The iPhone 15 Pro Max is the definitive Apple product, one in which the sum of several small advancements adds up to a atrocious upgrade. And that’s especially true for those who awaited three or four times — or further to do so Between its lighter body, lower bezels, emotional Apple Silicon innards, full- featured camera system, configurable Action button, bettered Dynamic Island, briskly dispatches, and USB- C harborage, the new Pros are a big step forward for this mature smartphone family. And the iPhone 15 Pro Max is an indeed bigger step forward, thanks to an each-new blowup lens with 5x optic drone.
As a critic, I do n’t generally get to stay long enough to appreciate these effects. But I inexplicably decided to not review any new iPhones last time, which is unusual. And I had switched from the iPhone 13 Pro I had been using to the Pixel 7 Pro back in April, so my time piecemeal from the iPhone was maybe useful While nothing is ever perfect, the iPhone 15 Pro Max comes tantalizingly close. It addresses some of my former crucial enterprises, which is obviously welcome. But it has also handed some unanticipated and pleasurable moments that speak to Apple’s grim drive for quality.
And, sure, there are some misfires too, and some features — like that 5x optic drone — do n’t relatively meet my Pixel- prejudiced prospects. But this is a smartphone I ’d be happy to use for a long time to come. And I may do just that depending on the outgrowth of my coming Pixel 8 Pro evaluation.
Design
From a distance, the iPhone 15 Pro Max does n’t look each that different from the iPhone X that debuted in 2017, and the bug- eyed three- lens camera system design on its hinder aesthetics important like that on the iPhone 11 Pro Max from 2019. But get a bit closer, put your hands on the iPhone 15 Pro Max, and you’ll incontinently see and feel the difference.
First and utmost obviously, the iPhone 15 Pro Max is noticeably lighter than its curiously thick forerunners. That’s thanks to the move to titanium rather of the heavier pristine sword used by the former two generations of Pros, and it’s a significant and relatively welcome enhancement. That said, while the band that runs along the sides is subtly brushed for a bit of isolation, the finish of the reverse of my “ Natural Titanium ” iPhone 15 Pro Max is a dull matte argentine color. It’s nothing like the sandstone faceless shown in Apple’s product shots, which was a bit disappointing, though I’ll noway see it anyway, as I always cover this precious device in a defensive case.
But before doing that, I noticed the coming major difference between the iPhone 15 Pro Max and its two immediate forerunners. Those iPhone Pros used the same iconic design as the iPhone 4, with sharp edges each around that made the bias painful to hold in the hand. Well, consider that complaint addressed too The iPhone 15 Pro Max features subtle but smooth and contoured edges that exclude the pain while retaining the iconic look. I ’m not sure what took so long, but it’s a great result.
There’s more. While Apple has been touting the “ all- screen design ” of its flagship iPhones since 2017, that marketing fell piecemeal in use, as each of these phones, in turn, sported veritably conspicuous and large screen bezels. Then, too, the iPhone 15 Pro Max addresses the complaint. It still has bezels, of course, but they’re relatively small and are eventually competitive with the screen bezels set up on Pixel and Samsung Galaxy flagships. Apple has eventually achieved what its marketing has been promising for times.
Beyond these points, the rest of the iPhone 15 Pro Max design aligns nearly with former iPhone Pros, for better or worse. The Lightning harborage has been replaced with a USB- C harborage, and the number of side buttons has expanded to include a small new Action button. The antenna gaps around the edges still feel like design accentuations and not the functional necessity they are. And the gigantic three- lens camera system on the top reverse is still gigantic and still causes the iPhone to wobble when it’s put on a table or other flat face.
It’s an iPhone, in other words. And if you loved the design before, as I substantially did, this new interpretation is indeed better.
Display
Apple loves its fancy brand names, and the iPhone 15 Pro Max, with its Super Retina XDR display with creation, nails it in the display order. But cut through the marketing, and you ’ll find a stunning and wonderfully flat6.7- inch OLED panel with a resolution of 1290 x 2796( 460 PPI), rounded corners, anon-skinny19.59 aspect rate, and HDR10 and Dolby Vision capabilities.
The ProMotion in that name is Apple’s way of saying that it supports not just high refresh rates( up to 120 Hz), but also variable refresh rates that acclimatize on the cover as demanded, which helps spare battery life. The display gets incredibly bright — 1000 nits or, with HDR content, 1600 nits outdoors and 2000 nits outside — and if anything, it can nearly be too bright, especially in low light.
The display also provides Apple’s vaunted True Tone functionality, which I love, and has 100 percent P3 color diapason support, with a 2 million- to- 1 discrepancy rate. numerous HDR10 Dolby Vision displays are exorbitantly lustrous with inflated color pop, indeed when not playing compatible content, but Apple has long packed what I suppose to be rightly balanced panels that play down the unnatural goods. And other than the brilliance in low light, there’s not important to condemn then. It’s nearly perfect.
The display is defended by what Apple calls a Ceramic Shield front, and it’s allegedly tougher than any other smartphone glass. There’s also a point- resistant oleophobic coating, which I suppose works All smartphone displays need to be gutted from time to time, and the edges can be tough depending on your case, but the iPhone 15 Pro Max has been low conservation. And I ’ve dropped it a many times formerly, though I’m using a silicon case, with no issues.
Connectivity
Not unexpectedly, Apple’s flagship among flagships offers ultramodern and able dispatches capabilities, with 5G cellular(sub-6 GHz and mmWave) with 4 × 4 MIMO and gigabit LTE with 4 × 4 MIMO, Wi- Fi 6E with 2 × 2 MIMO, Bluetooth5.3, second- generationUltra-wideband( UWB), and NFC. I ’ve noway had any connectivity issues with this device, and it generally delivers fast Wi- Fi pets — frequently important briskly — than any PCs I use.
further controversially, the handset only supports eSIMs — you can have two eSIM biographies enabled at the same time and does n’t point a traditional nanoSIM card despite the fact that there’s room for it( and Apple does offer this point in other countries). This is a problem for me because my carrier then in Mexico does n’t yet support eSIMs, and I use that carrier’s data connectivity when I hit my yearly limit on T- Mobile.( I ended up putting the nanoSIM card in my aged Pixel 7a for provisory purposes.) There’s no logical reason for Apple to push eSIM this aggressively now, but this is also one of those problems that will vanish in time.
I’m using the iPhone with two eSIMs, still. Right before the trip, I discovered a service called Nomad that offers pay- as- you- go eSIMs at affordable prices. So I bought an eSIM with 10 GB of 4G connectivity over 30 days for$ 32($ 29 on trade) and enabled it when my T-Mobile transnational data ran out. It’s worked faultlessly, and with binary- SIM support, I kept my phone and textbook on my normal number and just used the Nomad eSIM for data with no issues atall.However, I’ll get a$ 3 credit, which would be nice,( If you use my PAUL65GE referral law.
Audio – Video
The iPhone 15 Pro Max sports stereo speakers — one in the earpiece above the Dynamic Island and one on the bottom coming to the USB- C harborage and three microphones, one on the top and two on the bottom. Phone calls were always clear using the iPhone typically, but after getting two complaints about audio quality while on speakerphone — commodity that was noway an issue on the Pixel 7 Pro — I stopped indeed trying to use it that way.
The audio- videotape experience is much more emotional with music and videotape because the iPhone supports Dolby Vision HDR and Dolby Atmos spatial audio capabilities. And while I do n’t spend a lot of time watching vids on it, let alone without earbuds, it’s fair to say I was blown down. I always watch a many crucial sequences in Atomic Blond and a many other pictures when testing this functionality, and the combination of the iPhone 15 Pro Max’s display and audio systems is one of the stylish around.
Cameras
Apple’s three- lens pro camera system is the number one reason that guests choose an iPhone Pro over a standard- issue,non-Pro iPhone. And with the iPhone 15 series, the establishment used that knowledge to its advantage by making a crucial new camera point, a blowup lens with 5X optic drone, exclusive to the more precious Pro Max. This upgrade clearly smelled me in I’ve always gone for the phone( iPhone or Android) with the stylish camera system, and when I saw what Apple was doing with the iPhone 15 Pro Max camera system, I knew I had to give it a shot. Pardon the pun.
The camera system is emotional enough on paper, but it’s actually not important of a vault forward compared to former generations, and I ’m still a bit unhappy with Apple’s claims about it offering “ the fellow of seven camera lens. ” I’ll also point out that the Pixel 8 Pro’s camera system seems indeed more emotional on paper, with its three high- resolution lenses, but we ’ll see what that looks like in the real world when I come home from Mexico coming week and can eventually put that phone through its paces.
The main lens on the iPhone 15 Pro Max is principally identical to that on its precursor, despite Apple’s claims to the negative. It’s a 48 MP wide- angle lens, a 24 mm original with an ƒ/1.78 orifice and binary- pixel Omni- Directional Phase Discovery( PDAF, or what Apple calls “ 100 percent Focus Pixels ”) optic image stabilization( OIS). The only difference this time is that Apple’s Camera app saves images taken with this lens in 24 MP by dereliction, but you can switch back to the old 12 MP format to save storehouse space or enable one of three HEIF Max/ ProRAW modes if you ’re a pro yourself and upgraded to further storehouse. further on that in a moment.
Security
Apple bills iOS as the world’s most secure mobile operating system, and I guess I’ve no quibbles there. Recent iOS performances have ramped up its sequestration and security features, most specially with per- appanti-tracking prompts, and iOS 17 adds a many minor advancements to what was formerly a fairly complete system with advancements to lockdown mode( for guarding against cyberattacks) and bettered warrants controls. But the basics remain the same In addition to the inconceivable suite of security and sequestration protections in its OS, the iPhone provides tackle security features like a secure enclave, the T2 security chip, translated storehouse, and stylish- in- class facial recognition via Face ID. It’s each there.
Battery
When I switched from the Pixel 7 Pro to the iPhone 15 Pro Max last month, I incontinently noticed how much better the battery was in Apple’s device. doubly as important battery is maybe a stretch, but it feels like it Where my Pixel demanded to be recharged in the late autumn on utmost days, the iPhone routinely makes it until bedtime without me fussing about charging it. And I ’ve only considered chargingmid-day on busy trip days when we ’re out and about in the megacity taking lots of prints far from the apartment. And in the private theme then, I ’ll also note that I noway formerly took my movable bowl with me this month. It was a regular companion when I was using the Pixel in Mexico City.
As I write this, it’s 1242 pm and I took the iPhone off the bowl at 630 am. The battery is at 92 percent after 3 hours of active screen time and about 3 hours of idle time.)
From a configuration perspective, the iPhone has all the anticipated charging optimization features to help save its health, and it supports a low- power mode if you ’re running low. The only change I made was to display the battery life chance inside of the battery cadence in the status bar.
Software
The iPhone 15 Pro Max arrived with iOS 17, the rearmost interpretation of Apple’s mobile zilches. There’s not important to say then For the utmost part, iOS is as elegant and mature as ever, and I find switching between it and Android substantially flawless, with each having a sprinkle of advantages over the other in introductory operation. Is it dumb that you still ca n’t put icons anywhere you want on the iPhone’s home screen? Yep. This discussion has also been beaten to death.
That said, I’ll call out two areas in iOS that I suppose explain the highs and lows of this system nicely. Fortunately, I ’ve written about both formerly, so I can keep this short.
In the pro column, we’ve the iPhone gesture navigation system that I wrote about lately The thickness and sense of this system are nearly stirring and are commodity that Google should borrow outright.
On the flipside, Apple’s running of announcements remains a sad joke, with the odd exception of the Dynamic Island that debuted a time ago but is new to me This inconceivable software point is n’t just a way to hide the former notch, it’s an innovative and new approach to handling multitasking and cautions on a mobile device with a fairly small display and is so good I anticipate Apple to apply it on Mac and iPad in the future too.
Pricing and availability
The iPhone 15 Pro Max starts at$ 1199, a$ 100 increase over the base price of its precursor. But in the good news department, that includes further storehouse, 256 GB, too. You can upgrade to a 512 GB model for$ 1399, or to 1 TB for$ 1599. Available colors this time include Natural Titanium, Blue Titanium, White Titanium, and Black Titanium. The handsets are astronomically available at Apple, nearly every mobile carrier, and at electronics stores worldwide.
Recommendations and conclusions
The iPhone 15 Pro Max is stuffed with dozens of small but important upgrades that make it a no- brainer for anyone looking for the stylish possible flagship smartphone experience. Those coming from former iPhones will appreciate the physical advancements, Dynamic Island, Action button, and USB- C, while Android sneakers are running out of defenses as Apple continues to address moping enterprises. My iPhone 13 Pro was only two times old, but this was a atrocious upgrade and not at all a minor advance. And utmost people are likely using indeed aged phones, making the iPhone 15 Pro Max all the more charming.
That said, Apple has n’t moved the needle too much on photography It’s still a strong point, but I ’d like to see advanced- resolutionultra-wide and blowup lenses, and better optic and cold-blooded drone capabilities. And while the move to USB- C was times overdue, the addition of a Lightning-slow USB 2 string in the box is an personality.
No matter. Apple still delivers the stylish overall smartphone experience available moment, as always. Whether you ’re a convert or not, you won’t be dissatisfied.
At-a-glance
conic design
atrocious performance
Excellent battery life
Gorgeous and flat display with much lower bezels
Full- featured three- lens hinder camera system with 5x optic drone
Dynamic islet is more useful than anticipated and better than a notch
Configurable Action button
USB- C for the palm
And all the traditional iPhone advantages