iPhone 6 review

PROS

• Great 4.7-inch screen
• Good all-round camera
• Class-leading performance
• Great new software features

CONS

• Expensive
• Shorter battery life than rivals

KEY FEATURES

• 4.7-inch screen
• Apple A8 processor
• Up to 128GB storage
• NFC (Apple Pay only)
• Touch ID fingerprint scanner
• Manufacturer: Apple
• Review Price: £539.00/5000 MAD.

WHAT IS THE IPHONE 6?

When it was released in 2014 the iPhone 6 was one of the hottest smartphone on the market. Featuring a completely rethought design, Apple loaded the iPhone 6 with a wealth of custom software and hardware features.

The combination of hardware and software features made the iPhone 6 one of the most innovative and powerful smartphones ever seen. However, one year on Apple’s competitors have come out swinging releasing their own wave of top-end innovative handsets.

IPHONE 6: DESIGN – APPLE'S ON TO A WINNER

The iPhone 6 opts for soft curves and seamless joins between the screen and the back. It's a very different look from the iPhone 5S, which has shiny machined edges. Barring some plastic detailing on the rear it’s all glass and metal, and looks great for it.

It’s not as striking as its predecessor. The angular design of the iPhone 5S made it stand out amore. It’s the same with the iPad mini and iPad Air, although they marry the diamond cut edges with rounded metal sides.

As always with Apple’s phones the iPhone 6 has superb balance, it just feels right in your hand. The comfy edges are also a lot easier on the palm than the sharper ones on the iPhone 5S and the 6.9mm thickness makes it feel sleek yet strong.

IPHONE 6: SCREEN

If you’ve never heard of Retina before it’s a term trademarked by Apple. It refers to the resolution of the screen — that's the pixels per inch (ppi) a display has and the viewing distance you would typically use it from. It means that even if you have perfect vision you won’t be able to spot pixels in normal use.

For the 4.7-inch display on the iPhone 6 that’s 326ppi, the same as every iPhone from the iPhone 4 onwards barring the iPhone 6 Plus, which packs 401ppi.

The screen on the iPhone 6 is great, possibly only behind the Samsung Galaxy S5 and the upcoming Note 4 for visual quality.

Colour accuracy is outstanding. Regardless of whether you’re watching a movie or flicking through your holiday snaps, the iPhone 6’s screen displays colours exactly as it should. Incredibly, there’s also no colour shift when you tilt the screen. It’s impressive although the benefits are arguable, you don’t often hold your phone at obscure viewing angles.

IPHONE 6: PERFORMANCE AND FEATURES

Apple blew everyone away when it showed off the A7 processor on the iPhone 5S a year ago. The dual core 64-bit processor wiped the floor with the quad-core and octa-core competition. The 5S still runs like a dream on iOS 8, which shows that there’s still plenty of life left in the A7, but Apple has never released a new flagship iPhone without boosting the processor. It’s obliged once more with the A8 in the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus.

You’ll notice the performance too. Touch ID, Apple’s fingerprint recognition feature, is noticeably quicker when unlocking the phone. Zipping through menus and opening apps is as slick an experience as ever. If you’re a bit of a mobile gamer then you’ll really enjoy playing the latest 3D games with all the extra graphical effects on the larger screen.

IPHONE 6: CAMERA

Yet again, at face value the iPhone 6’s camera is just like the iPhone 5S’s one. It has an 8-megapixel 1/3-inch sensor with a 1.5µm pixel size. So far so last year, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing, the iPhone 5S still has one of the best cameras around.

It works really well on sunny days, too. You won’t get quite the amount of detail you will on phones with many more megapixels, but pictures are vibrant and sharp.

IPHONE 6: BATTERY LIFE

The slimness of a phone can give an indication of its stamina. If we judged the iPhone 6’s battery life like that we’d be worried.

The iPhone 6 is powered by an 1,810mAh non-removable battery, which is a little larger than the one on the iPhone 5S, but then it needs it to supply the bigger and brighter screen. Compare that to the power packs in the likes of the Samsung Galaxy S5 (2,800mAh) or the LG G3 (3,000mAh) and the battery on the iPhone 6 looks titchy.

SCORES IN DETAIL

• Battery Life8
• Calls & Sound9
• Camera8
• Design9
• Performance10
• Screen Quality9
• Value8