Apple iPhone 13 review: The most incremental upgrade ever
The truth is that smartphones peaked a few years ago.
After so many advances, the miniature computers have reached
incredible speeds, their screens have become bigger and brighter, and their
cameras produce images that make amateur photographers look like wizards.
The problem with so much great innovation is that upgrades are now
so iterative that it has become difficult to know what to write about them each
year. That’s especially the case with Apple’s iPhone 13, which may
be the most incremental update ever to the iPhone.
The newest iPhone is just 10 per
cent faster than last year’s models. (For context, in 2015, the iPhone 6S was
more than 70 per cent faster than its predecessor, the iPhone 6.) Its flashiest
new feature, a higher screen “refresh rate” on the $1,000-plus models, makes
motion look smoother when opening apps and scrolling through text — hardly a
game changer.
Innovations on smartphone cameras also appear to be slowing. Apple executives
described the iPhone 13 cameras as “dramatically more powerful” and the
iPhone’s “most advanced” ever, largely because they can capture more light and
reduce noise. But in my tests, the improvements were marginal.
This is all to say the annual phone upgrade, which companies like Apple and Samsung
tout with enormous marketing events and ad campaigns to gin up sales for the
holiday shopping season, has become a mirage of tech innovation. In reality,
the upgrades are now a celebration of capitalism in the form of ruthless
incrementalism.
Comments
Post a Comment