Review: iphone 12 mini
Price: £749 from fave.co/2wzknyb
Size matters, and for the past four years Apple fans with small hands have been crying out for the company to make an iphone they can hold comfortably. The SE (2016) was the last 4in iphone – most likely last in the sense of ‘final ever’, rather than just ‘most recent’ – and nothing since has come close to that device’s combination of portability and ease of use.
But this is the year of plenty, as far as iphones go, and there’s now something for everyone: like a 20thcentury rugby union team, Apple’s smartphone department welcomes all shapes and sizes. And the propforward iphone 12 Pro Max has a scrum-half scurrying along behind it.
The 12 mini certainly isn’t a 4in phone – its screen measures 5.4in, very nearly as large as that of the iphone 8 Plus – but the chassis that screen is nestled in is the shortest, narrowest and lightest since the cherished SE (2016). To those of us who’ve been using mid-size iphones
for the past few years – in this reviewer’s case, XS, 11 Pro, and most recently iphone 12 and 12 Pro – this is a surprisingly petite package.
The question, of course, is what compromises have been made for the sake of miniaturization? Is battery life shorter, or screen usability weaker? In our iphone 12 mini review, we’re going to find out.
PRICE
As well as being the smallest of the late-2020 iphones, the 12 mini is also the cheapest – but cheapness here is very much a relative concept. Here’s the full price list: 64GB: £699 128GB: £749 256GB: £849
DESIGN
We’d better start with the 12 mini’s obvious quality, which is its small size. If you’re used to the Face ID phones Apple has been releasing in recent years the dimensions (131.5 x 64.2 x 7.44mm) and weight (133g) will feel almost strange in the hand, as if something is missing. But you’ll quickly grow accustomed to the delightful convenience of a truly portable iphone.
I’m not one of those who’ve demanded the return of the 4in iphone, and don’t consider my hands especially tiny. But I do think that smartphone owners in general, not just Apple fans, have been pressganged into getting used to a size of device that isn’t entirely user-friendly.
We find ourselves using them twohanded, or find that our thumbs can’t reach the far corners of the screen, or that they won’t fit in some pockets. Perhaps the screen space and battery capacity make this relentless expansion worth it, but when I think of the ease with which my iphone 4 would slip into a pocket, and compare that to a current Max model, I wonder if the SE nostalgics might be right.
At risk of undermining my review – indeed the entire premise of reviewing – there’s no substitute, when it comes to evaluating size, for holding a phone in your hand, and I’d suggest a visit to an Apple Store if you can manage it. (Creating a cardboard cut-out using the listed dimensions is a reasonable workaround.) But I might be able to give you an idea by saying that I can just hold the 12 mini’s top and bottom corners with the thumb and forefinger of one hand. That’s not something I’ve been able to do with an iphone in a long time.