Oh I will. I am never going to keep a phone around as long as I kept my SE around.
It just won't be an iPhone.
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Sorry, iPhone Mini Fans: Apple Isn't Planning Another Small Phone
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It just won't be an iPhone.
Good riddance. This is super annoying for developers who need screen real estate and have been forced to compromise their UX just to support the only small screen device on the planet including Android.
That’s my guess also
Notice how Apple has leaned on privacy and not “mental health” as they LOVE the juicy cash that comes from the pocket Casino attention addiction machines.
Another reason is that people who use smaller phones might spend less time in front of the screen and consume less media. Something Tim Apple does not want.
He can't wait for everybody to walk around the streets with a Vision and then, spend the rest of your time at home like a mindless zombie.
He can't wait for everybody to walk around the streets with a Vision and then, spend the rest of your time at home like a mindless zombie.
Because I'm so happy that they've actually posted an article about the Mini not coming back. This was long overdue. I'm not saying I'm happy that people can't get another Mini, because if you like the Mini and want another one that's fine...but, it's not going to happen.
OK, I'm sure I'll post this again on some other folding iPhone news article (This is MacRumours, I'm certain there'll be plenty!)
This is my complete speculation based on the rumoured screen sizes (5.5" internal, 7.8" external) lined up so the screen heights correspond, with a simple 2mm bezel around them to arrive at an approximate size. *sigh* It's sad to see this is not going to be good for us mini users!
(click to embiggen)
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Android has some relatively light and narrow, slim phones though. I find the Xperia 10 ii (which I have running Sailfish) and iii were a nicer form factor than the iPhone Pro, as well as some Samsungs. I don’t actively track the Android market so I’m not sure if this has changed over the years.
Generally I’ve been quite jealous of the hardware on the Android side. Some nice designs and at much more affordable prices.
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Android manufacturers played in the market around the same time Apple launched the iPhone 12 mini. They hoped it would get big and could ride Apple's fame. But as expected, those small phones were a failure before and were a failure after. And it was tiny brands like Sony that tried it because they have few other selling points.
That "vocal group" mentioned must be the only humans left with standard sized hands. Just gone from an iPhone SE (1) to the iPhone 16 Pro. Great phone, but goddam.... It's massive and it isn't even the max. Don't get it.
Nah, most consumers just realized they can hold their smartphone with both hands. There's a reason why large phones continue to sell so well.
Nice. I'll take one half of that for 1/3rd of the price.
It's much more complex than "didn't sell well enough" or "no one wants small phones."
Look at iPads. If we apply the same logic to iPads then why hasn't Apple killed the iPad mini and even recently updated it with some of the latest iPad features?
Here's recent Chirp data of the last 5 years showing iPad mini consistently underselling at around ~9% of iPad sales.
OK, now if we look at the data everyone claims if proof people don't want small phones and we add up the percent of sales of all the small phones we see it's pretty similar to small tablets. Around 10% of people want smaller phones.
The issue isn't that there's no market for small phones or even that it was shrinking (it actually increased in those years). It's that Apple fragmented sales of the market among a bunch of phones that are all considered small and more affordable than the larger models.
Meanwhile Apple's iPad line has been more simple and if you want a small iPad, there's only one clear choice.
Another key difference of why the iPad mini product strategy is working is that it's not tied to the exact features of a numbered larger model. That was a big issue with 12 and 13 mini. It wasn't sustainable. Apple couldn't commit regular release updates that match specs. iPad mini doesn't have that problem. It's updated infrequently with its own unique mix of features between the base iPad and the iPad Air. It's also priced between the two - not pretending that the smallest thing has to be the cheapest.
It's entirely feasible for Apple to make a sustainable iPhone Mini product that's profitable for them. They just failed to do it right. Actually. Now that the SE phones are totally gone there's absolutely no device serving the needs of small phones. Now would be a good time to introduce a stand alone iPhone Mini to be a single small phone to serve that market.
Gurman reporting it actually decreases the certainty.
The bigger the screen the better! Won’t upgrade until there’s 10” option so I can hang it around my neck with a golden chain!
This is a good one! I wonder what are the sale numbers between the two actually 🤔
The Plus model also have been a failure, why not release a mini every 3 years? to the people who want big phones, why don't you get the iPad mini for yourselfs? It is really dissapointing, mini was the perfect size for many people, at least you could hold it like a phone, use it with one hand and could easily fit in your pocket.
I think I’d be okay with this if this does turn out to be the size. Ideally, I’d like it to also replace my iPad (maybe MacBook too) even if I do need a Bluetooth keyboard for it with external display support. It'd be hard to justify a $2000+ cost for it though. I don’t trust myself enough to not break it immediately.
Everywhere I go, I just see so many people just staring at their phones. It's like an automatic response when there's nothing going on. Admittedly, I fell into this for a while, but have started to become mindful about my phone usage. I'd rather connect with people when I can, instead of mindlessly scrolling. This is how I remember life before social media and smartphones. I know there's a bit of a digital minimalism movement where people are going back to flip phones and deleting their social media accounts. It's too bad that a lot of things around us now are centered around us having a smartphone with us all the time.
I think the iPhone mini helps with the bad smartphone habits, but won’t completely fix it as long as a web browser is available on it. I've certainly toyed around with my Apple Watch Ultra as a dumbphone for a while. It almost worked for me, but I do a lot of driving and miss out on podcasts and music with it. Ideally I’d like a camera too. A Light Phone is likely in my future after my 13 mini is retired. I just don’t want to be one of those people just staring at my screen whenever I get a little bored. Self control is a little hard when I have infinite knowledge and information in my pocket at all times.
You're conflating small with cheap.
iPhone SE wasn't sold as a small phone, but rather a cheap iPhone starting at $399/$429. Similarly, iPhone 8 was sold for $449 in March 2020. It was literally the cheapest iPhone you could buy back then.
So of course your graph annotations make it seem like "small" phones are selling. You're combining iPhone 8, mini, and SE when those are very different consumer groups.
If Steve Jobs was alive today, we would get another mini or if some government passes some rule/law like how only they would allow USB C or put some conditions like how Indonesia did, then I am sure they would make another mini. Even the employees at the apple store get surprised that I have the mini and they tell me that I should not sell it, they say that so many people come everyday asking if they have the mini or a smaller phone.
Sad. As a mini fan, I miss it, but as an iOS dev, I get that it’s hard supporting such a large variety of screen sizes. It unfortunately seems like more people prefer the plus model size than the mini size.
The problem is not the lack of an iPhone mini but rather that when Apple launched the iPhone mini, the flagship iPhone Pro ballooned from 5.8 inches to 6.1 inches. The Pro now starts at 6.3 inches. I suspect iPhone mini fans would be thrilled with a 5.8 inch iPhone, which was once the flagship size.
