ever since Apple's iPhone event last week I have been asking myself the same question do these new iPhones deserve to be called the iPhone Pro well on one level yes because Apple made them and they can call it whatever they want and while I don't agree with every decision Apple made here these are still the best iPhones Apple has ever made is that enough to warrant this new name maybe there are some notable improvements in these two devices which I'll dig into you in a minute in other ways though the upgrades Apple made to the iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Macs are so subtle I think it would actually take a pro to spot them [Music] before we go any further let's just get a couple things out of the way apart from their different size screens and a really clear difference in battery life the iPhone 11 pro and the 11 Pro max are basically identical they used the same a 13 Bionic chip set they all have the same cameras they both run iOS 13 you get where I'm going with this if you're considering buying a pro your real decision boils down to three things what color you like how much swords you need and whether you want to use a phone as big as the max all the time because these phones have so much in common they share the same design quirks at Apple embrace this year they're both a little faster than the 10s Series was last year and they both come in Apple's new have been that green which really seems to be a crowd-pleaser I do you have to say it's only really green and direct light though otherwise it just kind of looks more like a slate gray which is honestly find my make these backs are made from a single piece of milled glass and most of it has this really nice matte finish it also means they're a little less prone to sliding around on certain surfaces to imagine this you were about to sit down on your couch and you just sort of absent-mindedly put your pro on the arm I do this all the time and when I tried it the tennis clattered to the ground while the pro stay put your mileage is probably gonna vary but in my experience this new finish doesn't just feel good it's actually helpful I wasn't too worried about the worst-case scenario of dropping this thing because the pros used what Apple calls the toughest class you'll find in a smartphone and there's reason to be skeptical there I honestly can't test that without trying to destroy phones I do not own that said my protest units have already withstood some accidental drops just keep this in mind though tough in this case seems to mean the glass won't shatter it's still pretty easy to scratch so a screen protector is probably a good idea now remember when I said you'd have to be a pro to spot some of the changes Apple made here well the iPhone pro screens are one of the best examples of that Apple calls these panels super retina XDR displays and that kind of bombastic branding suggests we can expect some eye-catching improvements a bath bed these are great screens but they're not dramatically better than the ones from a year ago the screen brightness tops out at around 800 nits instead of the 600 something we got in the 10s series but the pros aren't that much more readable in broad daylight than those older phones were if at all actually the difference is most notable when you're watching for 4k HDR video where the brightness Peaks and around 1200 nips during really bright scenes even then though you're not gonna notice the difference unless you have the new expensive phone right next to the old expensive phone that's not all remember 3d touch that pressure-sensitive screen tech that Apple push for a few years well it's finally gone and if you really miss it like I did which I'm in the minority on I'm sure that you can long press on app icons to access the same shortcuts most people I know never actually use it though so losing it here makes a lot of sense [Music] performance is another one of those areas where you might not see a huge difference but that really depends on where you're coming from if you haven't upgraded your phone in a while the iPhone 11 pro and pro max will feel fantastically quick thanks to Apple's new a 13 Bionic chipset if you're coming from last year's flagship iPhone so the difference is much more subtle apps launched a little bit faster and graphically intense games load a little quicker while multitasking feels just a touch more seamless the a 13th power might be more noticeable if you're using certain heavy duty apps since Apple execs spent a lot of time onstage last week talking about video recording I tried exporting 13 minutes of 4k 60 frames per second video in iMovie it took 18 minutes for the pro and pro max to render that final 5.7 gig file compared to about 21 minutes on last year's 10s and 10's max that's a decent improvement but maybe not earth shape I'm never gonna complain about improved performance but just don't expect to be totally blown away if you've been using a recent iPhone with all that said some of apple's changes definitely stand out battery life is a great example because the a13 is more efficient in addition to just being faster I've generally been able to get about 12 hours of continued use out of the smaller probe instead of the 9ish I got out of last year's 10s and the big old pro max easily ran for between 13 and 14 hours on a single charge compared to the 11 to 13 hours I got of last year's big iPhone if it's big changes you're after here look no further than the cameras we've got a 3-year ear 12 megapixel sensors in the pros the standard wide camera with optical image stabilization and an F 1.8 aperture the telephoto with a slightly wider aperture this year and a 2 X optical zoom and the new ultra wide camera that captures a hundred and twenty degree field of view the best results tend to come from the standard wide camera which is a good thing since it's probably the one you're gonna use most often it's by far the fastest of the three to lock onto your subject especially in low light and it delivers what I think is the best mix of color and detail of these three cameras the telephoto is no slouch though and it's actually really good at rendering fine details even though it's a little less capable than that why camera in the dark it would have been nice to see Apple push this thing past the 2 X optical zoom limit but it's still a really handy tool to have whenever you need it so what about that new ultra wide camera well it's mostly good it struggles at times to capture evenly exposed photos in the dark and it just it doesn't pack photos with detail the same way the standard wide camera does there's still a decent amount of it there especially when you're shooting in bright conditions it's just not as much as the other cameras and that's kind of not the point this camera is all about giving your photos more space in context if you're worried about clarity more than anything else you might be a little disappointed but in my experience it is a great utility player for when you want to shoot a sweeping Vista or when you just don't have much room to move in other words it's good enough for what it's supposed to do they have their quirks but by and large these are excellent cameras and I know some of you are probably wondering how they stack up to competitors like the note 10 and the pixel 3 honestly it's kind of hard to make definitive statements because they'll all kind of have different motives Samsung cameras processed photos to have very vivid colors and lots of detail so your photos almost look like an idealized version of what you actually shot Apple's three cameras here are geared more towards capturing the world as you see it even if features like smart HD are selectively amp up the color and exposure more than they used to and Google's pixels well they sort of land somewhere in between those approaches though that could change once the pixel force come out let me put this another way the photos I took with the Galaxy Note n are the ones I'd most like to post on Instagram with the no filter hashtag the photos I shot with the iPhone 11 pros are the ones I'd most like to throw into Lightroom and have some fun with which phone actually takes the best photos is a matter of preference I think but apples cameras here are clever and capable enough that you won't really feel like you're missing out on anything there are just a few other additions I should point out here quick-take makes it easy to switch from framing up a photo to shooting a video by holding the shutter button down there's also a high key light mono setting for the portrait mode which snaps a black and white head shot of your subject with a bone white background these results can be pretty impressive just as long as you make sure no one's behind your subject otherwise the camera turns them into literal ghouls that will clutter up your shot Apple also added a night mode this year which works pretty differently compared to what you'd see on a Samsung or a Google phone the camera will recognize when you're shooting in the dark and automatically enable night mode that is to say you can turn it off before you shoot but you can't really prevent it from turning on in the first place then the results are maybe not quite as striking as what you might get out of a pixel but that's again sort of by design other phones night modes tend to brighten up photos too much as if they were trying to turn night into day apples a night photos are still plenty bright but they feel like they were shot in the wee hours and whether that's a good thing is again really up to you there is just one catch though you can't use the night mode with that ultra wide camera at all the 12 megapixel front camera isn't quite as interesting as what's around back and as usual it'll take nice selfies without a whole lot of fuss Apple did add two notable features here though tapping a button widens the cameras field of view so you can squeeze a few more people into those selfies you can now also shoot slow-motion video which works as well as you'd expect you're gonna start seeing these slow fees everywhere and while I hate the name I figure I should just contribute my own before everyone goes crazy so just enjoy the shot of what happens when I eat a handful of glitter kids please don't try this at home oh and the videos you shoot with the iPhone pros are pretty great actually you can capture footage at up to 4k 60 and thanks to an assist from the knurl engine the pros did a surprisingly good job at adapting to changing conditions exposure was more consistent throughout and I noticed a lot less noise than I expected so at the end of it all should you buy an iPhone 11 Pro or pro max well I think it really depends they're all around better than the 10s series and they're definitely a worthy upgrade if you're using an iPhone 10 or anything older than that these are after all probably the most powerful smartphones money can buy right now but if you don't need the best of the best or if you're still not generally thrilled about the idea of dropping a thousand dollars on a phone even a phone that'll last you a few years there's another way the iPhone 11 is the more practical choice and the one that probably just makes sense for more people [Music] I've spent a lot of time testing these new phones so I really appreciate you guys taking the time to watch our review if you have any feedback or if you have any further questions you want us to try and dig into as we continue covering these devices definitely let us know and be sure to subscribe
