Sometimes you just got to put the conclusion right up front the iPhone 8 is a successful execution of a familiar idea it’s as iterative and upgrade as you can get and with a bleeding edge iPhone 10 on the horizon and scans of Android phones that have had similar features for years while the iPhone 8 doesn’t seem likely to shine in the annals of iPhone history but if you’ve got a lot invested in Apple’s ecosystem and you don’t want to spend $1000 on your next iPhone for some reason well this phone was made for you I’m Michael Fisher and this is part 2 of mister mobiles iPhone 8 review brought to you by D brand and the first half of this review I covered wireless charging the a 11 processor and some of the camera features if you haven’t seen that part you can find it on my youtube channel and please subscribe while you’re there for part two I spent a lot more time with the Plus version of the phone than I did the first time around so we’ll touch on the fancy camera some more at the end and for variety sake I’m gonna alternate the good points with the bad let’s start with the bad point these displays yes they’re the best LCDs Apple has ever put into an iPhone but there’s still LCDs and while there are compelling reasons for preferring that technology in my opinion there are many more reasons to prefer OLED again these screens are fine they’ve got apples true tone technology to optimize white balance depending on your surroundings but put them next to a really good AMOLED panel like Samsung’s and you really notice the added vibrance contrast and brightness another thing not exclusive to OLED panels is screen real estate this is a good example of how using the same design from 3 years ago can impair a product it’s not just about the stale aesthetics it’s about having less viewable area compared to much of the competition now you might be thinking that because of that power-hungry LCD and the slightly shrunken batteries compared to last year the iPhone 8 is more sprinter than marathoner but nope whether it’s the a 11 or something else going on under the hood Apple has worked some serious wizardry with the battery life with the real performer being the plus with its bigger battery I’ve been able to hit the end of a 16 hour day with over 20% left and that’s with a lot of camera usage and near-constant bluetooth streaming of podcasts and songs to my headphones and yeah it would have been nice for Apple to toss in a fast charger with
its $700 phone but that’s countered somewhat by the presence of wireless charging which I covered in part one my other big negative is more a matter of taste and it’s that homescreen man everything around it is amazing iOS 11th new control center is so fun to use and that built-in video screen captures what makes shots like this possible I love being able to swipe down on the home screen to type in a search query or quickly locate an app and even the Notification Center isn’t as messy as it once was but the home screen itself this stale grid of icons that you can only customize in the barest sense I mean it’s a little extreme to say that it makes me feel like I’m using a starter phone for a preteen but only a little on Android I can put anything anywhere without worrying about adjacent apps I can have widgets for glanceable information or I can clear everything away so you can actually see my wallpaper I can even change out the whole launcher to make for faster performance or just a better flow none of that is possible on the iPhone I know a lot of people don’t care and if you’re the type who doesn’t want to have to think about that stuff then hey this will be as enjoyable to you as the last decade of iOS has been as I mentioned I spent more time with the 8 plus this time around and this is absolutely the one I would buy if I had to choose between iPhones yes for the battery and the bigger display but most crucially for the dual camera now Apple makes very clear that the new portrait mode lighting effect is in beta and yeah it sure is it takes a lot of tries to get it to work properly framing one of these can be very frustrating with the finicky lighting and distance requirements but once you nail it and apply one of those new lighting effects the result is a shot you can’t get from any other phone and get ready for a lot of profile pictures that look like this the telephoto lens is also useful for long-distance photos and video obviously speaking of I’ve continued testing the iPhone 8 plus against its direct competitor the Galaxy Note 8 Apple and Samsung have fundamental differences in how they approach imaging the iPhone will generally hue more closely to accurate colors and it tends to bring out more detail in shadows which serves it well in low light compared to the note in daylight the differences are more polarizing the note eight punches up the saturation and contrast for a photo that seems custom-made for
Instagram while the iPhone again sticks closer to reality despite what you might read in the comments but which one is quote unquote better is not a simple matter it’s actually quite subjective it depends on how much you value authenticity for me the richer less accurate Samsung photos are the more convenient ones since I tend to upload to social media with very little editing and I like that added punchiness even if it is a little artificial if you like to take your pictures into Photoshop to really perfect them or you just want something that more accurately reflects the real world you’ll probably prefer the iPhone the only clear winner here comes in video where the iPhones new 4k 60 frames a second shooting and 240 FPS Full HD slow-mo give at the crown hands-down more video samples in part one winding it down with the details the external speakers seem a touch louder this year phone calls are nice and crisp and for all my complaints about iOS at home screen I have to admit I love some of its conveniences like 3d touch on the keyboard to move a cursor around also hanging out with the iMore crew for a few days showed me how seductive the Apple ecosystem can be if your whole family or team is using it in particular using airdrop to move files between iPhone MacBook and iPad is a dream and common tasks like restoring an old phone to a new one is still more seamless than it is on Android the features Apple introduced with the iPhone 8 will be remembered for a long time things like the upgraded camera a 11 processor and iOS 11 will serve as the foundation for iPhones going forward but the phone itself I said it in the intro if you’ve got a 7 you’re not missing much yet if you’ve got a 6 or older it’s definitely a nice upgrade and if you’re an Android user contemplating switching from a green to a blue bubble well until the 10 comes out you should probably hold off speaking of holding a glass on glass phone is a tough thing to hold on to and an easy thing to break so if you want to change up your look while adding some protection hit the link in the description and pick up a premium vinyl skin from today’s sponsor Dee brand and while you’re at it be sure to check out the D brand grip a brand new case designed to make sure your phone stays where it belongs in your hand the grip goes up for sale October 1st thanks for putting up with the two-part review format this time folks it’s not something I’m gonna make a habit of
but this time just had to be done until next time thanks for watching and stay mobile my friends
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