I’ve been on a four year upgrade cycle for my past two iPhones, and when I replaced my iPhone 12 Pro with the 16 Pro in 2024, it was the first time I felt that I probably could have waited another year without it affecting my experience that much. Don’t get me wrong – upgrading to the 16 Pro was still a big jump in battery life, speed, and camera quality, but the improvements aren’t as noticeable as they used to be. It’s the same phone. It just has fewer points of friction.
Like for most people, my main attraction in getting a new phone is the camera. I don’t have a dedicated camera these days, so every photograph I take is through one of the three lenses on the back of the iPhone 16 Pro (or likely all three at once, through software wizardry). The difference in quality from the 12 Pro to the 16 Pro was especially noticeable in outdoor photographs and in the amount of details the camera can capture. Especially in poor lighting conditions, where the 16 Pro is really impressive.
iPhone’s have become good to the point of almost being boring, and to me, that’s a good thing. I suspect I’ll be using my 16 Pro for another four years before I’ll get the urge to upgrade again.
