“In 2012, Apple was still making iPhones measuring 3.5-inches. By 2013, this had crept up to 4-inches, and by 2014, reached the heady heights of 4.7-inches and 5.5-inches for the iPhone 6 and appropriately-named iPhone 6 Plus respectively,” Rhiannon Williams reports for The Telegraph. “These new phones, Apple claimed, were ‘Bigger than bigger,’ and they sold by the shed load.”
“The world’s most valuable company is holding an event on Monday where it is hotly tipped to be revealing a new iPhone,” Williams reports. “But instead of an ever-larger, ever-thinner iPhone 7, we’re expecting to see a return to the modest 4-inch screens of old and a new name, the iPhone SE.”
“The iPhone SE with two very different customers in mind. The first is the current 4-inch iPhone owner who is looking to upgrade, but doesn’t want an enormous replacement,” Williams reports. “The second, and perhaps the most important, is living in India or China. Though pricing, like everything else surrounding the SE, is a closely guarded secret, it’s likely to be less expensive than the 6 and 6s models. Apple will probably slash the price of the 5s by around 50 percent, according to KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, presenting Apple fans in developing smartphone economies with a far more affordable way into the Apple eco-system.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Price. Fragmandroid’s last selling point is slipping away.
The 5s price drop is the most underrated factor IMHO. It’s not sexy new hardware, but making it dramatically more affordable is going to add many millions more NEW Apple customers. If push came to shove I could still be using my 4S, the 5S is a great iPhone to this day.
Coke Classic
Wrong. Lots of suits want iPhones and the new models are too large for many in the corner offices.
If I were not working from home and back in the office, I’d likely have gone for the smaller form. I love my 6s, and my eyes suck, so it’s not likely I’d go back to a smaller unit, but choice is good. I think it will sell – as long as it’s not castrated too badly.
Pack that ecosystem.
The iPhone 6’s are Too. Damn. Big.
What’s the point of a phone if it’s too inconvenient to carry with you?
I’ll be watching with interest.
Too damn big for you and others with small hands! Agreed, there is a place for the smaller iPhone but Apple employees, shareholders and those of us equipped to carry such phones should be thankful you’re not in the decision loop in Cupertino or else we’d be forced to use Samsung’s large format devices because MULTIPLIED MILLIONS of us per quarter want larger screens. Being just one of those millions I could never go back to a phone smaller than the iPhone 6.
With my Apple Watch, I find that I pull out my iPhone less frequently. In addition, as I’m in front of a Mac most of the day, I will send message via the Mac’s “Messages App” as opposed to getting out my phone . . . just an example of a workflow in which it doesn’t matter if you have an iPhone 6s or an iPhone SE.
No one else is making premium 4-inch smartphones anymore. Apple will own this market. Only question is, how big is the market? Do lots of people really miss the old small iPhones?
I still like the original size the iPhone was up until the 4S. It just fits best. The longer iPhone5 just doesn’t fit me comfortably. Ultimately I’d like the biggest screen and a good camera inside the original 4.5″x2.25″ form. I’d sacrifice thickness and bulging lenses over longer or wider.
I will wait it out for the SE/30.