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iPhone SE 4 Rumored to Feature Action Button, USB-C, Face ID, and More

haemolysis said:
So many people saying the mini small size wasn’t popular, and whilst I concede the device DID fail I don’t think it was the form factor that killed it. It is the fact that not only it was smaller, and hence you’d expect to cost less, but it didn’t, it was expensive. It was a budget (non-Pro) model and yet STILL was almost as, if not more expensive than large models of the previous year - which were still on sale. People might be happy with a small phone, but they’re going to expect to pay the small phone price. Apple priced it at a point that it got cannibalised. And we can see the same thing happening to the larger models now too, which are also being cannibalised by previous generation, even though they are not tiny at all.
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Perhaps you don't feel the price difference was enough but the mini did cost less. When the 13 mini launched, it started at $729 compared to $829 for the "regular" 13. Today, the 13 mini starts at $629 compared to $729 for the regular 13.

If we strictly use display size as a guide for pricing, the 13 mini's screen size is about 88.5% (5.4" versus 6.1") that of the regular 13. As I mentioned above, the regular 13's starting launch price was $829 and therefore 88.5% of that would be just under $734 which is very close to the 13 mini's $729 starting launch price.

As far as comparing different model generations, you could also go the other way and conclude that the 13 mini is not just $100 less but $200 less than the regular 14.
 
My wife is very short with small hands, can this thing please be basically a decent replacement for her iPhone 12 mini?

I NEED these idiot lightning cables out of my life forever.
 
Honestly, I'd take this over the inevitably higher priced 15 series on the way. The SE typically gets the same innards as the current gen iphone anyway, right?
 
In our family, we have a company SE3. It was locked up and had to be replaced. I hope they fix the problem while updating.
 
It's not just old farts & cheapskates buying the SE, mine was a conscious choice solely for touch ID. Small size and LCD were factors too, but mainly touch ID. I do hope they keep the classic design, but even if they put touch ID in the power button or under the display I'll be happy. I will not buy another face ID phone. I've given it many chances, I've had multiple face ID phones since 2020 and no matter what I do it's a fiddly PITA. I only have to enter my code on my SE if I restart it or if my hands are wet, but with face ID it's at least 3-4 times a day. Can't do my hair or makeup differently, can't wear sunglasses, can't be smiling, etc unless I want to enter my code. Have to turn off raise to wake(one of my favorite features) so I can pick up my phone freely without face ID blowing through the 5 auth attempts. Have to pick it up and look at it to unlock it. It just does not work well for me and is a downgrade from touch ID in many ways. I know lots of people love face ID and I'm NOT saying they shouldn't or that Apple should get rid of it and only have touch ID, I just want there to be choices. The SE is a great option for people who struggle with face ID, so it's kinda upsetting to know that Apple might be ruining the one phone that I actually enjoy using. Why not just offer both options so everyone can have a phone that works well for them? If Apple ditches touch ID completely in all future phones, that may be what finally pushes me back to Samsung once my SE 3 is no longer usable.
 
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Ac1d 8urn said:
It's not just old farts & cheapskates buying the SE, mine was a conscious choice solely for touch ID. Small size and LCD were factors too, but mainly touch ID. I do hope they keep the classic design, but even if they put touch ID in the power button or under the display I'll be happy. I will not buy another face ID phone. I've given it many chances, I've had multiple face ID phones since 2020 and no matter what I do it's a fiddly PITA. I only have to enter my code on my SE if I restart it or if my hands are wet, but with face ID it's at least 3-4 times a day. Can't do my hair or makeup differently, can't wear sunglasses, can't be smiling, etc unless I want to enter my code. Have to turn off raise to wake(one of my favorite features) so I can pick up my phone freely without face ID blowing through the 5 auth attempts. Have to pick it up and look at it to unlock it. It just does not work well for me and is a downgrade from touch ID in many ways. I know lots of people love face ID and I'm NOT saying they shouldn't or that Apple should get rid of it and only have touch ID, I just want there to be choices. The SE is a great option for people who struggle with face ID, so it's kinda upsetting to know that Apple might be ruining the one phone that I actually enjoy using. Why not just offer both options so everyone can have a phone that works well for them? If Apple ditches touch ID completely in all future phones, that may be what finally pushes me back to Samsung once my SE 3 is no longer usable.
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I don’t really mind either Face ID or Touch ID that much, but yeah those are exactly my same complaints about Face ID, it just doesn’t always work. If my hair is a little messy, my make up is different, or when I take off my glasses, it’d often fail to recognize me which is pretty annoying. Touch ID was very simple and has always worked unless your hands are a little sweaty or wet.
The only thing that’s preventing me from getting the SE is the battery life. Battery life is a main priority for me and I care a lot about it, so I really can’t tolerate the battery life on the SE. I own a 14 Pro Max despite having small hands. It’s indeed very heavy and bulky for my small hands, but I kinda got used to it, and I’d say it’s worth it for the better battery life.

Though I do really wish Apple would give us more options. The fact that they currently consider Touch ID on iPhones to be “outdated” by only including it in the SE model even though MacBooks and some iPads do still have Touch ID is beyond me. Why can’t they just include both Face ID and Touch ID as options on the current iPhone models ? Why would they only include it in the budget SE model as sort of an “outdated” hardware feature ? Again, it’s not outdated and I do think it should be an option. They could’ve at least offered it as an option on the power button like the current iPad models or something if they truly ditched it in favor of smaller bezels. I’d be totally okay with that.
 
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Pinkyyy 💜🍎 said:
I don’t really mind either Face ID or Touch ID that much, but yeah those are exactly my same complaints about Face ID, it just doesn’t always work. If my hair is a little messy, my make up is different, or when I take off my glasses, it’d often fail to recognize me which is pretty annoying. Touch ID was very simple and has always worked unless your hands are a little sweaty or wet.
The only thing that’s preventing me from getting the SE is the battery life. Battery life is a main priority for me and I care a lot about it, so I really can’t tolerate the battery life on the SE. I own a 14 Pro Max despite having small hands. It’s indeed very heavy and bulky for my small hands, but I kinda got used to it, and I’d say it’s worth it for the better battery life.

Though I do really wish Apple would give us more options. The fact that they currently consider Touch ID on iPhones to be “outdated” by only including it in the SE model even though MacBooks and some iPads do still have Touch ID is beyond me. Why can’t they just include both Face ID and Touch ID as options on the current iPhone models ? Why would they only include it in the budget SE model as sort of an “outdated” hardware feature ? Again, it’s not outdated and I do think it should be an option. They could’ve at least offered it as an option on the power button like the current iPad models or something if they truly ditched it in favor of smaller bezels. I’d be totally okay with that.
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Glad I’m not alone in this. I've noticed something, I see a lot more guys praising face ID than girls. It would make sense that we have more problems with face ID since our appearances can vary day to day, and guys have more issues with touch ID cause they don't moisturize their hands as much as we do 😅

I dunno, sometimes I feel like a luddite but Apple continuing to force Face ID when many people have issues with it just feels egotistical. Reminds me of the whole "you're holding it wrong" debacle, like no we can't possibly have made a poor design choice that made our products less user-friendly, you're just using it wrong. Good point about the ipads and macbooks too, it's stupid that my MBP that cost more than apple's most expensive phone has touch ID, but it's somehow too "outdated" to put it in the phones?

There is really no reason not to give us both options, even if us touch ID holdouts are a small percentage of users(though I'm absolutely certain there are way more who just don't bother to post about it) they could have a LOT of delighted customers by giving us both.
 
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Ac1d 8urn said:
Glad I’m not alone in this. I've noticed something, I see a lot more guys praising face ID than girls. It would make sense that we have more problems with face ID since our appearances can vary day to day, and guys have more issues with touch ID cause they don't moisturize their hands as much as we do 😅

I dunno, sometimes I feel like a luddite but Apple continuing to force Face ID when many people have issues with it just feels egotistical. Reminds me of the whole "you're holding it wrong" debacle, like no we can't possibly have made a poor design choice that made our products less user-friendly, you're just using it wrong. Good point about the ipads and macbooks too, it's stupid that my MBP that cost more than apple's most expensive phone has touch ID, but it's somehow too "outdated" to put it in the phones?

There is really no reason not to give us both options, even if us touch ID holdouts are a small percentage of users(though I'm absolutely certain there are way more who just don't bother to post about it) they could have a LOT of delighted customers by giving us both.
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Yeah exactly, I guess that also makes sense lol. Guys don’t change their appearances as much as we do, so Face ID probably works better for them 😅
I recently changed my pair of glasses and had to set up a new Face ID for the new pair since it only recognized me with the old pair.. so yeah it’s really not that convenient for me as a girl, and as someone who wears glasses 🥲
And soo many times when I just wake up in the morning and look at my phone, it fails to recognize me.. like do I really look THAT different when I’ve just woken up ? LOL
So yeah Touch ID was honestly a lot more convenient for me, it has always worked no matter how you look on that day..

And yep, I guess it probably makes sense for Apple to keep Face ID as the only option on the newer models, I’m assuming most people prefer it or they probably don’t mind, so we’re more likely in the minority. Just like how they discontinued the iPhone Mini because according to them, it wasn’t selling well, even though there are still lots of people who prefer the Mini size, but I guess they’re probably also a minority for Apple.
It’s a little sad that Apple doesn’t seem to care much about what the minority of their users, but I guess it makes more business sense for them to focus more on the higher percentage of users 🙃
 
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I'm a guy and will never use Face ID. It's a dumb, clumsy gimmick. Touch ID is truly useful, especially when you can't pick up your phone or look at it.

Apple loves to create a problem and then, if they implement a "solution" at all, it's the most unreliable and overcomplicated one possible. Face ID is one example. There are plenty of others in Apple software, which I won't bother to catalogue.

Apple shows off its ignorance further in the touch areas on its phones and computers. I can only imagine how much false-touch-rejection logic is churning away every millisecond to try to make up for the defectively-large trackpads on Apple laptops, yet still failing to suppress the false taps and false right-clicks that plague Mac users. And the lack of proper bezels on the phones necessitates the same thing.

And speaking of bezels, it's monumentally dumb to have the screen surface flush with the front of the phone. The screen should be recessed, so it wouldn't be nearly guaranteed to break if dropped. How much more obvious can this be? Same goes for the dumb "camera bump" on the back, as if this were fooling everyone into thinking the phone is thinner than it is. Bring the back of the phone out flush to the camera lenses (and slightly beyond, because again you don't want glass flush with the rest of the surface) and use the extra volume for battery. This would benefit everyone, but especially those complaining that the smaller phones don't have enough battery capacity.

The public has decided that the iPhone's design is a failure. You can confirm this by simply observing that the vast majority of users have buried their "thin, elegant" iPhones in a tacky, bulky case.

Simple solutions evade Apple all the time. It's pretty phenomenal.
 
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I recently tried the SE which I bought from Apple and quickly sent it back. It was my first iPhone ever but the screen size was way too small and even though it has a home button I was expecting gestures like on the iPad i.e. swipe up to home. No gestures for that which was a surprise.

I would be very interested in the SE 4 if and when it's released.
 
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