In this review, I’m not gonna tell you that
the iPhone 11 Pro is the best iPhone ever made. It obviously is. I’m also not gonna reverbatate all of the
specs, like you’ve heard a thousand times already. What I’m gonna talk about are the things
that actually matter, to both a tech enthusiast and an average consumer, like my wife. Both of us have been using the iPhone 11 Pro
for a few days now, so I’ve collected my own thoughts and I also interviewed my wife
to see what differences she noticed and what she liked about the iPhone 11 Pro. But before I get into that, let’s talk about
what happened at Apple’s event. There’s no doubt that a lot of people were
a bit disappointed.
A lot of people argued that Apple shouldn’t
have used the name “Pro”, since it’s missing a few Pro features like 120hz refresh
rate, a USB-C port and reverse wireless charging, but after people started to get the 11 Pro
in their hands.. The disappointment started to fade away. So the question is, does it matter that the
new iPhone is missing a few Pro features that Apple fans were anticipating? For most people, not really. What it does pack is a few important features
and changes that make it a seriously good package overall in terms of being a premium
smartphone. It now packs all 3 camera lenses that you’d
hope to see in a smartphone. It now packs night mode, which as you’ll
see later, works incredibly well. It packs the best processor in any smartphone. It has top-of-the-line battery life. A high-quality display that’s even brighter
this year. Incredibly balanced speakers. It finally comes with a fast charger in the
box. It packs top-of-the-line security. And it features a truly unique design that
you’ll never confuse for anything else.
It seems as though for the first time in a
long time, the iPhone 11 Pro gives you a complete package of features, and that’s what truly
matters. When it comes to upgrading your iPhone, I
thought of a formula for iPhone upgradability that is more realistic for regular consumers. And offering a full package of features that
work very well together is the first piece of the puzzle. Second, the iPhone has to look and feel different. Not that many people upgraded from the iPhone
X to the XS, and that’s because it looked basically identical to the X. Only the XS Max looked different because it
was obviously much larger, and that’s actually the flagship model that most people upgraded
to. This year, the iPhone 11 Pro looks and feels
WAY different, with a brand new unique feeling matte glass back, a relocated apple logo,
the new popular midnight green color, and most importantly, a very unique square camera
bump with large triple camera lenses that really stand out.
That new square bump with 3 lenses has become
a trademark alongside the Pro branding, so now, it’s almost impossible to mistake the
11 Pro for the iPhone X or XS, unless you’re looking at the front, of course. The 3rd thing that matters is that it sounds
different, and having the word Pro in the name, is more unique than ever before. When I was standing in line at the Apple Store
on Launch day, I kept hearing regular people saying that they want the new iPhone Pro. They seemed like they didn’t really know
that much about tech, but what they did know is that they wanted the Pro model. And throughout the weekend, I kept hearing
people ask, is that the new Pro? Is that the iPhone Pro? It seems as though the 11 part of the name
has faded away under the success of the Pro name. So it seems like using “Pro” is already
working for Apple’s benefit, even if some people disagree with it. And from a marketing standpoint, it totally
makes sense for Apple to do this.
They could easily continue using this naming
scheme for years, and it actually works quite well. I’ll explain why in a minute. Before I get into my personal thoughts on
what truly matters about the iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max, as well as the downsides or disappointments
of the Pro, I wanna quickly mention the real-world differences and changes my wife noticed and
enjoyed about her new 11 Pro. First off, she loves the camera, especially
the new wider lens on the selfie camera, allowing her to fit more into the frame without having
to stretch her hand out as far as she can. She also absolutely loves the new ultra-wide
lens, and she had a blast taking unique and creative photos at the park. She was also really impressed with the video
stabilization, and she actually really likes the square bump on the back compared to the
XS’s vertical bump, and she noticed much better battery life as well.
Her iPhone 11 Pro was still at 67% battery
life at 9:30pm on Sunday, with absolutely zero charging throughout the day, which was
something that’s never happened to her before. In terms of performance, she didn’t really
notice a difference coming from the XS, but she doesn’t really do any heavy tasks like
gaming or using professional apps or anything like that. So overall, she’s very happy with her new
iPhone 11 Pro, even coming from the XS, so I think regular consumers who are coming from
an older iPhone will definitely notice a difference.
Now let’s get into the real-world differences
that I, a tech enthusiast, noticed after spending a few days with the 11 Pro Max. First of all, I am pleasantly surprised with
the battery life. Every time that I would check it, I’d be
surprised at how high it was compared to my old XS Max. And on Sunday, I was at 61% battery life after
coming home at 9:30pm. This has never happened on my XS Max, so I
think the battery life is perhaps the biggest deal with the new 11 Pro. And don’t take my word for it, Mrwhosetheboss
just released his battery drain test, and even the smaller iPhone 11 Pro beat out the
Note 10 Plus, and that was with the Note 10 Plus manually set to a lower resolution than
both of the iPhones, at 1080P instead of the 1440P the Note is capable of.
And the iPhone 11 Pro Max lasted 8 hours and
32 minutes, the best battery life Mrwhosetheboss has ever seen on any smartphone. As far as the design, I seriously can’t
get enough of it. The matte finish on the glass feels incredible
in the hand, and I’m shocked at how Apple was able to pull off the square bump on the
back. It just looks so unique and premium compared
the vertical bump on the XS, and so far, everyone else I know loves the new look. The speakers have also been improved from
the XS Max, with the top and bottom speakers being much more balanced than before, which
is why I think the new surround sound effect works so well. As far as performance, I honestly haven’t
noticed a difference in the UI and using the phone normally, but what most people don’t
really think about is that the reason the cameras are as good as they are is solely
because of the extra performance of the new A13 Bionic chip in the 11 Pro.
That’s where most of the improvements are
going, and I’ll talk about them in just a minute. And even though a lot of the improvements
are geared towards efficiency, for getting that awesome battery life, we actually saw
a huge improvement in raw performance in both processor and graphics workloads. For gaming, the XS had excellent performance,
being able to max out the graphics on basically any game we tried, but it had a huge issue
while playing Fortnite at high brightness at 60 frames per second. After only 10 minutes, the XS would heat up
and the display would greatly dim. So I tried it on the 11 Pro Max and it was
able to last much longer before dimming, and it didn’t dim nearly as much as before,
so I’m really impressed with the efficiency of the new A13 chip, especially since you’ll
get better battery life during long gaming sessions.
In my opinion, even if you can’t notice
the difference in performance right now, having the extra power of the A13 for the next couple
of years is going to be a big deal for when new apps and games come out that will actually
be able to use it, especially augmented reality apps. And now let’s get into the cameras, the
main upgrade this year.
We now get the ultra-wide lens, which is actually
really fun to use. The quality isn’t nearly as good as the
wide lens, but it’s a blast to get unique angles and shots. The wide lens looks better than ever, with
excellent dynamic range and image quality. And I’m glad that Apple added a bit more
contrast to the photos so they don’t look as flat as last year’s XS. And the white balance looks very consistent
between lenses, whereas last year, it leaned towards the warm side far too often. And for the telephoto lens, I’ve actually
noticed that photos taken with this lens turn out better with less noise, especially for
portrait mode photos. However, I’m quite disappointed with portrait
blur edging. I thought they would improve on it this year,
but it still sucks when it comes to missing large sections of background.
So I really hope Apple adds a time of flight
sensor next year. Perhaps the biggest deal is Apple moving from
7 megapixels to 12 on the front facing camera, as well as making the lens wider in general. It’s much more detailed than before and
being able to record 4K 60fps selfie video is insane. And finally, Apple has added a night mode,
and it does such a great job, especially since the colors turn out natural and not oversaturated
like on a lot of the other Android phones.
The only downside is that you can’t use
night mode with the ultra-wide lens or the selfie camera, which is a huge bummer. As for video recording, Apple has completely
knocked it out of the park with the 11 Pro. The quality looks incredible and beats out
basically every other phone on the market. And this year, the stabilization is absolutely
phenomenal. It just works so incredibly well. And I love how you can record with the ultra-wide
lens. But the biggest improvement for video recording
comes thanks to the A13 Bionic chip. You can now shoot at 4K 60 while getting extended
dynamic range, which means that the chip is actually recording at 4K 120, with 60 darker
frames and 60 brighter frames, being blended together in real-time to offer incredible
dynamic range. This is a huge deal and it puts an even bigger
gap between it and other smartphones. However, there’s a massive downside with
recording.
While shooting in 4K 60, you can’t switch
between lenses. That means, if you start recording with the
ultra-wide lens, you can’t zoom out or switch to another lens. It works perfectly fine while recording at
30 fps, but not at 60. That’s a major flaw especially now that
we have the added ultra-wide lens. But overall, the cameras are outstanding on
the 11 Pro, and we’ll be putting out some very detailed camera comparisons shortly,
so if you’re not already subscribed, make sure to do so now so you don’t miss out! So that leads me into a few things that I
found extremely disappointing this year. Yes, the 11 Pro offers the most complete iPhone
package we’ve seen in years, and I honestly think that most people who are on the edge
of upgrading should just do it unless they’re perfectly happy with their current device,
but if we had these 3 things, I honestly think it would be perfect. First off, the same 4GB of RAM on the 11 Pro? That’s just a bit sad.
And even worse, the same 64GB of storage at
the base price is just embarrassing, especially since the Note 10 Plus comes with 256GB of
even faster storage at the same price. And finally, I was really hoping for an always-on
display on the 11 Pro, especially since Apple added it to their new Series 5 Apple Watch,
but we still don’t have it on the iPhone. Other than that, the iPhone 11 Pro is an excellent
package overall, and it looks and feels more premium than ever before, making the 1000
dollar price honestly seem worth it again, just like it was with the iPhone X from two
years ago. This has been Vadim with Max Tech, and if
you enjoyed this review, make sure to check out some of our other videos right there,
and click the circle above to subscribe for our upcoming camera comparisons. Thanks for watching, and we’ll see you in
the next one!.
