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It’s already borderline absurd. Pro shouldn’t have tiers - it should be the best Apple can offer, and as the Max has featured the smaller Pro doesn’t, it should only be available in Max. Then the regular size Pro could be the regular iPhone.
I feel like the way the do it with iPads would be fine:

iPad:
- one size

iPad mini:
- one size

iPad Pro:
- 11"
- 13"

iPad Air:
- 11"
- 13"

Done.

Of course, having yet another tier may be at least partially to steer more people toward the Pro Max because with an even higher tier, the Pro Max might appear more reasonable to certain people.
 
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The 6.1” Pro is a pretty dainty phone, have you held one? It’s the size of the 11 Pro with it’s 5.8” screen, I don’t really remember anyone complaining that that one was too big
I’m not an iPhone Pro user honestly, and anyways, the Pro is getting bigger in September.

But yeah, I agree that the 15 Pro is the closest to a handy, compact iPhone. However, I’m afraid it’s not enough.

Look, yesterday I needed to shoot a picture, with my iPhone SE 3 (what a joy of device). I had my left hand busy holding a bag full of groceries. So I grabbed my SE3 from my pocket with my right hand, I opened the camera with the swipe left gesture, rotated the phone 90 degrees to shoot in landscape -all of this just with one hand-, used my thumb and index to make a bit of zoom in, pointed and shoot.

I really heavily on one-hand usage. And I’m afraid that all of this, I couldn’t have made it with a bigger iPhone. Even with the 15 Pro.

Sure, if I used my smartphone with two hands like many people, I could live with bigger sizes. But it’s not my case. Even when my two hands are free, I use it with one hand, to open, to scroll, to type…
 
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I feel like the way the do it with iPads would be fine:

iPad:
- one size

iPad mini:
- one size

iPad Pro:
- 11"
- 13"

iPad Air:
- 11"
- 13"

Done.

Of course, having yet another tier may be at least partially to steer more people toward the Pro Max because with an even higher tier, the Pro Max might appear more reasonable to certain people.
The iPad line is also getting ridiculous though. There is becoming increasingly less justification for the Air to exist, and let’s not even talk about the absurdity of having 3 different Pencils.

Apple has generally had much simpler, more straightforward product lines while its competitors had more complicated lines trying to fill every imaginable price point. Apple is these days playing a similar game.
 
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Preach!! 🙌🏻 The new macbooks are def a step backwards in design, & this is exactly what I say when people complain about Apple dropping support for stuff like 32 bit, switching architectures, etc

Sometimes I wonder if they purposely do major shifts from time to time in order to force devs to update their apps, which keeps things progressing and keeps their UI aesthetic consistent. Don’t want to end up like Windows where there’s always a jumble of different UI’s, it makes me cringe every time I use it
How are the MacBooks a step back?? 🤨
 
Yep. And I’ve always found it annoying that 1) the phone doesn’t sit flat on a table, it wobbles around because of the corner lenses. Less of an issue with cases but still annoying.

And 2) you can accidentally put your fingers over the lenses when taking pics, especially if holding with left hand.

Both of these issues would be mitigated with centred camera lenses.
Reduce wobbling is mentioned as Nothing talks about Nothing 2a. But I have to admit that 2a is ugly. Maybe Apple can come up with a nicer solution.
Nothing 2a.png
 
The iPad line is also getting ridiculous though. There is becoming increasingly less justification for the Air to exist, and let’s not even talk about the absurdity of having 3 different Pencils.

Apple has generally had much simpler, more straightforward product lines while its competitors had more complicated lines trying to fill every imaginable price point. Apple is these days playing a similar game.

Re: the pencils, I agree. Technically, it's even 4 pencils now. Gen 1, gen 2, USB-C, Pro - three of which would look just about indistinguishable to the average shopper. The different layers of compatibility and features just make it so much worse.

As for the iPads themselves, I think the one that should go is the base iPad. Or rather, I think the Air should be the base iPad and be renamed accordingly - especially now that the Pro is lighter, rendering the "Air" name pointless.
 
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Re: the pencils, I agree. Technically, it's even 4 pencils now. Gen 1, gen 2, USB-C, Pro - three of which would look just about indistinguishable to the average shopper. The different layers of compatibility and features just make it so much worse.
Yep it’s incomprehensibly stupid. They should scrap the Pencil, rename the 2 to simply Apple Pencil, so there’s the Pencil and Pencil Pro. Both should be USB-C, continuing to sell both is stupid. Ditto AirPods.
As for the iPads themselves, I think the one that should go is the base iPad. Or rather, I think the Air should be the base iPad and be renamed accordingly - especially now that the Pro is lighter, rendering the "Air" name pointless.

This is how I’ve been leaning as well. The only thing with the base iPad is it’s the cheap version so there’s merit in it being the introductory model. But maybe the Mini could do that.

iPad Mini
iPad (the current Air)
iPad Pro
 
Yep it’s incomprehensibly stupid. They should scrap the Pencil, rename the 2 to simply Apple Pencil, so there’s the Pencil and Pencil Pro. Both should be USB-C, continuing to sell both is stupid. Ditto AirPods.


This is how I’ve been leaning as well. The only thing with the base iPad is it’s the cheap version so there’s merit in it being the introductory model. But maybe the Mini could do that.

iPad Mini
iPad (the current Air)
iPad Pro
Doing that with the mini makes sense. I mean the cheapest entry-level iPhone is the smallest.
 
Oh boy the rumours are everywhere, I will hang on to my iPhone 12 Pro Max for another year in a hope that next years lineup will l finally get the long overdue revamp.
 
Doing that with the mini makes sense. I mean the cheapest entry-level iPhone is the smallest.
Yep exactly, and I imagine it’s a good size for education purposes too. The Air seems to have become the Pro’s poorer cousin - getting the specs that the Pro had in the past. It’s still a nice device but that automatically makes it seem inferior. And as you say, it doesn’t even have the claim of being the thinnest or lightest iPad in the range, so “Air” as a name serves no purpose.

To bring even closer parity with the iPhone range they could rename the mini to the SE.

iPad/iphone SE (or both Mini)
iPad/iphone
iPad/iPhone Pro

And while we’re at it, stop calling the 13” MBP a Pro. It has barely anything in it that the 14” and 16” models have, even had worse ports and lack of MagSafe that the Air had. They may have fixed that all now but it was such a mess. The 13” is, if anything, a bridge between MBA and MBP.
 
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Oh please 🧐. This notch trope is very stale by now. Do you prefer no notch and a bigger bezel all around? Go buy an HP…

Or you could buy a Dell with slimmer bezels than a MacBook Pro and no notch. Windows Hello / Face ID / facial recognition built in!
 
Yep exactly, and I imagine it’s a good size for education purposes too. The Air seems to have become the Pro’s poorer cousin - getting the specs that the Pro had in the past. It’s still a nice device but that automatically makes it seem inferior. And as you say, it doesn’t even have the claim of being the thinnest or lightest iPad in the range, so “Air” as a name serves no purpose.

To bring even closer parity with the iPhone range they could rename the mini to the SE.

iPad/iphone SE (or both Mini)
iPad/iphone
iPad/iPhone Pro

And while we’re at it, stop calling the 13” MBP a Pro. It has barely anything in it that the 14” and 16” models have, even had worse ports and lack of MagSafe that the Air had. They may have fixed that all now but it was such a mess. The 13” is, if anything, a bridge between MBA and MBP.
It’s funny because I don’t think it gets the “hand me downs” from the Pro that people want. If it had Pro Motion and proper quad speakers, I’d probably take it over the Pro.
 
Port- & button-less?
hope not, losing the port would suck :/
The iPad line is also getting ridiculous though. There is becoming increasingly less justification for the Air to exist, and let’s not even talk about the absurdity of having 3 different Pencils.

Apple has generally had much simpler, more straightforward product lines while its competitors had more complicated lines trying to fill every imaginable price point. Apple is these days playing a similar game.
my bet is they’ll slim the pencil lineup down in the next couple years, I dont think the relocation of the magnets because of the camera change was anticipated and it led to this. Bet we have a pro and non pro pencil supported on new models across the lineup and that’s it within 3 years or so
 
It’s funny because I don’t think it gets the “hand me downs” from the Pro that people want. If it had Pro Motion and proper quad speakers, I’d probably take it over the Pro.
I can understand why it doesn't get every feature, but it generally gets things that debuted on the Pro.

hope not, losing the port would suck :/

my bet is they’ll slim the pencil lineup down in the next couple years, I dont think the relocation of the magnets because of the camera change was anticipated and it led to this. Bet we have a pro and non pro pencil supported on new models across the lineup and that’s it within 3 years or so
I hope so, this is all it needs. BUT it's not the Pro or magnet's fault that they had 2 versions of Apple Pencil in addition to the Pencil 2.
 
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