Test: iPhone 14 – an iPhone for the people

It’s almost like we feel sorry for the iPhone 14, the “simpler” model in Apple’s new iPhone series. Has it got a new processor? Nah. Promotion screen? Nope. Always on screen? Hardly. Dynamic Island? No! Is it a bad phone? No not at all.

The iPhone 14 is in most ways a good phone, which unfortunately ends up in the shadow of the new Pro models’ spiffy features such as always-on screen and Dynamic Island. Basically, this is an iPhone 13 Pro, which comes in two versions: one with a 6.1-inch screen, which we are testing here, and a larger model, the Plus, as a 6.7-inch screen. Instead, the Iphone Mini has had to seek out the rare hunting grounds.

In terms of appearance, there is not much to say about it. Two cameras on the back, a selfie camera hidden in the familiar flap in the upper edge of the screen. Basically looks like last year’s model. The phone comes in five colors: blue (the one we’re testing), purple, midnight (black), starburst and red.

If we were to rank by color, we think that the purple and black are by far the prettiest. The ugliest is the blue one, which brings signature flashbacks to a pair of ugly and prickly nylon shorts of the same color my parents forced on me sometime in the 1960s. Maybe that’s why the color isn’t very appealing.

Crispy OLED

The screen is a bright Super Retina XDR OLED screen. It’s not as bright as the Pro models, but can be pushed up to 1,200 nits if needed. However, it does not have dynamic frequency update. Is it decisive for a purchase? Not at all. No matter how you turn it, it’s a good screen with crisp colors and contrast. The resolution of the tested model is 2,532 x 1,170 and has a contrast ratio of 2,000,000:1.

Also read: 11 stylish cases that protect your new iPhone 14

It has support for Dolby Vision, hdr 10 and hlg. Films therefore look absolutely excellent on it, as do pictures. Are we missing dynamic screen refresh? Well, if you haven’t had it before, you won’t even think about it. However, it has been endowed with Truetone, which adjusts color depth and strength according to the lighting in the room.

New cameras

The biggest improvement that the iPhone 14 has received is the cameras. There is a new main camera, although not 48 megapixels, but a new 12 megapixels. But it has a larger aperture, is helped by Apple’s new “photonic engine”, which, together with the A15 Bionic, fixes and tricks, and takes better photos in the dark. The new sensor also makes the camera much faster and able to capture motion without blurring the photo.

Also read: 11 stylish cases that protect your new iPhone 14

The camera also has “Smart HDR 4”, which renders each person in a group shot individually, providing better colors, contrast and light individually for the people in the picture.

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Unfortunately, you don’t get an optical zoom. It is possible to zoom out 0.5, but if you want to zoom in, digital zoom applies. Stiff, we think. Sure, it takes good pictures, but digital zoom in a phone that costs from SEK 12,000 doesn’t feel very generous.

The camera is also not capable of taking as good macro shots as the Pro models do.

On the video side, it definitely looks brighter. iPhone 14 can record in 4k with 60 fps and hdr. This phone also supports Cinematic Mode 4k at 30 fps. The selfie camera? Yes, it does that too. And like its older siblings in the Pro family, it has been gifted with superb Action Mode, which stabilizes videos extremely well.

Battery life

If your top priority is battery life, then the iPhone 14 Plus with a 6.7-inch screen is what you want. In true Apple style, we don’t know how many hours that means, and synthetic battery tests aren’t fair either, but it probably has a battery that lasts all day.

The phone can also call via satellite if you are in an emergency. However, the service currently only works in the US and Canada. But a phone purchased in Sweden can make calls via satellite already today if you are in North America.

Also read our test of the iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max!

This phone has last year’s chip, the A15 Bionic. A chip that in several cases is still faster than those in this year’s Android phones. The simpler version of the iPhone 13 had four graphics cores, the iPhone 14 has five. You thus get plenty of gunpowder in your phone to be able to play graphics-demanding games. The effects interface and scrolling on pages flow as smoothly as possible.

In a game like War Robots, an mmo with demanding graphics, effects and graphics flow without any problems and without the phone getting ridiculously hot.

The phone also has Apple’s new “crash detection” which detects if you should get into a car accident. If that happens, which we hope not occurs, the phone automatically calls 112.

In conclusion, we can say that this is a modest upgrade of the Iphone 13 Pro, which, however, costs SEK 1,000 less than the entry-level model of what the Iphone 13 Pro did. It is a capable phone that is absolutely perfect for the majority of all users. Sure, you can’t shoot in raw format or film in Apple ProRes, but how many of us really need to?

Specifications

Product name: Iphone 14
Tested: September 2022
Manufacturer: Apple
System circuit: A15 Bionic
Memory: 6GB
Storage: 128/256/512GB
Screen: 6.1 inch Super Retina XDR, 2532 x 1170 pixels, 460 ppi
Cameras: 48 + 12 + 12 megapixel ultra-wide-angle, wide-angle and telephoto. 12 megapixel selfie
Connections: Lightning
Communication: 2g, 3g, 4g, 5g, wifi 6, bluetooth 5.3, nfc.
Operating system: iOS 16
Other: Dual sim, Face ID, water resistant (ip68)
Battery: 20 hours of continuous video playback (6.1-inch) and 26 hours (6.7-inch) respectively
Size: 14.6 x 7.15 x 7.80 centimeters and 16.08 x 7.81 x 7.80 respectively
Weight: 172 and 203 grams respectively
Award: iPhone 14 SEK 11,990 at Amazon Sweden
Award: iPhone 14 Plus: SEK 13,490 at Amazon Sweden (Release: 2022-10-07)

Benhmarks
Antutu Benchmark: 851 694
Geekbench 5: 4,695
Geekbench 5, one core: 1,746
Geekbench Compute: 12,677
3dmark Wild Life Extreme: 2,784
3dmark Wild Life Unlimited: 2,535
Read speed, storage: 949 MB/s
Write speed, storage: 1416 MB/s