Sad it doesn't have the dynamic island, was going to pick up one of these for testing for iOS app development. Everything else looks fine however, as expected.
I'd argue that is worth the money if you're going to be using a phone every single day of their life. People will drop a few hundred on fancy shoes and wear them once a month, but they treat phones as cheap commodities.
Last time I complained about the pricing of the iPhone, people pointed out that inflation included the prices wasn't to far of from the original iPhone.
Still, I don't care that the phones are faster, have larger screens, better camera, FaceID, AI, are thinner light and what have you. The iPhone design peaked in 2015, from there they could just have release the same phone year after year, making it cheaper and cheaper and I'd still be happy with it.
The prices are, in my mind insane, and I'll be buying used, but those are also overpriced.
Taking inflation into account, a $599 iPhone in 2026 would have been $380 in 2007. Given that the actual launch price in 2007 was $499, that's a pretty hefty drop.
I’m pretty sure they determine the price upfront and then figure out what bells and whistles they can ship without eating into their margins. Their goal is to hit a certain average selling price across their massive user base when they upgrade their old phones. They are not going to jeopardize that by releasing an attractive cheap iPhone.
For the people who really don’t want to spend a lot, obviously the easiest option is to just buy an older iPhone or keep your phone for longer. My partner doesn’t care about having the latest tech. So first I use a phone for 3 years and then they use it for another 3 years. We essentially get 6 years of life out of it (Apple is good about releasing software updates for 6 years).
People make fun of me but I'll never skip a chance to complain about how large these phones are. I hate it so much. I have a standard iPhone, not a max, and it causes real pain in my wrist if I use it too much. Was honestly thinking about downgrading to the last SE model even though it's several years out of date.
my wife upgraded from a 13 mini to an Air and she loves it. She thought she hated the larger size of new phones, but after holding the Air in her hand she realized the weight and thickness was the issue for her!
It’s a tough call though because the Air has a lot of pros and cons! My wife never takes nature photography or macro photography, so she was OK with the 1 camera compromise.
If you truly want a shorter phone, my condolences lol. Apple seems to be ignoring this user segment.
I moved off the mini to get satelite messaging which I use while hiking. But now that T-Mobile/starlink support satelite on the 13 mini, maybe I’ll go back.
I stuck with my 13 mini for a long time, and had recently put a new iFixit battery in it too. I did finally make the jump to a Pixel 10 but sign me up with everyone else who misses reasonably-sized phones.
Same. This would be an obvious upgrade for me, if the overall size was anywhere close to the Mini. Oddly enough, the announcement doesn't even list the screen size, but I'm sure it's 6" +
Finally moved on from my 12 mini, but I still have it sitting in my office and when I pick it up I think "wow this feels like a phone from the future."
Wish they made a new mini instead of the Air. A friend bought one of those, and frankly I just don't get it.
The screen is too big to use it one-handed, and thickness is really the only one of the three dimension of the phone that I don't care about how small it is (within reason). They probably spent billions of dollars shaving off half a millimeter and what do we get with that technology? Phone that's too big.
If this keeps up in another 5 years I'll be looking at flip phones and a separate camera.
I have large hands but the 13 Mini is roughly the maximum I can use one-handed without doing the weird finger balancing act to shift the phone around. I get why most people like large phones - media consumption - but not everyone is into that.
I don't even mind large phones if they're done right. My favorite phone of all time is the BB Passport which you have to use two-handed, but it was actually designed around that and amazing to use.
I showed my Costco membership QR code to the cashier the other day, and they suddenly exclaimed, “oh my! What a cute little phone!!”
It took me a second to even process why someone might say such a thing about my case-less generic 12 mini. Most of my close friends have 13 mini’s so I often feel my wife’s “regular” size iPhone is the odd one out.
Still loving mine as well. I held out with the 2016 SE for 8 years. Sadly it's looking like I might have to do that again with the 13 mini! It boggles my mind that Apple thinks it's worthwhile to sell the 16, 17, 17 Pro, and 17e all in basically the exact same form factor. And then the Air and Max in very similar form factors. Vary it up! I don't need a new mini every year, but something in the 5.4" form factor every 3-4 years would obviously have an audience. I don't care if it's a Pro or an SE/e model, I just need something that'll keep me on the latest iOS for security updates.
Sigh. Maybe the Clicks Communicator (at 13cm tall) will get my money.
Yeah, I wish they would commit to doing a mini every x years. Last year I bought a 16 and this year I bought an Air. I returned both after just a few days. I can't reach across the phone with my thumb, meaning I can't use it one-handed.
The new phones have some neat tricks (satellite connectivity comes to mind), but the on-device AI seems pretty mediocre and I value pocketability and one-handed usability more than the new gizmos.
When I asked myself if I would rather keep the new Air or go back to my 13 mini with an extra thousand dollars in my pocket, it was no contest.
> Running deepseek 6B on the Private LLM app on the iPhone 13 basically set my phone on fire
Hey, I’m the author of Private LLM. I hope you’re joking about the phone catching fire. Btw, there’s no DeepSeek 6B model, you’re likely talking about the DeepSeek Distill 7B model.
i send them an iphone mini request every once in a while through the feedback form hoping it will make a little bit of difference: https://www.apple.com/feedback/
still holding on to iphone 13 mini hoping they bring back the perfect size. also trying very hard not to accidentally fat finger a ios 26 update.
My iPhone 12 mini is hobbling along. A few rare apps are not usable because UI is clipped, the battery is throttling and making it sluggish, and it overheats all the time as a GPS.
Many mobile websites are unusable.
But I love the form factor and I'm going to keep it going as long as it is reasonably secure.
Are there any androids with a similar form factor?
Ideally, degoogled android, of course. (Or even not android?)
The 13 mini probably still has a few years of security fixes coming, but after that, I’m going to consider jumping ship, and would like something that’s privacy respecting.
I stupidly downgraded to a 17 from the 13 mini two-weeks ago and I hate it. It’s the first time I have been earnestly tempted to just get a dumb-phone and be done with it. The constant growth of mobile phones is perplexing to me but I don’t doubt Apple knows what sells.
That's why they stopped making them, because the people who buy minis are willing to stick with them for 5 years, whereas Apple wants you to buy a new phone every year.
Every single person I know who uses a phone of more than 4 years old, uses an iPhone 13 mini. Without exception. Now I'm sure there's plenty of HNers who use other 4+ year old phones, but I'm talking about non-tech people.
iPhone 11 here. Chugging along just fine. Though after the latest liquid glass update the responsiveness has noticeably degraded. They've added lot of animations & moving elements which my poor old 11 doesn't seem to handle all that well.
Worst part about big phones are that fingers cannot reach around the whole screen when using one hand, so you are forced to always use two hands. They also fall out of pant pockets easily and have no holes for lanyards.
Same. And so do many people around me. And many still cling to their 12 minis.
Maybe that’s why Apple won’t make them anymore, people like us tend to keep them forever.
I’m in exactly the same situation. My wife just upgraded from a iPhone 11 Pro to a refurbished iPhone 13 Mini. My daughter just bought a refurbished 13 Mini too.
The second hand market for these phones seems pretty buoyant
Seems like a decent deal for what it has and getting the full support lifecycle out of it instead of used. Does anyone know if this gets $50 off with the education discount?
I'm glad they added MagSafe with this version, that was my biggest "issue" with the 16e. Thankfully you can add a ring to the back of the device to "give" it MagSafe (the magnets part at least, if not the faster charging).
My understanding (and I don't ahve a magsafe phone so maybe I'm wrong), is that a lot of the time, you need to buy a magsafe compatible case, i.e. one with magnets in it, to get it to work (assuming you want a case on your phone). But if so, then adding such a case to a 16e would also add back the magsafe functionality. So technically, having it on your phoneb doesn't actually make a difference right? Or am I missing something? I was considering getting the 16e because its discounted now.
Indeed. I have 16e from it's launch and can't be happier. Battery life is incredible while no issues with connections whatsoever (I am heavy traveler so can test it on multitude of telco hardware)
I couldn't care less about multi-gigabit 5G speeds (my 15 Pro can already practically get ~2 Gbps – who really needs that in a battery-powered phone?!); give me better battery life (my 15 Pro gets warm to the touch doing absolutely nothing in some 5G scenarios) and better security (e.g. carrier-side location tracking prevention) any day.
I really want to like the lower cost e phones, but the lack of ultrawide band support is a deal breaker. Does adding this feature really increase the cost, or is this a calculated move by Apple to ensure those who use this for air tags or keyless entry continue to buy higher end phones.
I'm happy for the existence of the e line mainly because it forces them to bump up the specs on the base iPhone. 17 is so good now that there's very little reason to get the 17 Pro.
Is massive storage on a mobile device really still a thing that's important?
I'm saying this as someone with 512GB, but I just checked and I'm using 85GB at the moment, including the OS.
Photos and videos are the likely reason why the phones have so much storage, but these days both apple and google offer decent cloud backup solutions which negates the need for massive on-device storage. I'd rather the storage be smaller, and the savings going toward more battery or whatever.
I'd love to have a smaller/cheaper phone but I continue to hold onto my Pro from a couple years ago is for the high end camera, particularly the telephoto lens.
Waiting for the first pro line phone with both the Apple modem and Apple wifi/BT stack in it. Battery life is always a struggle when the phone gets older.
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[ 2.6 ms ] story [ 79.9 ms ] threadStill, I don't care that the phones are faster, have larger screens, better camera, FaceID, AI, are thinner light and what have you. The iPhone design peaked in 2015, from there they could just have release the same phone year after year, making it cheaper and cheaper and I'd still be happy with it.
The prices are, in my mind insane, and I'll be buying used, but those are also overpriced.
For the people who really don’t want to spend a lot, obviously the easiest option is to just buy an older iPhone or keep your phone for longer. My partner doesn’t care about having the latest tech. So first I use a phone for 3 years and then they use it for another 3 years. We essentially get 6 years of life out of it (Apple is good about releasing software updates for 6 years).
This is just a free market for any product works. No?
Why do software engineers ask for six digit salaries? Because they can get away with it — someone is willing to pay for it.
It’s a tough call though because the Air has a lot of pros and cons! My wife never takes nature photography or macro photography, so she was OK with the 1 camera compromise.
If you truly want a shorter phone, my condolences lol. Apple seems to be ignoring this user segment.
Wish they made a new mini instead of the Air. A friend bought one of those, and frankly I just don't get it.
The screen is too big to use it one-handed, and thickness is really the only one of the three dimension of the phone that I don't care about how small it is (within reason). They probably spent billions of dollars shaving off half a millimeter and what do we get with that technology? Phone that's too big.
If this keeps up in another 5 years I'll be looking at flip phones and a separate camera.
(Until they release a new human hand sized phone at least)
I don't even mind large phones if they're done right. My favorite phone of all time is the BB Passport which you have to use two-handed, but it was actually designed around that and amazing to use.
It took me a second to even process why someone might say such a thing about my case-less generic 12 mini. Most of my close friends have 13 mini’s so I often feel my wife’s “regular” size iPhone is the odd one out.
Sigh. Maybe the Clicks Communicator (at 13cm tall) will get my money.
The new phones have some neat tricks (satellite connectivity comes to mind), but the on-device AI seems pretty mediocre and I value pocketability and one-handed usability more than the new gizmos.
When I asked myself if I would rather keep the new Air or go back to my 13 mini with an extra thousand dollars in my pocket, it was no contest.
Running deepseek 6B on the Private LLM app on the iPhone 13 basically set my phone on fire
Hey, I’m the author of Private LLM. I hope you’re joking about the phone catching fire. Btw, there’s no DeepSeek 6B model, you’re likely talking about the DeepSeek Distill 7B model.
still holding on to iphone 13 mini hoping they bring back the perfect size. also trying very hard not to accidentally fat finger a ios 26 update.
There are some models that everyone wants but companies discontinue or never make
iPhone 13s was the last one
Another example was the Cadiallac Ciel at Pebble Beach. Only ever appeared in Entourage after that.
Many mobile websites are unusable.
But I love the form factor and I'm going to keep it going as long as it is reasonably secure.
Ideally, degoogled android, of course. (Or even not android?)
The 13 mini probably still has a few years of security fixes coming, but after that, I’m going to consider jumping ship, and would like something that’s privacy respecting.
https://blog.bschwind.com/2025/01/11/the-original-iphone-se-...
That's why they stopped making them, because the people who buy minis are willing to stick with them for 5 years, whereas Apple wants you to buy a new phone every year.
Every single person I know who uses a phone of more than 4 years old, uses an iPhone 13 mini. Without exception. Now I'm sure there's plenty of HNers who use other 4+ year old phones, but I'm talking about non-tech people.
In fact, if this phone died, thanks to Liquid Glass I would likely go buy an Android phone. Maybe a Graphene OS phone from Motorola.
So much so that I went on to check the specs but no it's 6.1". Damn, so close, what a missed opportunity.
The second hand market for these phones seems pretty buoyant
I don't see why I would want magsafe on my phone at this point.
Occasionally there’s a feature that requires a minimum amount of RAM like Apple Intelligence but that’s the exception.
I couldn't care less about multi-gigabit 5G speeds (my 15 Pro can already practically get ~2 Gbps – who really needs that in a battery-powered phone?!); give me better battery life (my 15 Pro gets warm to the touch doing absolutely nothing in some 5G scenarios) and better security (e.g. carrier-side location tracking prevention) any day.
Is massive storage on a mobile device really still a thing that's important?
I'm saying this as someone with 512GB, but I just checked and I'm using 85GB at the moment, including the OS.
Photos and videos are the likely reason why the phones have so much storage, but these days both apple and google offer decent cloud backup solutions which negates the need for massive on-device storage. I'd rather the storage be smaller, and the savings going toward more battery or whatever.
Am I the only one?
No, I don't need it all the time.
But when you do need it, it's invaluable.
and I have a nice portable camera (ricoh gr 3) collecting dust.