iPhone 13 vs. iPhone 12: Should I Upgrade?

Apple has unveiled the latest iPhone series on Tuesday. The iPhone 13, including standard iPhone 13, Mini, Pro, Pro Mac now is available for pre-ordering on September. 17 and will be shipped the next Friday.

If you have an old iPhone, like iPhone 12, you may wonder “should I upgrade to iPhone 13/13 mini/pro/pro max”. Here we will help you to decide by listing several differences between iPhone 12 and iPhone 13.

iPhone 13 vs iPhone 12: Should you upgrade to iPhone 13?

Color

The iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 mini come in 5 colors: pink, blue, midnight or black, starlight, or white, and red. Apple provides a new Sierra blue for the pro version and new pink option for the iPhone 13. For some people, color can be an important factor to decide whether to buy a new iPhone. We suggest you check the colors in Apple Store when iPhone 13 series are available, if you really enjoy the Sierra blue and the new pink.

Performance

iPhone 13 models are powered by the A15 Bionic chip, which is upgraded from the A14 Bionic silicon. The makes the performance of the iPhone improved by 50%. And the graphics performance is improved by 30%. It seems to be a great improvement.

But the A-series chip is now the leading level, and the A14 chip can provide enough speed for most conditions. So, we do not recommend you to upgrade your iPhone 12 to iPhone 13 for the new A15 unless you are using an old model, like iPhone 6s/7/8/X.

Camera

Generally, the camera on iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 mini models don’t have much improvement on camera. They still have dual camera settings.

Apple brings a new feature called “sensor-shifted optical image stabilization) and smart HDR 4. Official acclaims that the Smart HDR 4 can target 4 people in a scene and optimizing their contrast, lighting, even the skin tone to make everyone looks great.

The sensor-shift optical image stabilization technology was firstly applied in iPhone 12 Pro Max. Now iPhone 13 can have this feature. Unlike the usual anti-shake feature, the sensor-shifting optical image stabilization is a shake-proof mobile module that changes from a lens module to an image sensor, offsetting the phone's shake by moving the image sensor.

There's an upgraded triple-lens rear camera with an f/2.8 Telephoto lens, an f/1.5 Wide lens, and an f/1.8 Ultra-Wide lens on iPhone 13 Pro and Pro Max. The wide lens with a good aperture bringing 2.2 times lighter.

Battery life

In the event, Apple says the iPhone 13 mini and the pro will last up to 1.5 hours longer the iPhone 12. And the standard and Pro Max version are expected to have 2.5 hours improvements. Of course, considering the size of iPhone 13 mini, and iPhone 13, you don’t expect too much on the batter life.

The improvements of iPhone 13 Pro and Pro max are visible. The iPhone 12 Pro has up to 17 hours of video playback, while the iPhone 13 Pro is upgraded to 22 hours. iPhone 12 Pro Max has up to 20 hours of video playback, and the iPhone 13 Pro Max is upgraded to 28 hours.

Final words

So in summary, if you are using standard iPhone 12, we don’t recommend you to get the iPhone 13 for a better performance, battery life, and camera. While for some professional user, such as Youtuber, photographer, vlogger, the iPhone 13 Pro, and Pro Max will not let you down.