APPLE iPHONE XS MAX
The iPhone joins the giant phone trend with this 6.5-inch monster, but is it a big enough reason to upgrade?
So, Apple has joined the giant screen brigade. But is this larger phone really worth shouting home about?
For the last few years, when there’s been a ‘plus’-sized iPhone, the bigger one has always been better. The screen size is a matter of personal preference, but they’ve also had significantly better battery life and dual cameras instead of single-lens affairs. That all changes with the release of the iPhone XS models. The 5.8-inch iPhone XS and 6.5-inch iPhone XS Max are the same phone in different sizes, so apart from talk of physical dimensions, this is effectively our review of both.
Beauty factor
We might as well start by looking at that screen. The 2688x1242 OLED screen is absolutely stunning, leading the field in vibrancy and colours without question, even if the 6.4-inch Samsung Note9 actually has it beaten for sharpness. When things are this high-res, it’s not a problem.
Watching movies on the screen is especially impressive: all of Apple’s OLED phones support Dolby Vision, which is the most advanced kind of
HDR, and is supported by Netflix and iTunes movies, so there’s plenty of content. Firing up a blockbuster that makes the most of the dynamic range on offer here puts most TVs to shame – the depth of the blacks and richness of the colours is gripping.
As an added bonus, the stereo speakers actually give you true left and right separation if you’re using them, so you can hear things move in space as they travel across the screen. Good headphones will always be better, but the speakers are so clear, loud and well-balanced that this really doesn’t seem like a bad way to watch something. They’re among the most impressive we’ve heard, though the Razer phone’s amazing Atmos speakers still has them beat, since they somehow also added in height, despite coming from a phone you’re holding in front of you.
Obviously, the bigger screen of the XS Max makes this experience that much more spectacular than the regular XS (which is the exact same size and resolution as the X before it). But otherwise, the difference between using the bigger version of the phone and the smaller isn’t that pronounced – even less than we’d assumed, to be honest.
Tall order
A very important piece of context here is that your reviewer is a 6' 3" man, and therefore in possession of hands that are not exactly small. Moving from an iPhone X to the Max wasn’t the huge jump we expected. We could still type one-handed with only a tiny adjustment to grip, and reaching across the phone to use universal ‘back’ swipe was fine.
Reaching up to the top of the screen became a lot more of a hassle, and we had to use our pinky for supporting the phone more, but none of these left us feeling uncomfortable.
However, the Max is at the edge of what we can use one-handed. Giving the two phones to other people, it doesn’t take a big size difference before the Max is too much.
Which is fine – that’s why Apple makes two sizes – but outside of making videos and photos look even bigger and better, we have to say that we didn’t find that the bigger screen of the Max did much for us.
The idea is that, like the Plus phones before it, apps can make better use of the bigger screen. Turn an email or calendar to landscape and you get a split view, with a view of your email inbox on the left, say, and a pane showing the selected email’s contents on the right. We know that some power users swear by this, and hated that the 5.8-inch iPhone X didn’t have it, but we have to say that we’ve never found it essential.
On the Samsung Note9, the bigger screen is used for two apps at once, and though they may be quite cramped, anyone can find this useful in a pinch. We wouldn’t say the same about the Max. Which isn’t a knock against it – we’ve already explained how some apps use the screen, and almost any app can just show more stuff, potentially – but we’re saying don’t get a bigger screen expecting to be an automatic productivity boost. The smaller, easier-to-handle model may actually be faster to use.