Last week when Apple’s iPhone 13 models went on sale, I asked Twitter followers which model they planned to order. An overwhelming majority voted for the iPhone 13 Pro, followed by the iPhone 13 Pro Max, followed by the Mini and the Basic. Interestingly, those are my personal preferences, especially now that I have perused all four iPhone 13 models that Apple sent out for review. 

In addition to these phones, Apple sent out an iPad Mini for review — and given my bias towards the iPad, not surprisingly, I have spent most of the past few days mucking about with that device instead of digging into the iPhones. I intend to write my review in time, but I highly recommend John Gruber and Joanna Stern if you want to get some good intelligent reviews. 

Like all reviewers, they emphasize two things that have improved across the entire line-up of new iPhones — cameras and batteries. And candidly, it is all that matters to an average person: great cameras to capture daily moments and selfies. Given how much we all are addicted to our phones, battery capacity and performance are pretty high in feature lists for most people. 

Last year, I preferred the iPhone 12 ProMax because it had a better camera –, but this year both Pro and Pro Max have the same camera configuration. The 13 ProMax has longer battery life — Apple says it is an additional 2.5 hours compared to the 12 ProMax model — but (Read more...)