iPhone 13  Review: Better Than You Think!

- The iPhone 13 

are better than you think. So, really, there are only three things about this phone that are genuinely better than the regular 13. And one of them, you could argue, maybe not that many people are actually gonna notice, but the other two are pretty big jumps. And so, this feels like a pretty big upgrade disguised in the same design as last year. So, I've reviewed the iPhone 13 already, it was earlier this week. There, I go over Cinematic Mode and the new A15 Bionic, and a smaller notch, et cetera.

                                                                                                         This Pro phone has all of that. 

But then on top of that, the three major things that this phone does better than the regular 13 would be the screen, the battery, and the cameras. Now, you might be thinking, "Wait, Marques, that's the same list of three things you said was better about the 13 than the 12." You'd be right, but this takes a bigger leap in all those things. So, to start with the screen, the 13 Pro is the same size as the 13 and the 13 Pro Max is bigger, again, same sizes and resolutions as last year, but now, there is a smaller notch. Neat. Okay, looks a little better on the bigger screen, even though there is no more information on that extra screen, but then the display is actually noticeably brighter here, even versus the 13, it hits 1,000 nits max brightness versus the 800 on the 13, and even 1,200 nits peak with HDR, and it's really good. It's viewable everywhere, outdoors, has great responsive auto-brightness, and it's still one of the most color-accurate OLED panels out there.

                                                                                                             But what we're really here for, finally,

are  Apple's Pro phones now getting ProMotion, 

meaning an adaptive high refresh rate display. - It's about damn time. - Now, this has been really interesting to watch unfold because it's not just a matter of dropping 120 Hertz display into the phone and then calling it a day, there's a couple of different considerations, and nuances, and things to be able to do it well, and then there's whether or not people even notice. That's two different things. So, as a self-proclaimed pixel enthusiast, as someone who's seen a lot of phones, Apple has done this really well and it's, of course, an OLED, but it's also an LTPO display, meaning it's an adaptive variable refresh rate that can ramp up to 120 Hertz, but also now down to as low as 10 Hertz. It actually has 12 different refresh rates that it cycles between, which is seven more than the iPad Pro.

So, this helps it respond to exactly what's happening on the display. So, if you're watching a 24fps movie, the display only needs to refresh 24 times per second, but if you're scrolling through a website or social media, it'll be nice and smooth. Maybe for gaming, it's pinned at 120 Hertz, but if you're just sitting on a home screen or reading some text, like an email, nothing's happening on the screen, it can go all the way down to 10 Hertz, which can save battery. So, this tech has been around for years in other phones, and it's great. So, the interesting part is different phones ramp up at different times, and for different reasons, and different amounts.
So, an example is like, no matter how high a refresh rate of an Android phone I have, it's always 60 Hertz for Google Maps.
                   Anytime I open Google Maps, the whole rest of the phone: notification panel, using the app, it's all 60 Hertz. Probably to save battery 'cause it's a GPS-heavy app, but that's one thing it always does. So, it turns out there have been a lot of places where people have noticed the iPhone doesn't ramp all the way up to 120 Hertz.
In fact, a lot of places in third-party apps where it still stays at 60. Now, I've noticed, just from using a whole ton of different apps, I was actually pretty impressed by how many are already using 120 Hertz animations. And all of these apps, inside and out, felt smoother and more responsive. Also, all of iOS is smoother and more responsive. But for those that don't, Apple has put out detailed instructions on how to make it easy for developers to update their apps to fully support ProMotion, exactly the way they want to.
                                                                                                     So, when your favorite apps get updated, hopefully, the developers include them. But all that being said, will regular people who get this phone even notice ProMotion? And this is something I've thought a lot about, especially since the announcement. Of course, lots of other phones have gotten high refresh rates in the past, but because it's an iPhone, this is for millions of people
who have only ever seen a 60 Hertz phone their entire lives, this will be the first time they ever see a high refresh rate screen on a phone. And so, this is the thing I've been talking about for so long. So, when I actually first got this phone, I've started handing it to people, discretely, of course, but handing it to them like, "Hey, do you notice anything different about this phone? Like, swipe around, maybe hold it next to your current phone. Do you feel like it feels any different?" And I'll be the first to admit, not as many people immediately noticed it as I was hoping.