It’s been roughly 4 weeks since I upgraded from my Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max to the Apple iPhone 14 Pro so do I think that it’s a worthy upgrade? I would say that the answer is Yes and No, do I like the new features that would be a yes, would my 13 Pro Max have still done equally as good a job again the answer is Yes.
I generally can’t help myself when September comes around and the new iPhones go on sale, it’s like they call out to me even though there is really no need to upgrade every year. But alas I do and in this post, I want to cover what I have found with my new iPhone 14 Pro.
Size:
First, off the bat I want to cover the size, I have gone from an iPhone 13 Pro Max to a 14 Pro so I have lost a fair bit of screen. I made this decision because the 13 Pro Max is a big phone which is great but I wanted a phone that was going to be easier to handle as well as fit into my jeans pocket.
Although it’s a small screen that I have decided to go with I don’t feel that I have lost much in terms of useability. I can still read articles and blog posts on it easily and I have no issue with watching content on it either. I also watch a lot of content on my iPad Pro so the bigger screen of the Pro Max is not really something I needed.
Display:
The display on this phone is lovely. You have the 120hz refresh rate the same as on the 13 Pro and Pro Max which is silky smooth. I don’t think I could go back to a phone that doesn’t have a decent refresh rate. It just makes consuming content on social media and scrolling the web a more enjoyable experience.
This screen can go up to a crazy 2000nits of brightness so when you are out in the sun you will not have an issue with seeing what is on the screen. It’s best to keep your adaptive brightness on as you want to keep it on max brightness for battery reasons and it being just blinding especially at night.
Always on Display:
This is something that Android has had for years so I was looking forward to it finally coming to the iPhone albeit only the Pro models. Now it is a bit different to what I have come across on the Android devices that I have owned and has taken a little bit of getting used to.
I do like that it’s different to the Android version and of course, Apple was always going to have a different take on it. I love the fact that you still get to see your lock screen picture, it basically your lock screen but dimmed right down.
I was hoping for some sort of notification count like on Android but you just see the notification as you do normally, which I am fine and I guess with IOS 16 you can set your notifications to a count anyway.
I have read and seen some other reviews mentioning that at first, they thought that their phone was unlocked and it always grabbing their attention. I can’t say that I found this myself but I can see how it could distract people, but it is just one of those things that you will get used to with it not something you have had with an iPhone before.
Dynamic Island:
So this was the feature that no one was expecting when we first heard that the notch was going to be replaced with a pill cutout. I do like the Dynamic Island and think it’s a great innovation to use that space that would not be used otherwise for displaying information.
I have found it most useful when I am listening to music and you can see the Album art and the Wave Form. I do think that they should have had the short press on the Island to bring up the controls as you get on the lock screen and the long press to take you to the app. I find myself wanting to have the controls pop up more than wanting to go back to the app itself.
I also like that you can see any timers you have set there as well as it is handy to have when you want to check how long you have left again without having to go into the app. Some other cool things that show up here are it tells you when you switch to silent or ringer, volume control as well as phone call information.
I am sure they will be more that happens with this as time goes on and more Third Party apps take advantage of it. I think I would like to see notifications show up there next rather than the banner dropping down to make more of this feature. But anyway I think this is definitely a watch this space kind of feature.
Camera:
This is one that I don’t tend to touch on much when I talk about the phones that I have used, but this time I wanted to look into this a bit more. I am actually trying to use the camera on the iPhone 14 Pro for taking all the photos that are used across my blog. Instagram, YouTube, etc., to see if this is up to the standard of my Canon M50 II. So far I would have to say that it’s not far off and really for the sort of content I create it’s more than capable.
I am finding that even with the 48-megapixel camera disabled (you will need to turn on ProRaw in the camera settings for the 48-megapixels) the photo is still really sharp so for photos that I don’t want to or need to edit this is fine.
For those photos that go onto Instagram and I tend to edit so I will switch to ProRaw and take full advantage of all those megapixels.
In terms of video, I am loving the improved cinematic mode and I shoot all of my reels using my iPhone 14 Pro. The quality is great and it’s also so much easier to take a video on my phone rather than setting up my camera and transferring from my SD card onto my laptop and then to my phone. So using a phone is a much nicer workflow.
I have only been using this for the last couple of weeks so there is a lot more to try in this space but so far I am very impressed with the results from this camera.
Battery Life:
The battery life is not as good on my iPhone 14 Pro as my 13 Pro Max but that’s because this is a smaller phone than the Pro Max. When I first got the phone I was in the red by bedtime but I am putting this down to having a new toy and playing with it all the time. In the past week, I am finding the battery life is a lot better and I mostly have around the 30% mark by the time I go to bed.
So not quite the 2 days I would get from the 13 Pro Max but still not too shabby and as I charge my phone overnight it’s that big of a deal for me.
Price:
A quick note on the price the iPhone 14 Pro will set you back £1,099 if you are looking to buy it outright so it is more expensive than the iPhone 13 Pro. This is another thing to think about when deciding to upgrade or not, these are not cheap phones so if you have 13 Pro already it might be worth saving your pennies unless you are due an upgrade through your mobile provider.
Conclusion:
Do I regret upgrading the short answer is no. I wanted the Always on Display and the Dynamic Island so I was happy to upgrade to experience those things straight away rather than waiting another year to upgrade.
I personally don’t think you would be disappointed or regret upgrading but if the above is not something that you are super keen to experience then I would stick with your current iPhone. Having said that if you have an older iPhone then the jump will be fairly significant and more likely worth you thinking about upgrading.