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iPhone 14 Pro review: Known strengths and weaknesses

iPhone 14 Pro test headers
Picture: TechnikNews
(Post picture: © 2022 TechnikNews)

The new iPhone 14 Pro is undoubtedly a very exciting smartphone, since Apple has revised two important points with the camera and the front design. The notch belongs after five years – at least for them Pro-iPhones – finally a thing of the past – and those around 65 Procent bigger main camera with 48 megapixels has received on paper one of the biggest upgrades in recent years. 

All of this sounds pretty good, but this is offset by the enormously high price of a whopping 1.299 euros. You can find out whether this is justified or whether the predecessor is more worthwhile in this detailed test report.

Haptics & design

With dimensions of 147,5 millimeters in height and 71,5 millimeters in width, the iPhone 14 Pro clearly assigned to the handy smartphones. One-hand operation is almost always proeasily possible, which is unfortunately only the case with very few smartphones these days.

As with the 12th Pro and 13 Pro an angular high-gloss frame made of stainless steel is used again, which isproIt looks and feels classy, ​​but is extremely prone to fingerprints. You could clean the frame all day. In addition, there is a rather uncomfortable in-hand feeling, which is conveyed by the angular design. Unfortunately, it is not as ergonomic as the iPhone 11 Pro with rounded frame in hand. I like the back much better. This consists of matte glass, which feels particularly high-quality and is very grateful for fingerprints. Along with the stainless steel frame, we have it on the iPhone 14 Pro to do one of the highest quality smartphones on the market.

When it comes to colors, customers have four variants to choose from: space black, gold, silver and dark purple. I tested the model in purple, which made me very happy because it's finally something new again. Apple calls it purple, but honestly it's only really purple in some lighting situations. Often it looks gray and sometimes silver.

In addition to the color and the Apple logo placed in the middle, the camera design should also immediately catch the eye, because the built-in sensors in the upper left corner are enormously large and protrude extraordinarily far from the housing, which means that the smartphone lies on the table during operation wobbles a lot. Furthermore, it is very difficult to remove dust between the individual lenses because they protrude so far. Apple could have done a better job of that.

The notch is history

Something has finally changed on the front. The notch now appears at the Pro-iPhones history to be. Instead, Apple installs a large punch hole in the middle of the display below the top of the screen. Of course, Apple had to come up with its own name for it. They call the recess “Dynamic Island”. You can think what you want about that, but I have to give Apple credit for the fact that the Dynamic Island looks much nicer than the notch in my opinion. It's also a bit smaller and just looks more modern. The Dynamic Island also introduced some new software features, which we'll take a closer look at in a moment.

Other than that, not much has changed on the front. The evenly thick border around the screen has only become slightly thinner than the predecessor, but that is only noticeable in a direct comparison.

Excellent workmanship

In terms of processing, there is absolutely no reason for criticism. The back looks extremely robust, there is no gap between the back and the frame, nothing creaks, the keys are firmly attached to the case and have an excellent pressure point. This is exactly how a smartphone for over 1.000 euros should be processed.

Display – top class

The Super Retina XDR OLED display measures 6,1 inches diagonally and has a resolution of 2.556 x 1.179 pixels at 460 ppi, which is more than sufficient for everyday use. In addition, the panel supports a smooth refresh rate of 12o Hertz, which means that 120 individual images pro second can be played back. As with the predecessor, Apple uses LTPO technology, which is able to automatically adjust the refresh rate to the required level in order to save power.

iPhone 14 Pro Display

The display of the iPhone 14 Pro is excellent. (Image: TechnikNews)

The screen of the iPhone 14 Pro convince all along the line. No other smartphone has such a beautifully contrasting yet realistic display of colors. The black value is excellent as usual and even the white value, which does not always look perfect with OLED panels, is more than impressive. In addition, there is a phenomenal brightness and a very good viewing angle stability. Even on extremely sunny days I never had Proproblems with readability.

Always-on display

 The iPhone 14 Pro an always-on display was also added as a new feature, which, among other things, is based on the new display engine in the A16 Bionic Processor falls back. Unlike what is known from Android smartphones, however, this is a display that covers the entire screen. The lock screen wallpaper is darkened with all widgets and notifications, and you can't turn the feature on and off on a fixed schedule either.

The image on the left shows the iPhone with the activated lock screen and the image on the right shows the always-on display:

Software—iOS 16

The unique selling point of an Apple iPhone is undoubtedly the software, because unlike the smartphones of the competition, it relies on the in-house iOS operating system. The question of whether you like the software is also a matter of taste. However, one can positively comment on the easy-to-understand operation and the pleasant user experience, which is based, among other things, on high fluidity, the same scrolling behavior everywhere, clean optimization and very fluid animations. On the other hand, the closed system also has disadvantages, for example you are limited to the Apple App Store and there are no options for multi-tasking.

Apple is also superior in terms of longevity, because with more than five years of OS updates, which always appear on the first day, they are clearly superior to the competition when it comes to software support.

Dynamic Islands

The most important new feature of the iPhone 14 Pro can be found on the front, it is the so-called "Dynamic Island". In addition to the front camera, this wide screen recess also contains the sensors for FaceID, Apple's three-dimensional face recognition. However, in contrast to the previous "punch holes" on Android smartphones, it was also integrated into the software operation as a new level.

Activities from applications that continue to run in the background are displayed as icons at the top so that they can be accessed again with one click. This includes navigation in Apple maps, running music / voice messages or a timer. The island also serves as an indicator, for example for a low battery level or for muting the iPhone. Support for Dynamic Island from third-party applications is currently quite rare, but this is likely to change quickly in the future.

Performance - fast, future-proof & hot

The one in the iPhone 14 Pro built Prozessor is called A16 Bionic, it is once again the most powerful smartphone chipset on the market. This is manufactured using the four-nanometer process. Together with the excellent optimization, the smartphone has a terrific everyday performance, the software always follows the hand and apps start very quickly. Even with more complex tasks such as video editing or 3D games, the iPhone has none Protrouble. Together with the many software updates, this is definitely the most durable smartphone currently on the market.

Despite the excellent performance, the heat development in everyday use could be improved. This isn't just for lavish ones Probut also very pronounced in everyday tasks, such as consuming social media with a high screen brightness.

Battery – good runtimes, long loading times

Apple installs a 3.200 mAh battery that can be charged with up to 20 watts. With a MacBook power supply, it takes almost two hours to fully charge the battery, which is extremely embarrassing for 1.299 euros. Even significantly cheaper smartphones from OPPO, OnePlus, Xiaomi and Vivo are worlds better here. Apple really needs to do better here in the future.

As bad as the loading times are, the runtimes are fortunately good. With activated always-on display I still had at the end of the day with a screen-on-time of 5 to 6 hours zwischen 27 und 38 Procenter Battery left, which is very commendable for such a small battery. at deactivated always-on display I still had it after 5 to 6 hours zwischen 30 und 50 Procenter battery left. Even if the always-on display eats up a little more battery, of course, I wouldn't worry about it as much. Most people might proget through a day without a charge.

Camera - good quality with known weaknesses

Apple installs a triple camera on the back, which is also supported by a LIDAR sensor. The main camera has received a major update on paper compared to last year. It now has a resolution of 48 megapixels and, at 1/1.28 inches, is significantly larger than the 13 Pro. There is also an ultra-wide-angle camera with a resolution of 12 megapixels and a sensor size of 1/2.55 inches. The third camera is a 12 megapixel telephoto camera with 3x optical magnification. Digital can be zoomed up to 15x.

iPhone 14 Pro Camera

The triple camera of the iPhone 14 Pro. (Image: TechnikNews)

I deliberately keep the camera short, because we only had the iPhone 14 a few days ago Pro in a detailed camera comparison with the Vivo X80 Pro compete. In addition, our colleagues from HUAWEIblog in a detailed comparison the camera of the P50 Pro with those of the iPhone 14 Pro compared, which I can also recommend to you. In these articles you will find all the details about the new iPhone camera:

In summary, the iPhone 14 Pro takes good pictures with all three cameras, but hardly better than the iPhone 13 Pro are. Colors are sometimes reproduced too unnaturally for my taste, and all Android flagships are actually visibly better in terms of dynamic range. However, the sharpness is very good and the iPhone still takes decent pictures even in low light, although I would have expected a little more here. Selfies have improved noticeably and when it comes to videos, Apple is still unmatched.

Other - great speakers, good vibration motor, FaceID and more

Apple donated the iPhone 14 Pro great stereo speakers, which are even better than their predecessors. They get extremely loud, the sound is clear and the bass is really great for a smartphone.

The vibration motor (taptic engine) ensures extremely precise haptic feedback and does not sound annoying either. It is currently one of the best vibration motors in a smartphone.

The only secure option to unlock the smartphone is hidden in the Dynamic Island: FaceID. It is a three-dimensional face recognition, which is much more secure than most Android smartphones. Only HUAWEI can currently do this with the Mate 50 Pro keep up. FaceID works extremely reliably and, compared to its predecessor, the iPhone can now also be unlocked in landscape format - and if you wear a mask.

Additionally, the iPhone 14 supports Pro an IP68 certification at a depth of even six instead of just 1,5 meters. Only the connection on the underside could do with an upgrade, since Lightning is still the slow, old USB 2.0 standard. So you have to plan more time when transferring files.

Conclusion

The iPhone 14 Pro is an excellent smartphone with some strengths and very few weaknesses. One of the strengths is definitely the aussproThe high-quality design, the first-class display with peak brightness, the strong and future-proof performance, the excellent battery life and the numerous premium features such as FaceID, the vibration motor, the IP68 certification and the great stereo speakers.

However, with the extremely long loading times, the dynamic range of the cameras and the slow Lightning connection, there are also a few repeated weaknesses that last year's iPhone 13 Pro already had. So what was really good last year has now been improved even further by Apple and what was expandable has unfortunately not received an upgrade. In my opinion, this makes it a bit difficult to compare the extremely high recommended retail price of 1.299 euros compared to the iPhone 13 Pro to justify.

With a price difference of 100 to 150 euros, I would definitely go for the 14th Pro grab, but if the price difference is (significantly) more than 150 euros, I would definitely toy with the idea of ​​getting the 13 Pro increase.

iPhone 14 Pro buy

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Fabian Menzel

Fabian has been part of since mid-September 2020 TechnikNews and regularly supplies the site with various news, but also with some test reports on smartphones. He's having so much fun and is extremely grateful to have such a great team by his side. In his free time, he enjoys listening to music and occasionally taking photos with his Huawei Mate 50 Pro.

Fabian has already written 300 articles and left 24 comments.

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