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It’s a sad day indeed, but I think from the sales point of view, a 5.8” device would have sold much better. I tested several iPhone 13 minis and reached to the conclusion that it’s too narrow for me, so I’m no longer interested in that screen size.

Agreed, but then the price, size and weight difference between 5.8” and 6.1” would be so small that many people would just get even more confused.
 
I don't think only the size has been the reason for the poor sales. Yes, everyone here in Macrumor's forums knows that the difference between regular/mini is only the size and battery, but normal people who are not into technology may not know that. The "Mini" name may have led people to believe that it was a "downgraded model" - also because the price was a bit less, it then made them choose the regular model because they were afraid to buy something that wasn't good enough, and when the price difference had been so small, it was a no brainer.

Apple should have launched iPhone 12/13 without using different names like Mini. But quite simply launched iPhone 13, same phone, choose between 2 sizes.

I saw it coming. That's why I replaced my iPhone 13 Mini, which I've had since release, with a brand new one for approx. 1 month ago when there was a good offer on it.

The iPhone Mini is a perfect phone for those who understand how devices "should" be used. An iPhone must be easy to carry in your pocket, it must handle the day's quick tasks. Reading an SMS, replying to a quick email, searching for information on the web, listening to music and making calls, the iPhone Mini is perfect for that. You should not watch movies or play "big" games on a phone. Movies must be watched on a large TV with surround sound. Work must be done on a Mac, and entertainment and light work is done on the couch with an iPad in hand.

If you choose to do everything on a phone, I understand that you don't choose an iPhone Mini.

RIP iPhone Mini. I hope you will be resurrected in a later version, and preferably with Dynamic Island aned a"matte glass" back, like on the Pro models. It's also perfectly okay if you come back as the new iPhone SE 4th gen.


So to be clear, everyone that didn’t get the mini is doing it wrong? And you and other purchasers know how things are supposed to be done and everyone else is either ignorant or stupid?

Narcissistic much?
R/iamverysmart
 
Make the SE the new mini and make it thicker with similar battery life to standard size, non-pro iPhone. Instant win.

Again, SE is not an iPhone on its own, it is an old and already used design, so making it thicker with similar battery life to standard size breaks two laws - profitability (you can try to lobby Tim on that, best of luck!) and physics (this one is tough).
 
If the iPhone 13 mini had had the telephoto lens I would buy it at the same price point as the iPhone 13 Pro I currently own. Even with lesser processor, battery life, etc.

Great, a pity Apple would like to sell more than one of these technical wonders! And since a mini is not exactly big as it is, putting that telephoto lens in will result in a smaller battery.
 
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Apple has more than enough money to offer 3 phone sizes. I got the mini because I value 1 handed use, and want something small to slip in my pockets on the go.

We are not asking for much, all Apple has to do is put the latest processor in the mini to keep it current and I'm happy.
Apple is not a charity.

They would keep the Mini if it was making money, simple as that.
 
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Again, SE is not an iPhone on its own, it is an old and already used design, so making it thicker with similar battery life to standard size breaks two laws - profitability (you can try to lobby Tim on that, best of luck!) and physics (this one is tough).
Correct. However having a thicker chassis (just one part , unibody aluminium) to be manufactured for it. Screen, camera system and logic board can stay exactly the same.

And toolings are already here - Just make it a continued production of iPhone 13 mini.

And I don't think the thickness would be that much more; few more mms should be fine as iPhone 13 mini battery life was not too different to standard 13.
 
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They should make a Pro Mini
I have a 12 mini. My wife, daughter, and mother all have the 13 mini. We love them. Our other family members haven't purchased a mini because it still costs too much for them. Keep the 13 mini around and drop it by $100 and we are buying 2 more that day to replace SE first gens and looking to buy them again next time we need a phone for all of us. Mini's don't sell well because their cost is too close to bigger/better phones - my opinion anyway.
I feel the opposite.

Mini was an inferior model: an inferior camera, an inferior battery.
Make it a Mini Pro: put the best camera in it, make the body thicker to fit a bigger battery, and I'll buy it right away at the iPhone Pro price.

But neither of them will happen:
You want a cheaper iPhone, but Apple doesn't want to sell cheaper iPhones.
And I'm in the minority because most people want a huge phone, and Apple doesn't want to design an extra model because of 3% of buyers.
 
Yes because I've never tried one. You're using a mini and seemingly don't even know why.

I do know why - because it is light and small and super easy on the move. I do enjoy it and do not have any issues with it as is. It is just that I like upgrading iPhones once every three years or so and, when I do, would like to have something significantly better, compared to what I have now. So right now I have a choice of getting a mini 13, which is a very minor uprgade vs my mini 12 - a better battery, as any new one would be, a slightly better low-light photography and a slightly faster A chip. iPhone 15, however, will be a much more significant qualitative jump - a 48 Mpx camera, DI, a more precise GPS, the famous USB-C and I can basically forget about the battery for a while, as it would easily last me a day and some.

The only surprise would be if Apple did upgrade its mini line, then I would get back to some more serious head scratching. Otherwise I am waiting to see what tomorrow brings and for me, personally, mini 13 is no longer a smart investment in 2023, even though there is still a lot to like about it.
 
Alternatively, I will just get the SE when I want to upgrade. Going to save the money towards a mirrorless camera instead.
 
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This is a very key point. And not just in Asia. Many people in the 20 to 40 age group I have met through step kids in the UK and other parts of Europe function with only a big phone. They either do not have a laptop/desktop or tablet due to financial constraints or lack of interest.

Unfortunately this trend is bad for someone like me in my 60s who wants a small phone when out of the house as I handle other tasks on my laptop.

I am also a PC person, either desktop with 4 monitors or large laptop on the go.

One thing that I hear from other runners is that they want shorts with a pocket big enough to carry a large phone. And I always suggest a 13 mini because it just makes so much sense for running to minimize size and weight. But the average person wants a big screen.
 
Have owned an iPhone 13 Mini since its launching nearly 2 years ago. After moderate to heavy use, it still shows 93% battery efficiency. In my case, the battery holds up better than my previous phone, which was an iPhone Xs ( which was the worst of the 4 iPhones I have owned since 2013, IMO). The 13 Mini is the best of the bunch. I plan to keep it for at least 2 more years, and I will probably replace the battery at some point. It runs as fast as the day I bought it, and I absolutely love its size. Too bad this size will not be continued, but I saw the writing on the wall in 2021, which is why I bought a 13 Mini then. One more thing, the Qualcomm modem is worlds better than the crappy intel modem in the Xs. That overpriced phone could not even make reliable calls from my daylight basement.
 
Going to save the money towards a mirrorless camera instead.

Before you purchase, you may want to watch some uTube videos of professionals comparing their expensive single-frame and video cameras to the iPhone 14 Pro camera. I'm talking $5k, $10k camera bodies and lenses, even using a $50k Red videocamera and comparing it to iPhone 14 Pro video with motion stabilization.

Result: the professionals are shocked to the core an iPhone 14 Pro taking stills and video is holding its own against their dedicated "pro" equipment costing many multiples of an iPhone. And the iPhone video with motion stabilization looked incredible in side-by-sides -- good enough for a Hollywood movie, no joke or exaggeration. I recall one photog saying they are going to be out of jobs, because a know-nothing doing point-and-shoot with an iPhone 14 Pro can get reasonably decent results on par with knowledgable professionals with their expensive camera bodies, lenses, etc. And just wait until iPhone 15 Pro is released.
 
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The main problem with the mini is its name. I’ve had a few experiences with other people to conclude the mini is larger than people presume it is and many if not most who decide they don’t want a “mini” say so largely because of its unfortunate name.

If you ask women which boyfriend you’d prefer: tall, medium or small very few if anyone would choose small, but if you told them that small is 6 feet, the medium one is 7 feet and the tall one is 8 feet then good number of them would change their mind. Remove the mini name and just call it iPhone and give it to many people to hold and try and I’m confident you’d get a decent amount of people who like the size of it.
Yup. There’s a reason why you cannot buy condoms in size Small. Sizes starts at Large 😂
 
I hope Apple make another ‘small’ iPhone in a year or two. I don’t really want to have to buy a huge phablet, and I don’t need a new iPhone every year. A future SE based on the 12 or 13 mini with updated internals seems the most likely route for another ‘small’ iPhone if the mini is not updated. My 13 mini battery’s maximum capacity is at 89% and I’ll likely get the battery replaced when necessary. Alternatively, Apple could sell me a ‘Pro Mini’ for much more money. If they want more of my money sooner.

People say the mini was not popular, but I would argue that even a small fraction of iPhone sales is a successful (and likely profitable) product, and Apple would be unwise to abandon those customers who don’t want a huge phone, both for reasons of money and brand loyalty. I also think the 12 and 13 minis were (and are) oddly positioned in the line-up, somewhat badly marketed by Apple (and even worse by carriers who obviously want to upsell if they are even aware of the mini in some instances(!)), and that the pandemic likely played a part in suppressing sales too as people being and working at home likely lessened the need or attraction for portability at least a little.

At the same time I think I understand why both manufacturers and the tech media have pushed consumers towards larger and larger devices. They have given justification for higher and higher prices which people are happy to pay, and they ultimately mean more advertising space for everyone who advertises through them.

I also think the idea that it’s as simple as ‘it must not make money or they’d keep doing it’, whilst being a reasonable and logical opinion, is not necessarily the whole picture. Apple have abandoned many things that were making them money because they were either trying to push technology in a certain direction or make even more money, or often both. Not every decision they make is exclusively about profit. They like control, they like to advance technologies and they like to frame the market they way they want it. Sometimes that pays off handsomely (e.g. the anti-consumer wireless headphone push and ‘courage’ argument = massive profits through essentially forced adoption), but sometimes it doesn’t (e.g. the MacBook Pro’s Touchbar that no-one asked for and very few apparently wanted. I thought it was kinda cool, it just shouldn’t have replaced any other keys… *shrug*).

From 2007 - 2014 tens of millions of iPhones were sold in what are now deemed by many as ’tiny’ and ‘unusable’ form factors. And yet few would seriously argue the iPhone only became a successful product with the iPhone 6 and later/even larger devices, would they? In fact, those of us old enough will remember the days when a new iPhone release inspired excited lines down the street, camped out for hours before the stores opened… all for those apparently tiny devices people now say are only for people with tiny hands that would be crazy to buy… funny how things change. Even more iPhones are sold nowadays of course, but the notion that tens of millions of people were repeatedly, over many years, buying devices they couldn’t use is a very odd one.

I accept many people want large iPhones and that many of those people would have wanted large phones regardless of any other factors. However, I think the way many people have been pushed towards that view has been highly manipulative over many years.

I’d actually go back to the 2016 SE form factor in a heartbeat if it had updated internals. For me that was the best iPhone experience in almost every way.

Finally, the way certain people (both individuals and media) almost drool at the prospect of other people being denied a product is weird and distasteful to me. Other people don’t always have to ‘lose’ for you to ‘win‘ and get what you want. I’m very happy people who want huge phones have them available, genuinely. I just don’t know why some people seem to take so much delight in other people not having the smaller phones that they want. I would never want Apple to remove the option of large, Pro Max-size phones, because I understand (as just one example) some people run their whole digital lives from their iPhones and need the larger screens, and that’s great if that works for them. Just like some people need a ‘tiny’ lightweight Macbook Air, and others may need a Mac Pro (with the wheels!).

TL;DR - Don’t tell me what I should like on my pizza and I’ll happily respect your choices too - we don’t have to eat each other’s pizza. :)
 
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