Apple have made subtle changes to the design of the iPhone 5 to make it a better product for you to hold and use. It is taller and has a larger 4 inch screen, and at 112g is one of the lightest smartphones on the market. The extra half inch of the screen means you can now watch videos in the correct ratio without any black lines.
The iPhone 5 camera is very similar to that of the 4S. It is still only 8 megapixels, as going for more megapixels might have meant having a thicker phone, contrary to everything else that Apple has done with this upgrade in moving towards a more streamlined look. It now has a new lens that affects the way light enters, and should make a difference to the quality of the image. Panoramic mode is a new setting for the iPhone – it guides you as you take portrait pictures and slowly turn around, and then stitches the pictures together to make an impressive panoramic picture.
The video quality is still the same as the 4S, recording 30 frames per second at 1080p, but Apple has also introduced the ability to take pictures while recording; something that has been available on other phones for a long time and is a welcome addition to this one. The forward-facing camera has been upgraded to 720p – which is great news as this function is so useful for taking group shots and self-portraits, but the quality was always disappointing in the past.
Your actual calling experience is noticeably better on the iPhone 5. There are now 3 microphones installed on the phone in different places to ensure your voice is picked up completely, and the new noise cancellation features mean that things like wind noise have been greatly reduced.