Ive used iOS 15 on an iPhone 6S - heres how it compares to iPhone 13 Pro

Date:
Sun, 03 Oct 2021 11:00:00 +0000

Description:
Having upgraded to an iPhone 13 Pro, I wanted to see how iOS 15 ran on the iPhone 6S over a weekend.

FULL STORY ======================================================================

I used to upgrade my iPhone every year without fail. Regardless of some features that I wouldnt use, it was the allure of having the latest and greatest that always mattered.

However, in recent years, as life does, other priorities take hold, and you also realize that having the latest and greatest every year simply doesn't matter.

This happened to me in 2018 when I upgraded my iPhone 8 Plus to an iPhone X - essentially the same phone, but the X had Face ID instead of Touch ID, alongside a smaller OLED screen compared to the bigger LCD display of the 8 Plus.

Ive been waiting for a 13 Pro all year, and it feels like my iPhone X has
been aware of this - crashing, being slow and running on a battery lifespan
of two hours. But theres others who have been using older iPhones that still run on iOS 15, and I wanted to see just how the experience compared, using
the latest and greatest iPhone, to one from 2015. How to download iOS 15 Read our hands on iPhone 13 Pro review How the new Focus feature in iOS 15 works Using an iPhone 6S in 2021

I used to work at a store as tech support, and I remember when the iPhone 6S launched. 3D Touch was the big feature for that line of iPhones, where you could force-press on an icon, and the equivalent of a right-click menu would appear.

With photos and web browser links, you could peek and pop to preview the content instead, while you could have animated wallpapers on your lockscreen, which would play when 3D Touch was enabled.

However, the feature never caught on, and has since been reduced to a haptic touch, where its now an optional use case for Apple and third-party apps.

But the other big feature, like any other iPhone launch, were the cameras.
The front-facing camera went from 1.2MP to 5MP, able to showcase selfies in greater detail alongside a Retina Flash that could give the camera a flash in darkened areas by lighting up the LCD display and flashing, giving an image more brightness. While the back cameras went from 8MP to 12MP, with the ability to shoot in 4K video.

Using these in 2021, you can tell just from the design and the cameras that these were supercharged iPhone 6 devices from 2014, and using them with iOS 15, theyre still remarkably fast to use, albeit with caveats. Taking photos with a 6S and 13 Pro

The cameras between the iPhone 13 Pro and iPhone 6S are night and day, to excuse a pun.

Using Night Mode in the 13 Pro has already transformed how I take photos once the sun sets, and adding in the fact that this can be used on every lens the phone has, is only a bonus.

The iPhone 6S doesnt have this, with Night Mode only appearing on the iPhone 11 series in 2019, but its detail in the daylight still works well,
especially compared to budget Android phones.

I used to do what was called the Cathedral test in the old job, where I would compare images of phones around Lincoln Cathedral. I decided to do the same here. Image 1 of 4 (Image credit: TechRadar) iPhone 13 Pro shots Image 2 of 4 (Image credit: TechRadar) iPhone 13 Pro shots iPhone 13 Pro shots Image 3 of
4 (Image credit: TechRadar) iPhone 13 Pro shots Image 4 of 4 (Image credit: TechRadar) iPhone 13 Pro shots Image 1 of 4 (Image credit: TechRadar) iPhone 6S shots Image 2 of 4 (Image credit: TechRadar) iPhone 6S shots iPhone 6S shots Image 3 of 4 (Image credit: TechRadar) iPhone 6S shots Image 4 of 4 (Image credit: TechRadar) iPhone 6S shots

The results speak for themselves - while many still upgrade every year and
see incremental improvements, seeing the difference in quality here just
shows that the camera system in the iPhones have only gotten better.

But thats only half the story for the iPhone 6S. iOS 15 on a iPhone 6S

This is the earliest iPhone that can run iOS 15, and using a freshly-reset iPhone 6S, theres still life in this yet.

Taking into account the obvious omission of Face ID and the smaller 4.7 inch screen here, the software still works well, with Focus and widgets able to work as well as it does in the iPhone 13 Pro.

But the one big difference is using Touch ID for ApplePay. Its much faster
and straightforward than using Face ID, especially when using a mask. It
makes you yearn for the feature to arrive in the power button for a future iPhone 14, similar to how its in the iPad mini and iPad Air devices.

Its also a night and day comparison when you consider Android phones.
Software updates on a variety of devices are few and far between, and still you may buy a phone that only has one Android update left.

For instance, if you buy a Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2, your next available
update may be Android 12, and thats it. Patience is a 13 Pro virtue (Image credit: Apple)

After upgrading to a new iPhone after four years, its great to have the
latest and greatest features, not only from this year, but since the release of the iPhone XS in 2018. From the triple-camera design, to Night Mode, to
the 120Hz display and the smaller notch of the iPhone 13 Pro, its already a favorite model of mine.

But Im sure that if I upgraded from an iPhone X to an iPhone 11 Pro, the upgrade would have still been significant, but not as major as this leap. Waiting between upgrades is the next best thing now, and while you may be happy on a yearly device cycle, the joy of taking advantage of four years of upgrades is unparalleled. Apps that have updated to take advantage of iOS 15



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/news/ive-used-ios-15-on-an-iphone-6s-heres-how-it-co mpares-to-iphone-13-pro/


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