From mini to Max: Apple is introducing four new iPhones

With a delay of around a month, this year's iPhone event is finally taking place. Apple has a lot to offer, Tim Cook & Co. are unpacking four new smartphones. And they also have a little surprise ready.

The WWDC in June and the September event already showed that Apple's virtual events are more entertaining than the usual, often somewhat lengthy shows in front of an invited audience. The presentation of the new iPhones was again a pleasantly short and entertaining presentation. And Tim Cook & Co. had a lot to show, because this year the iPhone SE 2 will be followed by four new 12-series models: iPhone 12 Pro and iPhone 12 Pro Max, iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 mini.

New mini model and 5G

After not much has changed visually in the past two years, the 12 series has received a refreshing new design. In other words, it's not that new at all, because the wide, flat metal frame with a glass back is very reminiscent of the design of the iPhone 4 / 4S.

The frame of the top models is made of steel, the simple versions are made of aluminum. The changed design is due, among other things, to the fact that all new iPhones are 5G-capable and Apple was able to distribute all antennas in the flat frame.

All four variants have OLED screens that are protected by ceramic glass that is said to be four times more stable than other cover glasses. In addition, Apple has increased the resolution of the panels. The iPhone 12 Pro has a 6.1-inch display, the iPhone 12 Pro Max a huge 6.7-inch screen. There is also the iPhone 12 with a 6.1-inch panel and the super-handy iPhone 12 Mini with a 5.4-inch display.

Chip as strong as a bear, improved cameras

All four devices contain Apple's new 5-nanometer A14 chip, which should offer by far the most powerful main and graphics processors that will power smartphones this year. The new neural processor, which is supposed to handle many AI functions at high speed without cloud support, should also be spectacularly powerful. Among other things, this should also benefit photos and videos both during recording and editing.

Like the current devices, the Pro models can snap through three different lenses: main camera, super wide-angle camera and telephoto camera, which now offers four times optical magnification. Apple has left the resolution at 12 megapixels, but promises other changes to significantly improve recordings compared to the iPhone 11 line-up. Among other things, the sensor is now optically stabilized instead of the lenses. The Pro models also have a lidar sensor for 3D space and object recognition, which also supports night shots. As before, the simpler versions only have a main and super wide-angle camera and the lidar sensor is also missing.

Lots of colors, low prices

The iPhone 12 Pro and the iPhone 12 Pro Max come in gray, silver, and gold Blue. The iPhone 12 Pro can be pre-ordered from October 16, and it will go on sale on October 23. For the iPhone 12 Pro Max, Apple will take pre-orders from November 6th, and it will be available in stores from November 13th.

Because of the corona-related adjustments to sales tax, the prices have turned out to be wrong: The smaller Pro costs € 1120 with 128 gigabytes (GB) of storage, € 1237 with 256 GB and € 1461 with 512 GB. For the Max variant you have to pay 1217 euros, 1334.45 euros or 1558.65 euros.

The iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 mini are available in blue, green, black, white or red. Pre-orders for the iPhone 12 will be possible from October 16, and it will go on sale on October 23. The iPhone 12 mini can be pre-ordered from November 6th and will be available from November 13th.

For the iPhone 12 mini you pay 778.85 euros with a meager 64 GB of storage, the 128 or 256 GB models cost 827.55 or 944.55 euros. The prices for the iPhone 12 are 876.30 euros, 925.05 euros and 1042.05 euros.

Inexpensive Homepod mini

Finally, Apple also had a little surprise ready: the Homepod mini. The small, spherical WLAN loudspeaker should sound just as good as its bigger brother and the tiny 8.4 centimeter high also offers 360-degree sound. At 96.50 euros it is relatively cheap by Apple standards.