Seventeen years after the first iPhone sent the world spinning at an unprecedented speed, there is always the feeling that it would be difficult to summon any fresh wonder with a new version of the device. Apple has done exactly that with the familiar slab of delight.

Unsurprisingly, the iPhone 16 series is a delight to use, no matter the option you choose. We began with the familiar version before moving to iPhone 16 Pro Max. There’s plenty to sink our teeth into.

THING 1: There’s a faster chip inside iPhone 16: The A18 takes performance almost to the level of A18 Pro that powers the iPhone 16 Pro models. More speed is always welcome even though people are not complaining about the previous iPhone’s speed.

THING 2: There is a better, faster camera — among the best on a smartphone. Photos are crisp and clear, with beautiful colour while low-light photos are especially impressive for a phone.

The iPhone 16 has an improved ultra-wide camera with better low-light photography and what Apple claims is a 2x optical quality zoom thanks to the phone's 48MP Fusion camera

THING 3: You can’t complain about the price because it remains the same as it was for iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus and, at the same time, it comes in new bold colours.

THING 4: It supports a transformative technology called Apple Intelligence. Even though there will be a staggered release for it, Apple Intelligence will bring about a meaningful difference in the way we use the iPhone.

To refresh or not

iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus are available in five bold colours — black, white, pink, teal and ultramarine. The only difference between the two models is the size of the screen and battery. The former has a 6.1-inch Super Retina XDR display with OLED technology while the other has a 6.7-inch screen. Battery life has received a boost on both phones.

Like last year’s iPhone 15, the phones have a colour-infused glass back that gives them a frosted look. The new colours pop and it makes me not want to cover them with a case. In fact, I am carrying the phone around Calcutta for days without a case and though I have tossed it in my bag, it hasn’t scuffed or scratched.

Unlike the Pro models, these two phones can’t boost their refresh rates up to 120Hz for smoother scrolling. The question: Would a 120Hz display help? There are two ways to look at this. First, tech reviewers are spoilt by top-end smartphones, meaning they mostly use a 120Hz display. Once you get accustomed to such a display, there is no going back to 60Hz.

Then there is the real-world scenario: Users earmark a certain amount of money to buy a phone every few years. Most people who will use the iPhone 16 could be upgrading from iPhone 12 or iPhone 13 and to them 60Hz works well. My wife, for example, has been using an iPhone with 60Hz display for years and she doesn’t care about 120Hz. Of course, a high refresh rate display is always welcome.

The iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus hold their own in the camera department

Pressing the right buttons

There are two big hardware changes to the iPhone 16. The phone comes with the Action Button as well as Camera Control.

Action Button was introduced last year with the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max. This year the technology has trickled down to the other models. This button is programmable, meaning you can click it to automatically load a feature, like trigger the flashlight, turn on Do Not Disturb, Shazam music or record a voice memo. I have been using the button to trigger Voice Memo since my profession requires interviewing people. The Action Button is underrated. It brings a level of customisation to the iPhone that you didn’t have before.

The second hardware change is Camera Control which is new to iPhones. It’s now easier to swap between shooting modes. Can you still use the control on the display? Yes. But is Camera Control fun to use? Absolutely.

You can use Camera Control to swipe between different settings — zoom, depth, exposure… things like that. If I want to get out of the mode, I have to tap to go back to whatever the last setting that I was using and then I can press down to zoom in a little bit and take a picture. It makes the iPhone feel more like a point-and-shoot camera.

When I started using Camera Control, it took me around 30 minutes to get it right. I kept instinctively reaching for the camera icon on the screen but then things changed. Suddenly my finger doesn’t obscure the screen while taking photos. It’s also a lot easier to keep a shot consistent since I don’t have to move my hands as much to zoom in.

Unfortunately, the most interesting thing about Camera Control won’t be coming for a few weeks — Visual Intelligence. That feature will let you launch the camera and point your phone at objects in your surroundings to learn more about them, like the business hours of a nearby restaurant.

The iPhone 16's photo is dramatically brighter than the iPhone 15's

Apple is not the first to introduce a “camera button”; Sony’s Xperia 1 came with it but the implementation on the iPhone is far superior. The camera is one of the most important aspects of the iPhone and to see Apple experiment with the interface only proves that more refinements are coming in the future.

You could be wondering how Camera Control works. In simple words, there is an integration of hardware and software. There is a tactile switch that powers the click experience, a high-precision force sensor that enables the light press gesture, and a capacitive sensor that allows for touch interactions.

Apple says that third-party apps that use the camera will also be able to take advantage of Camera Control, so Snapchat, Instagram and Halide will be able to use the slider. It’s technically impressive.

You may also wonder if the addition makes sense when using the phone in vertical mode. On the iPhone 16, it’s easier to use it in the vertical mode than on the larger iPhone 16 Pro Max because of the difference in weight.

Style and substance

One of the features that impressed me a lot is Photographic Styles. These are not filters.

Those who rely on their iPhones for recording media will appreciate the iPhone 16's new Audio Mix feature, which lets you edit a video to isolate a person's voice, provide a studio recording effect or give voices a more cinematic feel. We tried it after visiting 'Radio Kaku' Amit Ranjan Karmakar in Kumartuli

You can use Photographic Styles to customise photos by locally adjusting colour, highlights, and shadows in real time. It has a deeper understanding of skin undertones, so users can personalise how they appear in photos. Unlike filters, which often use a one-size-fits-all approach by adding a colour to an entire scene, adjustments are applied to specific colours of a selected style.

This feature combined with the rest of the improvements can make the iPhone 15 feel old. One of the best “styles” that you can deploy is black-and-white.

Zoom away

Apple has made a few clever updates to the iPhone 16’s camera. The camera system now features a dazzling 48MP Fusion camera (f/1.6 aperture, sensor-shift optical image stabilisation) with a 2x telephoto option (52mm, f/1.6 aperture), giving users two cameras in one while a new ultra-wide camera (12MP, 13mm f/2.2 aperture and 120-degree field of view) enables macro photography. Autofocus is new in the 12MP ultra-wide, so you can take macro photos. Here I come Tickles, take care of your nose!

Playing an AAA game like Resident Evil 4 is easy on the iPhone 16. It's a game that is the cream of the crop in graphical fidelity and it runs perfectly

Audio sorcery

Audio Mix is quickly becoming my favourite feature on the iPhone. New to the iPhone 16, it is meant to help those who record a lot of audio on the phone. It lets you adjust audio after shooting to enhance the voice of the person on camera. Based on my experience so far, it makes a huge difference. I was at Kumartuli where it’s loud and the crowd continues to swell through the day. There’s a lot of echo and it’s not a great place to record audio.

Once you use Audio Mix, chances are — and I mean in most cases — you will stop using an external microphone. In fact, I am surprised that Apple is offering Audio Mix in its cheaper iPhones. This feature lets you change the audio quality of your videos — Studio mode, for example, cuts out all background noise and makes you sound like you’re in a studio; Cinematic mode focuses on the people in the centre of the frame and adds in some background chatter as ambient noise. It’s effective on the iPhone 16 but I feel the feature works better on the iPhone 16 Pro because it has better microphones. Disclaimer: The gap isn’t very wide.

Camera Control on iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro Max

Hello Apple Intelligence

The one big thing we haven’t talked about yet is Apple intelligence. The iPhone 16 lineup (and last year’s iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max) is capable of running it but it won’t be available at launch.

This requires some explanation. Out of the box, the phones in the new series come with iOS 18 but that doesn’t include Apple Intelligence. At the moment, iOS 18.1 public beta is already out, which has some Apple Intelligence features while the final version of 18.1 software update is nearing launch. Usually, beta status gives way to a final release in two-odd weeks, so we should be looking for the software upgrade very soon.

What about the bigger features of Apple Intelligence? The company is racing to complete a major iOS 18.2 upgrade, which may include features like Genmoji, ChatGPT integration and the Image Playground app. Apple wants to get iOS 18.3 completed soon after that. The next big update after that will be iOS 18.4.

Photographic Styles are applied during capture. On the iPhone 16 series, there is a whole new range of custom settings to help you dial in the photographic style you like

I have been playing around with some of the Apple Intelligence features as part of the developer beta programme and there is plenty of goodness. So far I’ve played with writing tools which can summarise and rewrite text and the new version of Siri is better at understanding you even when you stutter. What stands out is the way Apple Intelligence can summarise.

Gaming beast

Since the device is powered by A18, there is a sizeable leap in performance. Built on second-generation 3-nanometer technology, an upgraded 16-core neural engine is optimised for large generative models and runs ML models up to 2x faster than the A16 Bionic chip. The 6-core CPU is 30 per cent faster than the A16 Bionic chip and faster than all the competition. It is also more power efficient and can run the same workload with 30 per cent less power than A16 Bionic. The 5-core GPU is up to 40 per cent faster and 35 per cent more efficient than A16 Bionic to power graphics performance for Apple Intelligence, and puts a powerful gaming device in users’ pockets.

There is hardware-accelerated ray tracing to ensure graphics are accurately represented. The iPhone 16 supports AAA games that were previously only available on iPhone 15 Pro, as well as new titles like Honor of Kings: World with an ultra graphics mode optimised for the iPhone 16 lineup, coming next year. On our phone is Resident Evil 4 and we are looking forward to playing Infinity Nikki.

Which iPhone to buy

You will have to get the latest case because of the new Action Button and Camera Control

For most people, the 6.1-inch iPhone 16 works well. The non-Pro phone makes perfect sense for anyone who doesn’t want to record a 30-minute film on the phone or doesn’t dream to become Vishal Bhardwaj around an iPhone.

Look at what Apple has already brought to the phone — Dynamic Island, Action Button, 48MP primary camera, macro camera, Camera Control. Jumping to the Pros amounts to a higher refresh rate on the screens, faster USB speeds, a higher zoom camera, a more powerful chipset and other differences. But you may not want them. The new A18 processor is extremely fast and appears like a binned version of the A18 Pro, which is on the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max.

Perhaps a more important question to ask yourself is what’s the storage option you should buy. If you are already an iPhone user, head to Settings>General>iPhone storage. It will show how much you are currently using. If you are bumping up against your limit, you will need to get more storage. If you have some room to spare you could drop down and save some money or stay the same but this will give you a good indicator to plan your purchase.

Protective cover

Personally, I have stopped using a cover with the iPhone for the last year or so. The phone is incredibly durable — both the iPhone 16 and the 16 plus have a Ceramic Shield which is 50 per cent stronger than the last model and two times stronger than any other smartphone glass. This means way fewer shattered screens and much better protection against everyday drops and impacts. They are also water and dust-resistant with an IP68 rating so you don’t have to worry about even some small spills or splashes or even a brief submersion in the water.

But you may still want a case for the phone. For the new phone you have to purchase a new cover because of the additions to the hardware, namely Action Button and Camera Control. The Camera Control cutout is important because it’s a touch-sensitive control. When you put pressure on the case at that point, the Camera Control will work. Also, the flashlight now has a specific hole instead of being inside the camera square. Of course, the alignment of the cameras has changed… not because the designers had nothing else to do! The alignment will help to record spatial videos.

The camera alignment has been changed to help with recording spatial video

Make the call

It would have helped had Apple Intelligence come out of the box and if 120Hz refresh rate were supported.

Everything you do on an iPhone is improved by a better chipset: Games and applications run faster and Apple Intelligence is waiting to take advantage of A18. Battery life has also improved. The iPhone 16 offers up to 22 hours of video playback while the 16 Plus stretches that to 27 hours.

With the iPhone 16, it’s not just a change in the series number; it’s what’s in a phone — plenty of amazing technology and some of it indeed feels like wizardry.