iPhone 7 Lacks Courage To Impress

The eagerly awaited iPhone 7 was released by Apple last week and we have tested it out to find out if the device is actually any good. The iPhone is the predecessor to the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6S, which struggled with fewer sales and lower enthusiasm from Apple fans.

Battery Life

The battery life on the iPhone 7 is poor. Using it as my primary device with three hours of app usage and browsing, hundreds of emails with push notifications, a couple of photos and the odd game of Space Raiders meant that it lasted an average of just over 12 hours between charges, meaning it didn’t survive past 6.30pm. I found that if I enabled the GPS and maps while moving the battery life depleted even faster. It also took a long time to charge, over 2 and half hours, making battery life a big problem for the iPhone 7. If you need your iPhone to stay powered up all day you will need to carry around a battery pack like this.

Though iPhone 7 would be one of the most expensive smartphone I am disappointed that there is still no fast charging on it seriously @apple

— Ranjit (@geekyranjit) September 23, 2016

Camera

The iPhone 7 has a much better camera than the iPhone 6S. It is faster and boosts an optical image stabilization that takes good photos while moving. The iPhone 7 camera does not have the best camera on the market with phones by BlackBerry, HTC, LG,  Samsung and Huwai offering much better cameras.

Headphone Jack

The iPhone 7 is the first iPhone without a headphone jack. The move seems strange as the iPhone was born through the iPod which is a MP3 device designed to listen to music. Moving away from this now renders many other headphone devices incompatible with the iPhone 7. The move was really unnecessary and complaints about the new Lightning Jack have not been great. Another big problem with this iPhone is you cannot charge the device and listen to music through headphones at the same time.

Just had my first moment where lightning headphones powered off after five minutes. Audio routed to phone speaker. This is not good.

— Neil Cremins (@ncremins) September 21, 2016

Verdict

The iPhone 7 is really just a big disappointment. Rather than make news with new features, they have made news for removing features. Much like the recent updates to the OSx software. Apple is in great position to really push the boundaries by releasing a phone that could have been modular, reducing the need to replace every part each year and cutting back on the wasted resources. A modular device will also eventually cut back on poor working conditions in the off-shore sweatshops where they are produced.  There are also reports emerging that the iPhone 7 has poorer call quality.  A lot of people also mention that the shiny, glossy finish of this iPhone scratches a lot easier than other models.

The verdict is in: Yes, the jet black iPhone 7 scratches ridiculously easily https://t.co/I7zdLVOgH0

— Quartz (@qz) September 19, 2016

Glad I didn’t pre-order jet black after seeing all the scratches on @techcrunch’s iPhone 7. https://t.co/mt7kLnl59U pic.twitter.com/QxNqSX6kHj

— Mike Mignano (@mignano) September 13, 2016

Specifications

• Screen: 4.7in 1334×750 (326ppi)
• Processor: Apple A10 Fusion
• RAM: 2GB of RAM
• Storage: 32/128/256GB
• Operating system: iOS 10
• Camera: 12MP rear camera and 7MP front-facing camera
• Connectivity: LTE, Wi-Fiac, NFC, IR, Bluetooth 4.2, Lightning and GPS
• Dimensions: 138.3 x 67.1 x 7.1mm
• Weight: 138g