Like the iPhone X(opens in a new tab) and its notch, the iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 Pro Max(opens in a new tab) have a controversial design that seems to have divided everyone.

A lot of people don’t like the way the three lenses protrude in a squircle-shaped bump that also houses the LED flash and microphone. The holes are reportedly triggering people’s trypophobia(opens in a new tab) (fear of clusters of holes and bumps).

I’m not dismissing trypophobia, but having used the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max for a week ahead of its release, I can definitively say everyone needs to chill out.

Almost everyone I’ve shown the iPhone 11 Pro to say it’s not as offensive in person — the lens rings aren’t nearly as thick as closeup images make them appear — and the design is one of a kind (for now).

The fact that I literally couldn’t go anywhere in New York City without drawing attention from people who spotted the triple cameras suggests the iPhone 11 Pros already have what Android phones could only dream of: celebrity status.

Once you get over the camera bump, you'll see the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max are more "pro" than meets the eye. I'll take the most versatile camera system, the longest battery life of any iPhone, and the most secure mobile operating system over a new design that's different for the sake of being different any day.

Unlike the iPhone 11(opens in a new tab), which costs $50 less than the iPhone XR(opens in a new tab) did when it launched, the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max aren't cheaper. They have the same premium prices introduced with the iPhone X.

The iPhone 11 Pro starts at $999 and the 11 Pro Max at $1,099 for 64GB of storage; $1,149 and $1,249 for 256GB of storage; and $1,349 and $1,449 for 512GB of storage.

I'm less bothered by these prices — monthly installment plans help split up the cost — and more by the fact the base storage is still 64GB. A $1,000+ "pro" iPhone shouldn't have the same amount of base storage as a $700 iPhone 11.

Samsung's Galaxy Note 10(opens in a new tab), which starts at $949, comes with four times the storage as an entry-level iPhone 11 Pro. This isn't cool, Apple. If you're getting an iPhone 11 Pro or 11 Pro Max, I recommend ignoring the 64GB and getting at least 256GB. You can thank me later when you're not frantically deleting apps and photos because you're running low on storage. 

Ignore the noise you hear online. The iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max are way better looking in person, after you’ve held one in your hands, and used its weirdly aligned triple cameras (there is a reason why they’re like that, which I’ll get into soon).

Just as everyone immediately pounced on Apple for the iPhone X's notch and then learned to accept it, I guarantee the same will happen with the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max’s triple cameras.

I’m confident about this because people have been complaining about camera bumps(opens in a new tab) — a “pragmatic optimization(opens in a new tab)” according to outgoing Apple Chief Design Officer Jony Ive — since the iPhone 6’s(opens in a new tab) tiny lens protrusion.

I, myself, have chronicled the evolution of the iPhone’s growing camera bumps(opens in a new tab) over the years, and guess what? I always got over the knee-jerk criticism because I value photography. If you’re a parent, I'm positive you’ll care more about how the iPhone 11 Pro’s camera captures photos and videos of your kids than how the bump looks. 

Other than the three lens rings, the rest of the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max are mostly iterative of the iPhone X. That's what Apple does — make products that don't look outdated years out.

The thing you’ll notice most is the textured glass back. It’s so much nicer than the glossy glass introduced on the iPhone X and 8, and the matte finish makes the iPhone 11 Pros more grippy. Putting these iPhones in a case would be a complete disservice to the team that designed them. 

Compared to shiny glass, the matte glass almost never picks up fingerprints unless your fingers are really greased up or slathered over the Apple logo, which if you’re paying close attention, has moved to the middle of the backside. The “iPhone” text has also been removed on the iPhone 11 Pros and iPhone 11 because, come on, everyone knows what an iPhone is.

There were rumors(opens in a new tab) that the Apple logo was supposed to double as a marker for wirelessly charging AirPods(opens in a new tab) or an Apple Watch(opens in a new tab), but Apple never announced any “reverse” or “bilateral” wireless charging feature. There are skeptics who believe Apple intended to ship the feature, but disabled reverse wireless charging due to heat issues, and may activate it in a future software update.

A person familiar with the matter told me it’s not something the company included and the inevitable teardowns of the phones won’t reveal any special coil for it. This highly positioned person at Apple also reminded me not to take all rumors as truth. So take that for what you will.

Another small, but perceivable change: the iPhone 11 Pros are a hair thicker in all directions and heavier. Somewhere, Jony Ive is in tears. The iPhone 11 Pros are definitely weightier — the iPhone 11 Pro is 0.39 ounces heavier than the iPhone XS and the iPhone 11 Pro Max is 0.63 ounces heavier than the iPhone XS Max — but in a good way, especially without a case on.

While I truly miss the days of the seemingly feather-light iPhone 6, the iPhone 11 Pros feel solid and dense the same way a premium mechanical watch like my Omega Speedmaster Professional does. Tons of phones now sport the same metal-and-glass sandwich design, but not all of them feel, for lack of a better word, engineered. There’s no hollow “thwack” sound when you tap the back of an iPhone 11 Pro like there is on metal-and-glass phones.

The ring/silent aka mute switch, volume buttons, and side/power buttons have all curiously moved a few millimeters down. Nothing major, but they're just a little more reachable, which is a good thing.

On the bottom, there’s a Lightning port, stereo speaker (the other speaker is the earpiece), and microphones. A USB-C port instead of Lightning like on the iPad Pro(opens in a new tab) would’ve really made the iPhone 11 Pro even more pro-like, but that kind of change should probably be saved for a top-to-bottom design refresh.

Apple also increased the iPhone's water resistance again. The phones are still IP68 rated, but they can be submerged in up to 13 feet of water for up to 30 minutes compared to 6 feet of water for the iPhone XS and 6.5 feet for the iPhone 11.

Greater durability is always a plus, but I can’t say I needed more water resistance. I suppose if there’s a high chance you’ll drop your phone in a pool, or lake, or sea, you’re gonna be all like “Hells yeah,” but otherwise, when are those extra feet really going to matter?

At first glance, you might think the iPhone 11 Pros have the same displays as the iPhone XS and XS Max.

Yes, the OLED display sizes and resolutions are the same (5.8 inches on the iPhone 11 Pro at 2,436 x 1,125 resolution and 6.5 inches with 2,688 x 1,242 resolution on the iPhone 11 Pro Max, both at 458 pixels per inch), and the notch hasn't shrunk. But underlying improvements technically make them better (on paper, at least).

First, the iPhone 11 Pro’s Super Retina XDR display (a ridiculous name that’s so jargon-filled it almost has no meaning) is brighter than the regular Super Retina display on the iPhone XS. Apple says the iPhone 11 Pro's' screen can reach up to 800 nits of peak brightness outdoors compared to the iPhone XS's 660 nits, and can hit 1,200 nits of brightness when viewing HDR10 and Dolby Vision videos or HDR photos.

In practice, I don't think the increased brightness adds any meaningful value to what were already incredible displays. Holding my iPhone XS and iPhone 11 Pro, side by side, the latter’s screen was a little more readable in direct sunlight, but not dramatically so. I’m not complaining about a brighter screen, but since I (and most people I know) usually have the brightness set to between 50-75 percent most of the time, I can’t say I’ve ever stopped and said, “I sure wish the screen could get brighter!”

Ditto for the increased contrast ratio. On the iPhone 11 Pro, the Super Retina XDR display has a 2,000,000:1 contrast ratio compared to 1,000,000:1 on the iPhone XS.

It's another nice technical spec for Apple to brag about, but I don't think most people who get the iPhone 11 Pro will notice and appreciate it. I played an episode of Planet Earth II, an HDR10 series, on Netflix on my iPhone XS and iPhone 11 Pro (both set to full display brightness) and asked a few friends and colleagues if they could tell the difference.

Only one person out of five said the iPhone 11 Pro looked better with more dynamic range and better contrast. The other four said the video looked about the same, and after I told them which phone was which, their collective impression boiled down to “Oh, that’s nice.”

The iPhone 11 Pros also come with a sound upgrade with support for Dolby Atmos. Phones like the Galaxy Note 10 and OnePlus 7 Pro(opens in a new tab) had Dolby Atmos first and now the iPhone 11 Pros (and iPhone 11) have the improved sound, too.

For content that supports Dolby Atmos, you should be able to hear more range between the highs and lows for a more immersive spatial sound experience. In reality, through the speakers or AirPods, I’m not convinced many people will be able to hear the greater separation. I barely noticed an improvement until I paired Sony’s WF-1000XM3(opens in a new tab) true wireless earbuds and turned on noise cancelation, and cranked the volume up in a quiet room at the office.

Personally, I miss 3D Touch(opens in a new tab). While I understand that most people won’t — the pressure-sensitive display tech never expanded beyond being a right-click — I loved and used 3D Touch all the time. In place of 3D Touch is Haptic Touch, a long press and vibration, that Apple introduced on the iPhone XR.

Haptic Touch replicates most of 3D Touch’s functions (minus needing to press harder into the screen), but using the iPhone 11 Pro made me miss small 3D Touch features like the ability to “pop” (expand to full screen) a photo on Instagram or preview of a website link. Similarly, I had to retrain my brain to stop 3D Touching anywhere on the keyboard to bring up the cursor for text selection and instead remember that the function is now a long press on the space bar.

Apple told me it removed 3D Touch for a number of reasons: the display tech was expensive and they couldn’t bring it to other iOS devices such as iPads. With iOS 13(opens in a new tab), many of the functions previously exclusive to 3D Touch-equipped iPhones such as “peek” and “Quick Actions” (the shortcut menus that appear when you 3D Touch on an app icon on the home screen) are available for all supported iPhones, iPads, and iPod touches as a simple long press without needing special screen hardware.

I miss 3D Touch dearly — some of you guys do too(opens in a new tab)— but I’m all for iOS features working more consistently on all iOS devices, so I think it’s a win in the end.

Let's not waste any more time, and talk about the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max's cameras. There are four cameras on each phone — three on the rear and one on the front.

On the back, the triple camera consists of the following:

• 12-megapixel "wide" camera with f/1.8 aperture with optical image stabilization (OIS)
• 12-megapixel "2x telephoto" camera f/2.0 aperture with OIS
• 12-megapixel "ultra wide" camera with f/2.4 aperture and 120-degree field of view

Inside of the notch, the "TrueDepth" camera's been upgraded from the iPhone XS's 7-megapixel shooter to 12-megapixels with same f/2.2 aperture.

If you've got an iPhone with a single rear camera, you might be thinking the iPhone 11 Pro's triple-camera system is a little overkill. But I think once you use it and see how all three cameras work as one, giving you a zoom range from 13mm (ultra wide) to 26mm (wide) to 52mm (2x telephoto), you won't be able to go back to a single lens.

You'll get slightly better photos, especially in low-light scenarios, using the 2x telephoto lens since it's got a faster f/2.0 aperture to absorb more light, but the ultra wide camera is the star attraction.

Apple isn't the first to include a triple-camera system with an ultra wide lens. Huawei beat everyone to punch with the Mate 20 Pro(opens in a new tab) and this year almost every phone maker, including Samsung and OnePlus, added triple-rear cameras to their flagship phones.

In typical Apple fashion, though, the company ceded being first to focus on making the best triple-camera system. Other phones may have a similar three-lens camera system, but they fail to work consistently as one. 

Apple's deep software paired with the camera hardware is what sets the iPhone 11 Pro cameras apart and makes zooming between the three cameras feel so smooth; there's none of the stuttering you see on Android phones when you toggle from one camera to the other.

It's for this very reason that the three cameras on the back of the iPhone 11 Pros are aligned the way they are: for zooming straight out from the center. On Android phones, where the three cameras are usually aligned in a row, you have to physically shift the phone to the left or to right to recompose a shot, and doing so feels less like zooming in and out and more like switching to separate cameras. It's a small detail, but if you're serious about photography, it makes all the difference.

Below, you'll find examples of the kinds of shots you can get with the three cameras. With the ultra wide camera, photos that would have previously required the use of a wide lens attachment from companies like Moment or Olloclip(opens in a new tab) are now possible. I could spill another hundred words, but I'll just let the photos speak for themselves.

Shooting with the ultra wide camera dramatizes the scale of a scene. Landscapes, buildings, rooms — everything is widened and looks a little more epic.

As I said in my Galaxy S10+ review(opens in a new tab), shooting with an ultra wide camera on a smartphones is a ton of fun. It's hard to go back to the main wide camera, but here's why you shouldn't use it all the time. 

Besides the obvious image distortion — the ultra wide lens curves things to look larger and smaller — photos aren't as crisp as with the wide and telephoto cameras.

First, there's no optical image stabilization (OIS) on the ultra wide camera, which means shots tend to be softer when you zoom in to examine the details.

And second, it's not as good for low-light photography; both the wide and telephoto have faster apertures (measured with an f-stop of f/1.8 and f/2.0, respectively).

If you're only planning to share iPhone 11 Pro photos to Instagram or Twitter, sharpness isn't as high of a priority. But if want to get the best iPhone 11 Pro photos, you'll going to have to work a little harder: definitely lock in your focus instead of relying on autofocus for sharper shots.

Not all ultra wide smartphone cameras are equal, though. As I've said many times before, a camera's ability to capture a photo is only one part of the equation. To get a great photo, you also need top-notch image processing, which matters just as much (if not more).

Take a look at the ultra wide shots below. The Galaxy Note 10 has the sharpest photo, but the color temperature is bluer than the scene really looked, and the fake candle lights in the chandelier are blown out. The photo taken with Huawei's P30 Pro has a red cast and the candles are even more overexposed. The OnePlus 7 Pro shot is the darkest, but it did a better job preserving the candles than the P30 Pro.

Meanwhile, the iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro captured the most true-to-life image with accurate colors, exposed the candles the best, and maintained sharpness across the image. They didn't produce the crispest photos, but overall, the consistency of the image quality wins in my opinion. 

Different smartphones also have different lenses. Samsung's phones are the most similar in terms of lens focal length, but phones like the P30 Pro and OnePlus 7 Pro have arguably superior telephoto lenses.

Once again, you can see how the color science varies between phone cameras and their three lenses. The iPhone 11 Pros always produce the most realistic colors. Samsung's Galaxy Note 10 tends to dial up the brightness and saturation for more vivid pics. Shots from Huawei's P30 Pro are just too red. And the OnePlus 7 camera, while markedly better than previous OnePlus phones, still lacks the wider dynamic range from the other phone cameras.

Night mode is an equally major upgrade for the iPhone 11 Pro cameras. Google was the first to blow minds with Night Sight(opens in a new tab) on the Pixel 3(opens in a new tab), using "computational photography" to composite multiple photos into a brightly-exposed image. Night Sight shots are often unreal: scenes that are completely dark to the naked eye are brought to life and made visible.

The iPhone 11 Pros catch up to Night Sight with their own night mode. The feature automatically kicks in when the wide or telephoto camera detects there isn't enough light in a scene. A night mode icon with a recommended exposure time (usually between 1-5 seconds) appears next to the flash icon and when you tap the shutter button, an exposure meter counts down to indicate how long you should hold still. 

The meter is also used to manually turn night mode off or switch to the maximum recommended exposures. Pop the iPhone 11 Pro on a tripod and it'll automatically shoot at the highest exposure time (I got a 30-second exposure for one photo).

In the below shot of a building in Chinatown, you can see how the iPhone 11 Pro's camera without night mode and with night mode compare.

Sure, Google did night mode first, but the feature is more intuitive on the iPhone 11 Pro. On a Pixel, a spinning exposure ring blocks the entire viewfinder while you're holding still, but on the iPhone 11 Pro, you can see in real time an exposure getting brighter as the timer counts down.

And the iPhone 11 Pro's night mode also produces better photos in my opinion — sharper details from corner to corner, and better tones and contrast to preserve a scene's mood. Whereas night mode on other phones brighten a scene to the point it looks artificial or flat, the iPhone 11 Pro's night mode more delicately balances the light and dark areas in both the foreground and background.

Have a look at the Vespa comparisons below, with and without night mode, for several phones. The quality of the night mode on the iPhone 11 Pro is richer. After all, even with night mode, you still want a photo to look like it's nighttime.

Below are the same shots of the red Vespa with the iPhone XS and iPhone XR, both without any night mode because Apple isn't adding it to past devices.

Night mode works a little differently with people. When taking photos of people with night mode, the Neural Engine applies all kinds of machine learning algorithms so that the face is more finely exposed along with the background. Skin and hair should have more specular highlights, faces should appear a little sharpened.

Relying on autofocus alone, I can't say the iPhone 11 Pro's night mode blows rival Android night modes away. Huawei's P30 Pro took the sharpest photo, but it lacks contrast. The Galaxy Note 10 pic is too soft. The OnePlus 7 Pro does a decent job, but the white balance skews yellow.

The iPhone 11 Pro preserved the background the best (see the emergency truck on the right) with greater detail, but my jacket details were lost and my face could've used a little more illumination.

All of the phone cameras turned the sky into daytime, which was not what it really looked like (actual color was navy).

As with shooting with the ultra wide, you'll get sharper night mode photos if you manually lock the focus; autofocus is more reliable than on Android phones (some phones failed to autofocus at all), but it can be finicky.

And again, just so you can see the previous generation, here's the iPhone XS and iPhone XR, neither with any night mode. Just a regular camera.

Portrait mode is improved as well. On the iPhone X and XS, portrait mode only worked with the 2x telephoto camera, and on the XR, Apple used machine learning to blur out the background.

But on the iPhone 11 Pro, the wide and 2x telephoto can both be used for portrait mode, giving you the best of both portrait modes from the iPhone XS and XR.

Portrait mode photos taken with the wide camera will be wider, brighter, and sharper because of its faster f/1.8 lens aperture. However, the background blur, aka bokeh, won't be as creamy as portrait shots taken with the 2x telephoto camera. 

As you can see, each camera yields different portrait looks, mimicking a 35mm focal length (wide camera) and 52mm focal length (2x telephoto).

The Galaxy Note 10 can also take portrait photos (called "live focus") with both the main and telephoto cameras, but the images don't look anywhere near as vibrant. The white balance is bluer, creating a colder mood, and the image processing airbrushes away too much of the details.

Below are how other phones do portrait photography. Many people like the Pixel 3's AI-generated background blur. I think the image looks too flat and a fake, like a cheap gaussian blur applied in Photoshop. The Huawei P30 Pro and OnePlus 7 Pro shots also feel lifeless. 

A little bit of editing could spruce up any of these portrait photos, but straight out of the camera? iPhone 11 Pro easily beats everyone.

No surprise here: the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max take solid selfies. The camera app also has a neat trick: hold it vertically and it'll crop in for a 7-megapixel selfie (for single selfies, duh) and hold it horizontally and the viewfinder will expand to the wider field of view with 12-megapixel resolution (for group selfies). 

Of course, you can manually choose to get the wider or zoomed-in shot, but it's kind of nice the field of view adapts depending on the orientation you're holding the iPhone 11 Pro. Samsung's Galaxy S10 and Note 10, which also crop in and out, have no such orientation intelligence.

Of all the phones, the Pixel 3 and 3 XL are the only ones with two front-facing cameras (wide and ultra wide), each with 8 megapixels. There's no digital zooming in and out happening. 

But then again, that doesn't really matter when the image quality comes out looking this undeveloped:

Even with more megapixels, selfies from other Android phones don't necessarily crush the iPhones. The color accuracy is all wrong and the dynamic range is mediocre.

Portrait mode for selfies aren't shabby, either. There's a little more dynamic range in the iPhone 11 Pro shot compared to the one taken on iPhone XS, and you can see the foreground is better isolated from the background (my jacket isn't blurred out).

The Pixel takes a good selfie, but what happened to the color? I have no clue. The Galaxy Note 10 is the same story as ever: too much face smoothening and soft image quality overall. The Huawei P30 failed to focus. And the OnePlus 7 sucks at highlights (see the over-exposed nose).

There are numerous improvements to recording video. All of the iPhone 11 Pro's cameras (front and back) can record video in 4K resolution at up to 60 frames per second; older iPhones only let you shoot at 4K60 on the rear cameras. 

Vloggers will really appreciate this — 60 fps makes your footage look more lifelike — but it bums me out there's no way to choose different resolutions and frame rates for the front and rear cameras.

As it is, you can only choose one resolution and frame rate for all the cameras. I want the option to record video at, say, 1080p at 30 fps with the front-facing camera and 4K at 60 fps through the triple cameras. I, personally, don't need or want 4K front-facing videos and being able to set the front camera to record at a lower resolution would also help save on storage.

I'm aware that only allowing for one resolution and frame rate for all of the cameras keeps things consistent, but again, this feels like another feature that would've made the iPhone 11 Pros' cameras more "pro."

Third-party apps like FilMic Pro will let you view all four cameras at once and record from two simultaneously.

And, how can I forget about slow motion selfies, aka "slofies?" Corny name aside, this is gonna be a hit with the TikTok generation. 

As with all of my the smartphone camera comparisons, I want to remind you that we're all going to have different picture preferences. Some of you, like me, will side with the iPhone 11 Pro for its consistency across all four cameras and others will maybe prefer what the Galaxy Note 10 or Pixel 3 produces. 

Photography will always be subjective and it's more important to go out and shoot better photos than focus strictly on image quality because the differences really are in the details now, and on Instagram or Twitter, nobody's pixel peeping because every photo is compressed further.

What I can say is Apple really caught up to Android phones with the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max. Personally, I feel the cameras strike the best balance when it comes to capturing reality without creeping into night-turns-to-day-fake-reality-world, but that's just me. 

They're so good, most people will probably ditch real cameras for good. I'm calling it now: it's all downhill for consumer mirrorless cameras and DSLRs from here. And when "Deep Fusion," a camera feature that fuses together multiple images to create one even sharper shot is released through a future software update, it'll be even more game over for consumer cameras.

As always, I'm including a gallery of my favorite unedited photos taken with the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max. I'm also always game to hear your feedback on Twitter @raywongy(opens in a new tab) or on Instagram @sourlemons(opens in a new tab) if you want to chat about all things smartphone photography.

It’s no secret Apple’s custom A-series Bionic system-on-chips (SoC) in its iPhones run laps around Qualcomm’s best Snapdragon silicon.

Last year, Apple’s A12 Bionic chip left the best Android phones with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 845 chip in its dust, and it’s widening that gap even further with the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max’s A13 Bionic chip.

The 64-bit A13 Bionic still has two “performance cores” and four “high efficiency cores,” but this time they have 20 and 40 percent faster CPU performance, respectively, while also being 30-40 percent more power efficient.

Apple says the A13 Bionic is the most powerful chip in any smartphone and my own tests confirm the iPhone 11 Pros indeed maintain the company’s lead over the latest Android phones.

To see how the beefy iPhone 11 Pros compared to the iPhone XS and latest Android phones, I fired up Primate Labs’ latest benchmarking app, Geekbench 5, and ran the CPU test. (Note: Geekbench 5(opens in a new tab) has 75-80 percent lower scores than Geekbench 4. As such, you can’t directly compare a Geekbench 4 score to a Geekbench 5 one and I had to run Geekbench 5 on all the below phones to get an accurate comparison.)

Based on an average of three tests, the iPhone 11 Pro running iOS 13 scored 1,335 on the single-core test and 3,489 on the multi-core test. The iPhone 11 Pro Max scored 1,336 on the single-core test and 3,499 on the multi-core test. Both of these CPU tests confirm the A13 Bionic is 20 percent faster on single-core and 32 percent speedier on multi-core than the iPhone XS running on the latest iOS 13.1 developer beta 3, which racked scores of 1,112 on single-core and 2,649 on multi-core.

Even the latest flagship Android phones are no match for the iPhone 11 Pros. Samsung’s Galaxy Note 10+ (Snapdragon 855 chip(opens in a new tab)) scored 730 on single-core and 2,380 on multi-core, making it 45 percent and 32 percent slower than the iPhone 11 Pro.

The OnePlus 7 Pro (Snapdragon 855 chip) scored 731 on single-core and 2,693 on multi-core, 45 percent and 23 percent slower on each test.

And Huawei’s P30 Pro (Kirin 980 chip(opens in a new tab)) scored 673 on single-core and 2,371 on multi-core — 50 percent and 32 percent slower, respectively, than iPhone 11 Pro.

Google’s Pixel 3 XL, which uses a last-gen Snapdragon 845 chip performed the worst: 367 on single-core and 1,763 on multi-core — 73 percent and 50 percent slower on each test compared to the iPhone 11 Pro.

Additionally, the A13 Bionic has a four-core GPU that’s 20 percent faster and up to 40 percent more power efficient for graphics tasks.

I downloaded several 3D games including Asphalt 9: Legends, Fortnite, Horizon Chase, and Grimvalor to see if I could spot any graphics performance boost, and… not really. Both Asphalt 9 and Fortnite push 3D graphics on iPhone really hard and as far as I could tell, they played virtually the same on both the iPhone 11 Pro and my iPhone XS. I didn’t notice any leap in frame rates or details.

I didn’t see huge graphics performance gains when editing video. Using a 1 minute and 25 second iMovie video project consisting of 10 video clips shot on the iPhone 11 Pro Max in 4K resolution at 60 fps, with nine dissolve transitions, and a title, the iPhone 11 Pro (iOS 13) exported the video at 4K60 in 1 minute and 41 seconds compared to my iPhone XS (iOS 12.4) which completed the export in 1 minute and 43 seconds. The iPhone 11 Pro was 2 percent faster at exporting the video.

Doing a 1080p export of the same 4K60 video project, the iPhone 11 Pro crunched the video in 31 seconds and my iPhone XS in 33 seconds, making for a 6.5 percent faster export.

To be fair, the A13 Bionic’s GPU is only 20 percent faster than the A12 Bionic, which is 50 percent faster than the A11 Bionic. The GPU improvement is not as significant this year. While I didn’t see a major boost to GPU performance, things could change as developers optimize their games for the A13 Bionic and Apple Arcade and its 100+ games launch. But at release time, I’m not seeing any real gains for gaming.

However, for augmented reality, apps such as Angry Birds AR: Isle of Pigs, The Birdcage 2 and Homecourt, did feel smoother. My guess is the A13 Bionic’s Neural Engine, which is up to 20 percent faster than the one in the A12 Bionic, is able to help speed up the calculations in an app like Homecourt to make it more responsive.

The iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max have also closed the gap on Gigabit-class LTE connectivity. Where Android phones with Qualcomm Snapdragon modems used to crush iPhone’s Intel modems, the iPhone 11 Pros are more evenly matched.

I ran LTE speed tests on an iPhone XS, iPhone 11 Pro, Galaxy Note 10+, and OnePlus 7 Pro — all with T-Mobile SIM cards and set to the same server — using Ookla’s Speedtest app (disclosure: Mashable parent company Ziff Davis also owns Ookla), and got the following download and upload speeds based on an average of three tests:

• iPhone 11 Pro: 103 and 55 Mbps
• iPhone XS: 78 Mbps download and 44 Mbps upload
• Galaxy Note 10+: 100 Mbps download and 47 Mbps
• OnePlus 7 Pro: 99 Mbps download and 45 Mbps upload

Now, with any cellular speed tests, your mileage will vary depending on where you are. I was in New York City when I ran these tests at around 12:30 a.m. The download and upload speeds were faster than during the day when T-Mobile is more congested, but you should still see faster LTE speeds on the iPhone 11 Pro than on the iPhone XS. In my experience, Android phones also tend to get faster LTE than iPhones during the day.

Apple’s also baked in WiFi 6 speeds(opens in a new tab), which is capable of up to 4-10x the data throughput and capacity of WiFi 5 and older networks. I wasn’t able to test this since I didn’t have any WiFi 6 networking gear to try it on. WiFi 6 is more of a future-proof feature, and you’ll appreciate when it’s ubiquitous over the next few years.

Mostly, the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max are so fast and responsive because of iOS 13. We’ve already highlighted all of the great features in iOS 13, including (but not limited to) dark mode, 30 percent faster Face ID, revamped Photos and Apple Maps apps, redesigned Reminds app, brand new share sheet, a “Find My” app that combines the previous “Find My iPhone and “Find My Friends” apps, more Memoji customization options, new Siri voice and simply Shortcuts automation, and a slew of privacy-focused features like “Sign in with Apple” and stronger Bluetooth and location access.

All of these software features work great on older devices like the iPhone XS and XR, but they’re just a teensy bit more fluid on the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max.

There are also a few other less-talked about features on the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max, like its U1 chip, which uses “Ultra Wideband” technology for more accurate spatial awareness, according to Apple.

For example, Apple says you could prioritize a file transfer to another device with a U1 chip using AirDrop just by pointing your iPhone 11 Pro at theirs. This feature wasn't available for me to test, but Apple says it will be ready in the upcoming iOS 13.1 software update. 

The more accurate location tracking technology seems promising, especially if Apple really is planning on launching its rumored Tile-like item trackers(opens in a new tab) soon.

The most underrated feature on the new iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max is easily battery life.

Apple’s insistence on making its iPhones thinner limited how far it could push battery life in previous iPhones, but not this year.

The thicker iPhone 11 Pros have room for a larger battery. Coupled with the power efficiencies from the A13 Bionic chip and you get longer use time: Apple claims up to 4 extra hours on the iPhone 11 Pro compared to the iPhone XS and up to 5 more hours on the iPhone 11 Pro Max versus the iPhone XS Max.

My iPhone XS usually lasts from around 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. with my abnormally heavy usage (lots of email, Slack, iMessage, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Spotify, and Feedly). On the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max, I routinely got about 3-4 more hours. I probably could have squeezed out the full 4-5 hours Apple advertises, but that would have required tweaking some settings like reducing the brightness down from 100 percent and lessening the frequency apps used my location.

Real talk: longer battery is low key the one feature everyone needs. It’s not sexy and really easy to gloss right over, but you’ll appreciate it when you’re out late and don’t need to bum a charge off someone else’s battery pack.

It’s also nice that battery life on this year’s iPhone actually makes sense. Whereas the iPhone XR had longer battery life than the iPhone XS and XS Max, the most expensive iPhone 11 Pro now rightfully has the longest battery life.

If you care about battery life above all, here’s how it breaks down from longest to shortest: iPhone 11 Pro Max, iPhone 11 Pro, and iPhone 11.

The iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max also come with one thing the iPhone 11 doesn't: a fast power adapter. Finally!

Although the iPhone 11 is still saddled with a puny 5-watt power adapter and USB-A-to-Lightning cable, the iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max come with an 18-watt power adapter and USB-C-to-Lightning that can charge them more quickly. 

Android phones have included fast chargers in the box for years and I complained about Apple being cheap about bundling a fast charger with the iPhone XS and XS Max. It’s good the power adapter, a $29 value, isn’t a separate cost anymore.

And trust me, you definitely want the 18-watt power adapter. In my tests using it, the iPhone 11 Pro charged up to about 28 percent in 15 minutes, 47 percent in 30 minutes, 65 percent in 45 minutes, 81 percent in 60 minutes, and 100 percent in about 112 minutes.

Meanwhile, if you use a 5-watt charger, you’d be getting much slower charge times: less than half the speed of the 18-watt charger. In 15 minutes, the iPhone 11 Pro charged about 12 percent; 23 percent in 30 minutes; 40 percent in 60 minutes; and over 2 hours for 100 percent. 

Worth noting: you can get a more powerful power adapter, like 30 watts or 61 watts, but the charging times will essentially be the same as the 18-watt charger. Just a little FYI for ya.

Wired charging is excellent on the iPhone 11 Pros, but still kind of average with a wireless charger. Just like the iPhone X, XR, and XS, the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max support Qi wireless charging on power mats with up to 7.5 watts. Samsung’s Galaxy Note 10, however, is capable of faster wireless charging at up to 15 watts with the right wireless charger.

You don’t need me to tell you the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max are the most advanced iPhones ever. Because of course they are.

What you’re likely wondering is whether or not Apple’s latest and greatest are worthy of the “pro” name. If you’ve read the entirety of this review, it’s pretty obvious they are.

With a versatile triple-camera system, noticeably longer battery life, powerful A13 Bionic performance, and even better display, the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max rightfully earn their premium pricing.

There are for sure arguments to be made that Apple isn’t pushing the envelope on design again, instead choosing to reuse the iPhone X’s two-year-old look, with just a change to the glass texture and camera bump.

But anyone who thinks innovation can only be purposeful if it looks new on the surface doesn’t really understand what iPhones are: powerful devices that enable you to do more, not just on day one or in six months, but years down the road.

How many Android phones get four years of software updates and quickly? I can’t name a single one, but the iPhone 6S, a four-year-old device, is getting iOS 13, which bodes well for the iPhone 11 Pros. How many other phones can add 4-5 hours of battery life without making them significantly larger? Mmhmm.

The iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max don’t have a new sparkly color the way the Note 10 does or a notch-free display like on the OnePlus 7 Pro, but aesthetic fades fast. Nor do they have any unproven technologies such as foldable displays or 5G — I’ll wait until this stuff isn’t half baked, thank you very much.

At the end of the day, the things that matter most aren’t how the device looks and feels (most people will put a case or screen protector on their phones, anyway), but whether it works reliably, and the iPhone 11 Pros do.

“Most people make the mistake of thinking design is what it looks like,” Steve Jobs famously said(opens in a new tab). “People think it’s this veneer — that the designers are handed this box and told, ‘Make it look good!’ That’s not what we think design is. It’s not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.”

It’s not enough to have great hardware and dank software (or vice versa) — you need both to be best and the iPhone 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max prove Apple still has the magic touch.