infrastructure. Yet this will only become important to you in the future.

That said, since most people keep iPhones for longer, as apple provides years of software updates. It's probably good that it's already here regardless. Originally, I thought that battery life would be my biggest complaint with this phone and that the small screen wouldn't bother me at all, but it actually turned out to be the complete opposite and battery life is pretty much a non-issue now, of course, it's nothing groundbreaking with about five hours of screen on time, but that's pretty similar to something like an OnePlus 8t, for example, and that's actually very average battery life. That can definitely get you through one day. Now, of course, if you're actually out and about a lot and use mobile data, then you might end the day with only five to ten percent left.

But if you're more at home and using Wi-Fi, mostly, which you probably are right now, then you can actually end the day with about thirty percent, so yeah battery life, actually not that bad. Who would think charging was never really that fast on the iPhone, and this is no different here, since it basically only lasts a day, you will probably mostly charge it overnight. I don't actually think the omission of the charging brick is that big of a deal with the regular iPhone 12, though, as the 5 watt charger they included before, was pretty useless anyway. Did I just say that iPhone charging was never really that fast? Well, that doesn't actually have to be the case if you want a way to quickly top up your iPhone and need to buy a new brake anyway, anger has a pretty good option with their new anchor NATO, it's as small as apple's old, 5 watt, brick, but charges the iPhone up to 3 times faster. You can get about 50 back in just 30 minutes of charging, which is pretty nice, and it's also pretty affordable and charges.

All of your other devices too. The anger NATO also works very well with a new MagSafe charger, and I actually found it to be very convenient, as you just need one hand to put it on or remove it, whereas the cable requires two hands that makes it just as convenient as regular wireless charging, which this one of course supports as well, but allows you to pick up and use the phone while it keeps charging. While it is pretty sad that the charging port will probably fully go away next year or the year after, at least the new solution is pretty good. The camera on the iPhone is, of course, still one of the main selling points, but in my opinion, it's not the best one on any phone anymore, because google improved their video quality. So much I'll talk about that more.

In my comparison with the pixel 5. In good light, the pictures are top-notch, even if the iPhone tends to dramatize colors a bit more and, of course, leans towards a warmer picture. I think these tendencies are especially visible in the sky and also especially on the wide angle camera. I don't know why, but on the iPhone 11, I remembered the two cameras to be a lot closer in terms of their look. The warmer tones are also apparent in selfies, but I do actually think that it makes them look a bit more lively.

The background blur is also still a strong point of the iPhone, even if it still misses sometimes with the new restrictions. I, of course, didn't spend that much time outside taking pictures, but I still think that I got some nice shots. What I think is a bit of a mixed bag is the night mode, not necessarily because it's bad, but because it's cumbersome to use on most phones. You can just select night mode in any conditions and get a brighter image, but because apple's approach to night mode is automatic, that means that the iPhone sometimes doesn't enable it when it probably should thus create an image that is too dark and when you do enable it manually apple. Have you chosen the exposure time yourself? Are you supposed to know that, so it's either all auto or all manual where an in-between approach would have probably led to better pictures for the average user? I also do prefer google's approach to night mode to apples in general.

The iPhone's pictures are still sharp and well-lit, but they do have more crushed shadows than photos from a pixel 5. I think that is intentional, as apple's photos look more like they're taken at night, whereas the pixel turns the night into day, but I just don't prefer that, and I don't know why. But the night mode on the ultra white camera seems to be much worse. Video quality was always a strong point of the iPhone and I think the shots speak for themselves that it still has the lead here, even if it's smaller than it used to be so, what's the verdict? Well, it's actually pretty easy. If you want a small iPhone, then go for it, but what's in that short sentence is actually pretty important.

Battery life should not be what holds you back. As I said, it's nothing special but also not a dealbreaker and, of course you get all the other nice features of the iPhone 12. , a really great camera. That is just not quite the best amazing, build quality performance and all the bells and whistles, but the words small and iPhone are actually pretty important. It really is small, and you have to know what you're getting yourself into and the compromises that come with a smaller screen.

It really does feel nice in the hand, but I'm actually asking myself if I shouldn't have rather picked the bigger iPhone with a bigger screen and lived with a bigger size and, of course the main selling point of the iPhone is iOS. If you want that, just know that there are better values to be had on the android side, with the pixel 5, for example, but yeah, if you want a small iPhone, then go for it. I have no reservations if you enjoyed this video. You know which buttons to press don't forget to press that follow button on Twitter and don't forget your mask when you leave the house, I'm Bienne thanks for watching, and I'll see you in the next one. You.

Source : Brian Alex