“Something has been troubling me since my review of the sixth generation iPod Touch last week. It’s the smaller form factor,” Ewan Spence reports for Forbes. “I’m really enjoying having a mobile device that fits comfortably in my hand, that is easy to use with just a single thumb over the whole screen, and doesn’t require any gym-work to be able to lift it.”
“There are times when I want my smartphone to be a phone and the iPod Touch has reminded me of that,” Spence reports. “Of course it only connects over Wi-Fi, but the use of FaceTime and iMessage allows for phone-like communications and with it running iOS 8 it is clear to see what a ‘small’ iPhone 6 would be like… There’s every chance that the iPod Touch is a precursor to a smaller-screened smartphone to be announced in September.”
“If the iPhone 6 had been available in a 4-inch screened format, that would have been my first choice for the family… and the first choice for myself as well,” Spence reports. “People want the option of a small-screened smartphone. There should not be a performance penalty just because someone would rather a phone fits in their hand rather than a monster phablet that looks like a comedy prop from the nineties… I doubt the iPhone 6C will match the iPhone 6S specifications, but at the very least I hope it matches the iPhone 6 both in hardware used, but also in storage options. The iPod Touch pushed up to 128GB, I can only hope that a four-inch iPhone 6C will do the same. If it does, expect it to be one of the most popular iPhones of all time.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Reports lately say that there will be no new 4-inch iPhone. While the reports could be wrong, as we wrote yesterday:
If they’re going to make a 4-inch iPhone, it should be on par (as much as possible) with the flagship iPhones – same processor, same amount of RAM, same storage options, very similar camera capabilities, etc. In other words, a high-margin premium device designed specifically for premium customers who are looking for a world-class 4-inch smartphone. Still:
“In general, the only people who still think they want a 4-inch iPhone are those who do not yet own a 4.7-inch iPhone 6 or 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus. After iPhone 5s and 5c go the way of the dodo, the 4.7-inch display should, and likely will, be Apple’s smallest iPhone display going forward.” — MacDailyNews Take, December 5, 2014
That said, there certainly are times now, with Apple Watches on our wrists, where we’d appreciate a smaller iPhone that we could just tuck away in a pocket and forget — at least while Watch is so dependent on iPhone. But, watch OS 2, coming soon, will begin to lessen the dependence, so whatever desire we had developed over the past months months for a small iPhone to support Apple Watch has diminished since watchOS 2 was unveiled. It’s likely Apple is thinking this way, too. Even with Apple Watch and watch OS 1.0, we almost always want a larger iPhone* for the times when we actually use the iPhone anyway. So, we’re back to thinking the 4.7-inch display is the smallest iPhone Apple should make.
*The one major exception would be toting around an iPhone on a run for GPS mapping, but, even then, the iPhone 6 is plenty small and light enough to suffice.
SEE ALSO:
No new 4-inch iPhone? Is Apple making a mistake? – July 29, 2015
Analyst: Apple has scrapped plans for a 4-inch iPhone 6c – July 27, 2015
Analyst: No 4-inch iPhone coming – May 12, 2015
KGI: 4-inch iPhone ‘unlikely’ this fall – April 22, 2015
Five reasons Apple won’t make any more 4-inch iPhones – December 9, 2014