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If there had been a smaller variant of the Air, I would have been a buyer.

Thin & light are great, but it's too big in L x W for me.

Now that I've seen iOS 26 though, I'm happy to remain with my 13 Mini on iOS 18 and just get a new battery for it this Fall.
Pretty sure Apple makes you update the phones to the latest available software when you do a battery replacement, no matter which phone it is.
 
Sounds like the camera is a disappointment compared to competitor’s cameras on thin phones.
Missing the ultra wide, which has been known for sometime now, is what it is. Apples to apples comparison between the Air and the Android competitors in the reviews dropped this morning definitely do not support your disappointment thesis. The Air seems to deliver better images. Did you not read the reviews you're apparently referring to?
 
Watch iJustine’s iPhone Air video and tell me what you think

This video is symbolic of how YouTube isn’t what it used to be anymore. Objectivity? Hardly to be found. Battery, Speaker? Missing
 
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I don't think the iPhone Air design will mature until we get better battery chemistry for a future model. With several companies finally starting to slowly ramp up solid-state battery production, by this time in 2026 the next model iPhone Air could get a thin battery rated as high as 4,200 mAh, which means almost iPhone 16 Plus battery life.
 
It was nothing more than anecdotes and a broadcast of his preconceived notions, MANY of which he was wrong about. Which part of HE DIDN'T REVIEW THE PHONE is confusing?
Who cares that HE DIDNT REVIEW THE PHONE... the point I was making to the person I originally replied to is that not all youtubers are biased. The fact that he didn't review the air is IRRELEVANT here. He has hundreds of videos where he is critical of Apple products
 
Watch iJustine’s iPhone Air video and tell me what you think

This video is symbolic of how YouTube isn’t what it used to be anymore. Objectivity? Hardly to be found. Battery, Speaker? Missing
IJustine is a total outlier... she is the cringiest Apple shill
 
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The bubble most of them are stuck in is the one that requires them to be very careful what they say, lest they lose early/special access and demo units, etc.

Most of this sort of content is "hype and excitement" as opposed to actual reviews.
What we need are honest MR member reviews.
 
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And Apple expects us to believe those are actual, unbiased reviews of these phones?

That’s not fair that some “special” YouTubers get the device earlier than 95% of people.

It is worth to wait for direct comparisons, especially of battery life and camera performance. I haven’t really seen anything in all the current reviews, more like “unboxing” useless videos from 2013 YouTube era
 
My biggest issue is the price. With all those compromises the iPhone Air should be cheaper. I shouldn’t have to make a bunch of compromises on a $1000 phone just to get a thinner phone, especially when there’s an $800 iPhone with few compromises.
So, you expect a phone sporting an elegant, groundbreaking form factor to deliver this without a price premium? Hmmm.
 
Battery life is not a big deal for me in my daily use, plenty of access to chargers or portable chargers. My question would be is there any way to do macro photography? I use this daily more for fun than anything else, but not sure I’m ready to give up my 16 pro. But to be honest, I wish I had kept my 15 pro instead of upgrading to the heavier, bulkier, though much cooler to hold 16 pro.
 
What we need are honest MR member views.

I'm not sure what I trust less: The Influencer-As-Apple-Mouthpiece YouTube avalanche, or the Apple Sycophant Keyboard Warrior Army patting themselves on the back for making such a great choice and making sure to tell everyone what a great choice they made over and over again.

If someone goes to an Apple Store, picks up an Air, and thinks, "yeah, this is for me," then good on them. I hope they use it in good health. The tortured, endless conversation about that decision, however, is just so much narcissism.
 
The European testing of the battery on the Air for their certification process show it's fine. It's better than the life of either the 16 Pro or 15 Pro or 14 Pro when they tested those phones.

You people are just incredibly dramatic.

It takes literally 15-20 mins of sitting still with the phone plugged in or plopped on a magnetic charger to top it off.... most cars manufactured in the last ten years have either USB ports or wireless charging. Almost everyone who travels has a power bank and charger in their bag.

So. much. drama.

Those of you having panic attacks about the "abysmal" battery life can just stick with the giant heavy pocket brick, that's why they still make it.

I understand what you are saying, but it's the situations where I am not by a wall outlet. I am a light to medium user, and I still don't get through a day with an iphone 15 pro using ios26.
 
Miss the legacy or classic extension that was not updated but know that will never happen. A lot would pay good amount for it. Not all of course. My point is was quicker, by only a little, with new content on any kind of discussion forum. Sometimes too much so.

Air works well with more than one other device like anything else mobile. If finding a balance or close.
 
Clickbait headlines and clickbait YouTubes. Thats the world we live in today. If you’re comparing the phone to the Pro or Pro Max, yes. There will be compromises. I’m not sure who would be surprised by that. If you want the most you can pack into an iPhone, then those are the models for you.

But if you evaluate the device by itself, it seem to stand on its own merits and is a very capable device. Apple set a pretty high bar for the device, given what they could do with tech at the time.

To me, this is just the MacBook Air vs MacBook Pro all over again. They’re designed for different folks. Nothing surprising there.
On the other hand, if you compare iPhone Air to its direct competitor - Samsung Galaxy Edge - the Samsung design really looks superior:
- much higher battery capacity
- dual speakers
- dual cameras (and 200MP vs 48MP for Air)
- 6.7" vs 6.5" screen
- two grams lighter than Air
- just 0.2mm thicker than Air
- $700 vs $1000
 
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I'm not sure what I trust less: The Influencer-As-Apple-Mouthpiece YouTube avalanche, or the Apple Sycophant Keyboard Warrior Army patting themselves on the back for making such a great choice and making sure to tell everyone what a great choice they made over and over again.

If someone goes to an Apple Store, picks up an Air, and thinks, "yeah, this is for me," then good on them. I hope they use it in good health. The tortured, endless conversation about that decision, however, is just so much narcissism.
Valid points. I get my Air on Friday. I will use it for a good and then post my honest thoughts and I will not be comparing to to Pro models.
 
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So, you expect a phone sporting an elegant, groundbreaking form factor to deliver this without a price premium? Hmmm.
I expect a phone with a smaller battery, fewer camera options, one less speaker, etc. to be cheaper than $100 less than the Pro version of the same phone. The pricing on this thing just doesn’t make sense, especially with how good the base iPhone is this year.
 
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If battery life is merely good enough on a brand new device with 100% Battery Health, that's not a great sign for real world owners because it's only going to get worse over time.

You're right. In all of the posts and reviews on the Air, this is the first time someone noticed this is on a 100% battery, out of the box. If your battery experience out of the box is "okay", that doesn't bode well. Also, someone saying battery life is better than expected is also not a sign of praise if we don't know what that person expected.
 
I expect a phone with a smaller battery, fewer camera options, one less speaker, etc. to be cheaper than $100 less than the Pro version of the same phone. The pricing on this thing just doesn’t make sense, especially with how good the base iPhone is this year.

I agree. I'm not a hater, I want the Air to succeed, but they placed it in the line-up where it shouldn't have been with these compromises.
 
Was having high-level tech discussion with my wife this morning and concluded that the mobile phone market has hit maturity in the mass market. Those who have owned a mobile device for 20+ years have watched the evolution of mobile communications - voice, text messaging, picture messaging, pseudo “smart phones”, and ultimately iPhone and Android devices. Phones went from slow, clunky plastic devices to slabs of precisely formed metal and glass which play music, take pictures, browse websites, play games, make video calls, and on and on. Large, tangible innovations were being added yearly and the push was to get mobile devices on par with the average desktop computer.

The result: today’s phones pretty much do everything the typical person needs or wants. Large, tangible innovations have been implemented which means that customers are given fewer and fewer reasons to upgrade at the aggressive pace of the past. If I upgrade my 2-year-old iPhone with a new one, what am I really getting? What does “2x faster” even mean for the typical doom scroller? Is liquid glass really going to revolutionize my productivity, or is this just the latest take on GUI fashion? Waiting one more year to upgrade is becoming easier and easier.

Bringing this idea back around to the iPhone Air, should we really be surprised by its existence? To the average person, the regular and pro iPhones are essentially identical. Tangibly, the $300 premium gets you a third camera, but what else? Seriously, think about that. Now has never been a better time to buy the regular iPhone! And because of that lack of differentiation, the Air opens up an opportunity for an alternative purchase (albeit with compromises). Historically, “skinny” phones always shipped with compromises*, but this is an opportunity for Apple to recoup R&D dollars and maybe even sell a fashion statement. It certainly has people talking and asking questions. Maybe the Air is ultimately a segue into next-year’s foldable phone, and it’s purpose is to train the customer to expect similar compromises to battery life or camera selection.



*Apple’s marketing group gave it their best effort convincing everyone that battery should be measured in video hours and not average or mixed use. More deplorably, a 2x crop was referred to as “optically equivalent” of a narrower zoom which is disingenuous at best.
 
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