“There’s growing speculation that Apple Inc. will roll out iPhones with bigger screens next year, a move that some experts say makes sense given trends in a steadily evolving mobile market,” Benjamin Pimentel writes for MarketWatch.
“In fact, Apple may not have any choice if the tech giant wants to stay competitive, some analysts say,” Pimentel writes. “‘We believe that screen size is becoming a more important feature to mobile devices given the inherent advantages for media and content consumption,’ Piper Jaffray analysts Gene Munster and Douglas Clinton told clients in a note last week. ‘We believe that screen size is one of the top two factors in consumers opting for Android devices over an Apple device in the U.S.'”
“‘The real reason is Asia,’ Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Brian White told MarketWatch,” Pimentel writes. “‘What’s happening over there is consumers prefer 4-inch to 5-inch screens. So Apple missed out on some market share opportunities. In the last 18 months, the trend of these 4-inch to over 5-inch screen sizes in smartphones has really accelerated.'”
Read more in the full article here.
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Analyst: Apple to launch ‘iPhone 6′ with larger screen as soon as Q214 – October 10, 2013
Jefferies analyst Peter Misek claims Apple’s iPhone 6 will offer a 4.8-inch Retina display – October 7, 2013
Apple’s worst kept secret: Bigger iPhones in 2014 – September 7, 2013
Apple should keep the iPhone height and make it wider so it has the 4×3 ratio instead of the 16×9 it currently has. The primary use of the phone is not watching HD video so it should not be catered to.
A bigger iPhone, ie a phablet, would cannibalize iPad sales.
MDN: when are you going to change your name to iOSDN? Like Cook, your primary focus seems to be only on iGadgets.
Apple has nothing to lose by offering consumers more choice.
The arguments that Apple “doesn’t need” to do something or would suffer cannibalization are all bogus FUD founded in personal bias. There is clearly a demand for different size/cost/capacity gadgets. Hardware differentiation is specifically what drives Android handset sales, hundreds of thousands of them who might have chosen Apple if not for the hardware limitations.
Likewise, a large percentage of Wintel PCs are sold because Apple really doesn’t offer many configurations, and continues to whittle away lifetime value of its machines by hard-soldering in components or needlessly sealing cases to prevent end user upgrades. When Apple chooses to not support a user’s hardware needs, it loses the customer for years, if not decades.
The funny thing is that Jobs showed that Apple could respond to different users needs — Apple serves multiple segments with its wide range of iPod options. To not do so with the iPhone would be to ignore what the market is asking.
… but what’s new? Mac users have been asking for a mid-range tower with modest internal user configuration options, and Apple continues to ignore them. It would seem Cook is no marketing genius either.
Build more hardware options, and without question there will be many reasonable people who are not religious fanatics for one OS versus another will switch back to Apple.
The success of the 5s and 5c, along with the disappointing sales of the Samsung S4, suggest that a larger screen size is not the deciding factor in most smartphone sales. Prior to the smartphone era, manufacturers aimed to make their phones as small and light as possible – some phones were so small it was difficult to dial because the keypads were so small.
However, for the over-40s, display size is an issue and a larger display makes for greater readability.
When Apple have two otherwise identical phones in the current and a larger screensize will we all know what influence screen size has on consumer preference.