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Report: 'Virtually No Demand' for iPhone Air

I think it is a fine phone. I would have bought one if it was smaller. But I hate big phones, so this one is no go. I think the issue is that todays Apple never reduces prices. Look at Jobs era, he was even reducing prices for new products. I understand market saturation, product placement and other factors, fine, but if you price it accordingly and realistically, it would sell like any other phone. Tim really wants a 1500 phone to be a new normal...
 
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Rumors may be overblown but I think they needed to go much heavier on product marketing. The incentives weren’t there tho. Why spend more money on educating the user on getting a cheaper phone when it’ll be mostly the customer that blind buys the Pro?

I personally know some friends that should be perfect candidates for the Air that got the Pro instead. They don’t need the extra compute or battery and would still have seen a big bump in both coming from older iPhones. They don’t really need the extra cameras but Apple and the general smartphone industry has conditioned people to think more is better and “just in case”.

It frustrates me a bit that people aren’t using these devices to their limits but still buying excessively. Maybe due to the Apple customer having easy access to credit.

I think 16E is the most recent phone that most people with an iPhone should have. They text, the browse, they take pics.
 
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turbineseaplane said:
Put another way …if they gimped the regular 17 with a super old screen technology, maybe the air would’ve sold better.

Glad they didn’t do that
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Thats what I'm saying, I'm surprised they didn't purposely gimp the base 17 to upsell the Air, its the sort of thing Apples loves to do. In the end, the base 17 is the best out of all of them in terms of value/features.
 
These articles and arguments are fruitless. Yes, sales numbers are a metric that drives future production. Whether or not the phone is good is use-case-based. I bought the Air for about $600 after trading in my old 15PM. It works for me 100%. It's a tool for utility. It's not an entertainment device for me. I don't doom scroll. I don't have social media. It's used for everything other than that, and works for me as I'm sure it does for others. If we're the minority, that's okay. And if it means no future Airs, that's okay too. IDK why everything turns into "mine is better than yours."
 
The Air would've been a runaway success if the base 17 didn't get the ProMotion display. The Air needed SOMETHING other than a thinner, lighter design to differentiate it from the base and Pros in a more meaningful way imo.

But now that Apple is seemingly moving to an 18-month refresh cycle for the base iPhone, I get why they did.
 
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I love my Air. The battery life is just as good as the 15 it replaced. I don't miss the multi cameras and other fluff.

I would not expect it to be a bestseller though, and I doubt Apple did either.
 
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MacFarmer said:
I think it is a fine phone. I would have bought one if it was smaller. But I hate big phones, so this one is no go. I think the issue is that todays Apple never reduces prices. Look at Jobs era, he was even reducing prices for new products. I understand market saturation, product placement and other factors, fine, but if you price it accordingly and realistically, it would sell like any other phone. Tim really wants a 1500 phone to be a new normal...
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If you take inflation into account, the prices have actually been dropping each year, which is especially impressive considering the cost of tariffs. Personally I applaud Apple for keeping the prices steady. Also consider that Samsung’s flagships are considerably more expensive, even Google is priced similarly.

Btw on the subject of this post I read reports that the Air is selling gangbusters in China. I’m pretty confident they will update the model next year instead of axing it. Perhaps it’ll sell better with a second lens, though personally I would take a second speaker vs the camera if it’s either/or.
 
I think all the compromises (relative to other current iPhones) would be fine if it had been 20% smaller, 20% lighter, and most of all… 20% (or more) cheaper. It’s almost the same weight at the 17 (which is only 12 grams heavier) but MORE expensive and LESS capable. If I absolutely must upgrade at some point (from my 12 Mini if you’d hadn’t guessed) I’d get the 16e which is the same weight as the Air for HALF the price.
 
I think people wanted a thinner iPhone but not with a smaller screen. That’s what Apple got wrong in my opinion.

I did buy the Air because I wanted a new design but I regret it, the Air is noticeably smaller but not thin enough to make up for the loss of screen.

Major disadvantage pf the Air is the loss of speakers. Also, it should be cheaper than it is…
 
I am surprised that the aspect of aesthetics has not been mentioned more often. Am I the only one that considers the Air ugly in the sense that this bulk at the “head” overly compensates for the thinness of the lower 5/6 part? This development unfortunately began already years ago with the protruding camera lenses in earlier models. I know - these are the laws of physics but this imbalance is too much for me.
 
everythingisspatial said:
Seen no mass reports of throttling compared to the Pro nor overheating issues. You're just making stuff up.
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Surely is talking thin air. The usb 2 thing he mentioned was actually in the list

d5aqoëp said:
Compromises:
1. Single speaker
2. Single camera
3. Extremely poor battery life (due to thinness)
4. Inferior C1X 5G modem compared to SD X80 in Pro series
5. Too thin to hold.
6. Busted Wifi 7 that is incapable of 320 Mhz channel width on 6Ghz.
7. No mmWave which is in Pro models.
8. No display output via USB-C to an external monitor or TV.

9. Still USB 2.0 speeds for a premium device in 2025.​

10. Slower binned SOC (again due to thinness and heat concerns)

Did I miss anything?
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it looks like a damn iphone SE with that singular camera. who wants to pay $1k to look poor?

badbitch-nene-leakes.gif
 
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contacos said:
What does the weak demand of an iPhone Air have to do with a foldable? Weird conclusion. That's like saying there is no demand for vegan products because some people eat meat
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It does not have sth “to do with it”, it’s just an analysis that not many customers will be willing to pay for a foldable.
It’s a saturated market and no game changing technology is on the horizon. People are replacing their phones according to their plan or ever few years if they bought it.
The manufacturers try to create demand with AI or foldable or thin but the analysis says that there is not a relevant number of possible customers wiling to pay for that.
 
profets said:
I must be in the minority but I absolutely love this phone. For me, its up there with the iPhone 4 and iPhone X.
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same for me, started with 4s 6s 8plus then 13 then 16 (black model - and preferred 13 due to Red actually), now air (white is nice - like a dentist's clinic)...
 
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contacos said:
What does the weak demand of an iPhone Air have to do with a foldable? Weird conclusion. That's like saying there is no demand for vegan products because some people eat meat
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I think it just comes from the same investors report. They probably did a survey or similar to figure out how much people would pay for a foldable. My guess the conclusion is there are people who'd want one they don't want it enough to pay e.g. iphone Air prices for it. Ultimately they don't want to add a cheaper option below the iphone but only a pricier one above.

Personally I think flip phones would find a market but probably among those that want smaller phone to use it maybe less, cover the basics, people that aren't power users or want to generally use their smartphone less for health reasons. But they'd still not necessarily agree on a $1100 price tag but would argue this less capable smaller phone should be more like $3-600. I think there is definitely a market but Apple (investors especially) want a trendy new thing they can sell for the higher price tag.

And the big flod open foldable type which can be a power user machine, probably has the unresolved issue of cameras. Most people buy the iphone Pro for the camera, but if you then have a big foldable with a worse camera you again have a tradeoff. So you can build it and even ask a lot of money for it but the people who'd want it are probably a very small percentage yet Apple would have to optimize iOS for it and produce another model. Issue there is probably that unless they can fix the Camera issue or they charge a lower price not enough people would buy it, to make it worth the effort.
 
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Apple like a giddy little girl:

“we have something revolutionary for you! Something amazing and innovative, the iPhone air! A slim phone, with worse camera, worse battery life”.

Public: “ so you’re trying to sucker us by giving us less for more money. Got it!”

Apple: “Yes!”

Public: “ummm yeh we’re good!”

Apple: shocked……..

We’ve had enough of that Apple, no one plays that game better than you, giving us less for more did not work this time.
 
Juggernaut510 said:
Apple like a giddy little girl:

“we have something revolutionary for you! Something amazing and innovative, the iPhone air! A slim phone, with worse camera, worse battery life”.

Public: “ so you’re trying to sucker us by giving us less for more money. Got it!”

Apple: “Yes!”

Public: “ummm yeh we’re good!”

Apple: shocked……..

We’ve had enough of that Apple, no one plays that game better than you, giving us less for more did not work this time.
Click to expand...

I see it the opposite way, you get a big fast screen in a premium built pocket friendly package with the Pro CPU. I don't see that you're getting less.

The biggest thing holding the Air back is FOMO, in that people are thinking they need a camera or other capability that they will never use.
 
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imho they missed the mark by about $100.
If this and the regular 17 had their launch pricing switched; then the product positioning becomes a lot more consistent.
Heck even if it launched at the same price as the 17, it'd have been okay. Instead it's pay more to get less; it looks and feels nicer; but that disappears as soon as yoiu stick it into a case.
 
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Sanlitun said:
The biggest thing holding the Air back is FOMO, in that people are thinking they need a camera or other capability that they will never use.
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I agree.

I really want to know what people who crave multiple cameras do with their photos. I think a lot of people have become drones who take endless photos they never look at.

I was at Disneyland Paris on Sunday and watching the nighttime castle show. People were holding their phones with their arms fully stretched upwards. This meant they could not actually see what they were filming. But the people behind them could. Very few had their phones aligned with the show. Most were filming off to the side. They’ll have delightful videos of trees to show their friends when they get home.
 
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Danie_Morrow said:
On the other hand, there are lots of YouTubers with clickbait saying that it's a bad product. Absolutely not. I upgraded from the 13 Pro, and it's a perfect replacement. The battery is perfectly adequate, and I charge it every two days. Of course, I don't walk down the street trying to drain the battery. The funniest criticism for me is probably the mono speaker. I've never played a movie, music, or anything else on my iPhone without headphones, and I'm sure these guys have the same thing on their "Pro" phones, but now they've remembered that they have stereo :D.
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I agree about the speaker, thought that was being overly circumspect, diving too deeply into specs. OTH, how is the camera? The 12 Pro is noticeably worse than friends' 14 Pros, causing some envy. Would like to do some occasional macro and nighttime photography.

Thanks for answering my query!!
 
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