iPhone 11: Is it worth it?

October 15, 2019 — by Allen Luo and Benjamin Li

With all the controversy buzzing around the recently released iPhone, there’s one major question: Should people buy it?

Nothing screams America more than the red, white and blue, bald eagles and new iPhones that seem to be released every few months. 

With the constant stream of new models coming out, Apple may be feeling hard pressed to find “new” features to tack onto its already existing ones. This is the case with the newest models: the iPhone 11, 11 Pro and the 11 Pro Max. 

The iPhone 11’s grand new addition is another back camera (or three back cameras in the Pro’s case) which have been dubbed the “next stage of mitosis” by many people. This term, which bears a negative connotation, refers to the camera lenses that seem to multiply with every new release: from the iPhones 6 and 7 that bore just one, to the iPhones 8 and X that sported two and now three for the iPhone 11 Pro. 

Despite the buzz surrounding the phone’s multiple back cameras, the “latest innovation” has really nothing more to boast than a higher definition picture. It is certainly not worth its expensive price tag starting at $999 for the Pro. 

Looking at it, it’s easy to compare the release of the iPhone 11 Pro Max to the release of the iPhone X; however, the iPhone X came out with several new innovative features, such as face ID, that made it well worth  buying. The 11 Pro Max lacks any new defining features other than the camera.

That being said, the cameras on all the new models have proven to be a major upgrade from the previous models. The new specifications offer features such as a night mode, which improves low-light photography, an ultrawide FOV (field of view) and an interface that shows a preview of the ultrawide FOV even while in normal mode. 

But the 11 Pro Max offers no noticeable improvements over its smaller counterpart besides an extended battery life. Picking up the 11 Pro Max will cost another hundred dollars, bringing the price to $1,100, a price that many deem to be not worth its benefits. 

Despite this, sales are expected to start strong this year in the U.S., as the price dropped from the previous $1,000 asking price for the iPhone X to $700 for the normal iPhone 11. Along with its traditional trade-in policy, many consumers are looking to pick up the iPhone 11 as soon as it hit the markets. It seems as if Apple is trying to pull itself out of the recent sales decline — going from 231.22 million unit sales in 2015 to 217.72 million in 2018 — by using marketing tactics such as these. 

Overall, the iPhone 11 and the iPhone 11 Pro seem like a decent buy for the general public, but the Pro Max is just not worth the price. 

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