Or Should You?

Finally! The iPhone 14 and 14 Pro are here and with some pretty impressive features! But are any of the released models worth it? In this article, we will focus on the Pro models, their features and my opinion.

Let’s start by talking about new features and improvements and there are a lot…

Goodbye Notch – Hello Dynamic Island!

The Notch, a feature that many smartphone manufacturers have gotten rid of. Apple has decided to hold on to it for a little longer, in fact, the standard iPhone 14 models still have it!

But unlike the standard iPhone 14 models, Apple has decided to drop this design in favour of a more interesting one and they call it the Dynamic Island, which I think sounds pretty cool.

The Dynamic Island is a pill-shaped cutout that contains the camera system, but what’s really interesting is that with the help of software, the pill can change in size and shape in real time. This is so that it can adapt to alerts, activities as well as notifications. 

Personally, I think that the Dynamic Island is a really cool idea and one that I wished that they would have implemented with the standard range, but I guess they had to save money somewhere. Maybe we’ll see it on the iPhone 15? 

A New Display! 

Both the Pro and Pro Max feature a new Super Retina XDR display that offers thinner bezels as well as more space. It features updated ProMotion technology that allows an always-on display which when active, will show the time, live activities and widgets whilst the wallpaper is dimmed. 

This is something completely new for iPhones, but from my experience of having an always-on display on some Android phones, I certainly hope it doesn’t drain the battery as much.

When it comes to HDR, the Pro’s display can reach up to 2000 nits at its peak, which is pretty impressive!

An Incredible Camera!

As expected with it being a pro model, Apple has introduced a new camera system with some pretty impressive improvements. For starters, they introduced a new 48-megapixel wide-angle camera with a quad-pixel sensor that adapts to the environment. That is a huge jump for Apple, particularly as last year’s model only had a 12-megapixel camera.

As with last year’s model, the iPhone 14 Pro offers 3 cameras at the back of the phone, and let’s face it the design looks very similar to last year’s model! But don’t let that fool you, because this year’s model offers a truly impressive camera system!

At the back of the phone, there are three cameras consisting of 48 24 mm, ƒ/1.78 aperture, 12MP Ultra Wide: 13 mm, ƒ/2.2 aperture with a 120° field of view and 12MP 3x Telephoto: 77 mm, ƒ/2.8 aperture.

A New Chip!

With the arrival of the iPhone 14 Pro, Apple introduced a new A16 Bionic chip which focuses on power saving, display and a better camera. The A16 chip has a faster 6-core processor with an accelerated 5-core GPU as well as a 16-core Neural Engine that can perform 17 trillion operations per second.

It’s also worth noting that for the first time ever, Apple used different chips between the standard and Pro models. Therefore if you are after performance, you should be looking at the Pro models.

But What About The Standard iPhone 14?

That’s a good question! I mean for starters, you don’t get that awesome-looking Dynamic Island, in fact when it comes to style it practically looks the same as last year’s model!

But what the iPhone 14 and 14 Pro do have is two new features which are very important when it comes to safety.

To begin with, these two models now offer crash detection, so if you’ve been in a car accident, the phone will automatically connect to emergency services, it will share your location and notify your emergency contacts. I think that this is a pretty essential feature that all modern phones should have. Speaking of all phones, I was surprised to find that my Pixel 6 Pro has this feature already! Now, I’m not sure how good the feature is on both phones, but if there’s one thing I know based on my own experience with the software on both systems is that Apple sure does know how to make software work smoothly. But I don’t really want to compare the reliability of this feature to give you an accurate answer!

Apple also introduced Emergency SOS via satellite on both models which allows you to text emergency services when you’re out of cellular and Wi-Fi coverage. I think that this is another really good feature to have on a smartphone, but living in the UK which has pretty decent coverage, I’m not sure whether this feature is necessary. But I can see where it might be useful in other parts of the world.

The Verdict

Judging by what was said during the event, I think the iPhone Pro is actually a pretty decent buy if you don’t mind spending a minimum of £1,099 for the basic Pro model.

But as I always say when I write this type of content, whether the investment is good or not solely depends on what you’re planning to use the phone for and how you plan to use it. 

On the other hand, the base model of the iPhone 14 starts at just £849 which actually is a pretty good price and let’s not forget that the iPhone 14 still is a pretty decent phone with a very good camera.

Are you planning to upgrade to the iPhone 14 or even 14 Pro? What are your thoughts? Let us know in the comments!