Key Takeaways

• The iPhone 15 series brings significant upgrades, including the Dynamic Island, A16 Bionic chip, and 48MP main cameras from last year's Pro phones.
• The introduction of a USB Type-C port is a major improvement for managing multiple devices and simplifying travel.
• While the iPhone 15 is mostly similar to the iPhone 14 Pro, it still delivers on what is expected from a top-tier phone, despite some iOS software quirks.

The iPhone 15 series is the most significant upgrade to the iPhone lineup in years, even if that's not saying much. There's usually not much to talk about with year-over-year improvements, which is partially why 2 and 3-year upgrade cycles are more common, but this is a special year for the base model. The iPhone 15 and 15 Plus now have the Dynamic Island, A16 Bionic chip, and 48MP main cameras from last year's Pro phones, as well as a new USB Type-C port to replace the old Lightning connector.

Even if the iPhone 15 is mostly just the iPhone 14 Pro with a new port, it's almost exactly what I want out of a phone. You still have to deal with the usual iOS software quirks, though.

Price and Availability

The iPhone 15 starts at $799 in the United States, while the iPhone 15 Plus starts at $899. The two phones are identical, except the Plus has a larger screen and battery. There's still no Mini version, which Apple has not offered since the iPhone 13 Mini. Both phones are available in the same five colors: blue, pink, yellow, green, and black.

Both models have 128GB of storage as the base capacity, and you can double that to 256GB for an extra $100 ($899 for the 15, $999 for the 15 Plus), or get 512GB for an extra $300 ($1099 for the 15, $1199 for the 15 Plus). Those are expensive upgrades, especially given the declining cost of flash storage, but overcharging for more storage is typical for Apple. There's also no 1TB option for either model, only the Pro series.

Apple and most mobile carriers (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, etc.) will offer discounts on the iPhone 15 when you trade in an eligible old phone, and some mobile networks are handing out more significant discounts in the form of bill credits. Those promotions can change frequently, so check with your carrier to see what deals are available for you.

The Design

The look and feel of the iPhone 15 and 15 Plus are almost identical to last year's iPhone 14 series. The front has an edge-to-edge display with Apple's own "Ceramic Shield," which the company says is "tougher than any other smartphone glass." The sides are aluminum, and the back panel is glass with a matte texture. The manufacturing process has changed slightly since the iPhone 14 series, as "color is infused throughout the back glass," which makes the camera bump more closely match the phone's main color.

There's still a large camera bump on the back of the phone, ensuring the iPhone 15 won't sit flat on a table without the right case. That's typical for a modern smartphone, but still annoying. The volume buttons and mute switch are still located on the left side—only the iPhone 15 Pro gets the new Action button—and the power button is on the right side.

The Lightning connector that has been present since the iPhone 5 is finally gone, as the iPhone 15 series switches to USB Type-C. The new port might not be a big deal to the people already knee-deep in the MagSafe ecosystem (which the iPhone 15 continues to support), but it's a massive improvement for managing multiple devices, simplifying travel, and cutting down on e-waste. The iPhone 15 works perfectly with all the USB-C chargers and cables I already own, and I don't have to think "did I pack the one specific cable my phone needs?" whenever I go somewhere. Households with a mix of iPhones and Androids will also have an easier time, especially with CarPlay/Android Auto, and other use cases that previously required switching between cables constantly.

For the first time ever, the iPhone is using the same connector as the rest of the smartphone industry. Remember, before Lightning, iPhones were using the 30-pin connector from the iPod. Granted, Android phones and tablets were far from standardized charging in those days—anyone remember Micro-B USB? The people who extensively bought into the Lightning ecosystem might not be fans of the iPhone 15's new port and will have to buy some dongles, but it's a great improvement overall.

The iPhone 15 also has all of the same design shortcomings as last year's phones. There's still no headphone jack, so now, instead of a Lightning adapter, you'll need a USB-C dongle to listen with wired headphones—Apple sells one for $9. This is also Apple's second iPhone series to use eSIM exclusively instead of offering a physical SIM card tray (unless you buy the phone outside the US). That means swapping SIMs between phones or using a different SIM for international travel might be more of an involved process, depending on your mobile network. I was coming from an iPhone SE with a physical Cricket Wireless SIM card, and when I tried Apple's own SIM copy feature in the Settings app, my service was working on the iPhone 15 in about a minute.

Speaking of connectivity, the iPhone 15 series has the same satellite SOS feature as the iPhone 14 series. If you're in one of the supported countries, including the United States, you can contact emergency services or update your Find My location from areas without a functioning cell signal. Apple has also updated it to offer roadside assistance with AAA in the United States. It's a great feature that has already been saving lives in the iPhone 14 series.

The Display

The iPhone 15 has an excellent screen, even if it's not too different from what Apple offered on the iPhone 14 series (noticing a trend here?). It's a "Super Retina XDR display," using the same type of OLED panel found on most other flagship and mid-range smartphones, such as the Samsung Galaxy S23 series and Google Pixel 7. If you're coming from a phone with a more basic LCD screen, like an iPhone SE or anything older than the iPhone 12, you're in for a treat.

The iPhone 15 has a 6.1-inch screen, while the iPhone 15 Plus has a 6.7-inch screen. The larger model also has a slightly higher resolution (2796x1290 vs. 2556x1179) to compensate for the increased surface area. Everything else is the same, including the 1000 nits max brightness, "True Tone" feature that adjusts colors to be more accurate based on the light around you, and HDR support. I don't have any complaints with the screen on my base model iPhone 15—the deep blacks look great, and the screen can get bright enough in daylight.

Notably, the base iPhone 15 and 15 Plus don't have the "ProMotion" adaptive refresh rate available on the Pro series. That feature doubles the screen's refresh rate from 60Hz to 120Hz in certain circumstances, improving the smoothness of animations and select games. This has been one of the more common criticisms of the base iPhone 15 since its announcement, especially since many budget Android phones have 120Hz screens, but the iPhone's faster processor and optimization with animations make 60Hz go a long way. ProMotion would have been a great addition, though its absence is not a deal-breaker when the rest of the display experience is this good.

Apple has brought the "Dynamic Island" from the iPhone 14 Pro to this model, replacing the slightly larger notch at the top of the screen. It's still a blank space at the top of the screen that contains the front-facing camera and Face ID sensors, but status indicators can appear along the edge, turning it into something more like the system tray on the Windows taskbar. For example, playing music will put the album art and sound levels in the Dynamic Island area.

There aren't many apps yet that use the Dynamic Island feature to an impressive extent, but there has been a gradual increase since the iPhone 14 Pro was released, and I expect we'll see that improve as more people buy the iPhone 15 series. I've seen two cool examples: Sports Alerts can place sports scores in the Island, and Pixel Pals adds Tamagotchi-style virtual pets to the Island that you can play with or feed.

The Software

The iPhone 15 series ships with iOS 17 out of the box, which is the latest version of Apple's mobile operating system at the time of writing. If you've used an iPhone before, you know exactly what to expect here. Except for the features built around the Dynamic Island and the USB Type-C port, everything here works much like recent versions of iOS on any other flagship iPhone from the past few years.

If you're coming from the Android ecosystem—which I expect many people will, now that there's a USB Type-C port—iOS isn't the radical change you might expect. Most of Google's apps and services work just as well on Apple platforms as on Android phones and tablets, and you can easily sync the email, contacts, and calendars from your Google account from the Settings app. The days of iOS forcing you to open all links in Safari or all email links in the Mail app have also been over for a while. You can even install the Gboard keyboard and use a more limited version of Google Assistant (as well as Lens) through the Google app.

There are still some downsides compared to Android devices, though. Apple still doesn't allow third-party browser engines on the App Store, so every alternative browser uses Safari's engine, which lacks some web features available in Chrome on Android. Most emulators are also still banned, and the ongoing Epic Games feud means there's no Fortnite either (that game requires sideloading on Android). The notification panel on iOS is also much worse than on Android phones, with no constant visual indicator in the status bar for unread alerts, and third-party home screen launchers don't exist on iPhone.

Apple does have an edge over Android in some software features, though. I love using Shortcuts to automate some tasks, like opening a web page with a certain Siri phrase or connecting to a Bluetooth speaker while opening Spotify. Long-term software support also still puts any Android phone to shame. There's no firm promise on when feature OS updates or security patches will end for the iPhone 15, but iOS 17 still supports phones as old as the iPhone XR from 2018, and security patches are still going out for devices on iOS 15 and 16 (such as the 2015 iPhone 6S).

It's a safe assumption that the iPhone 15 will get at least five or six years of iOS updates, and some security patches past that point. For comparison, flagship Samsung Galaxy devices currently get 4 years of Android OS updates and five years of security patches, and Google's Pixel phones are promised 3 years of OS updates and five years of security patches.

Performance

The iPhone 15 and 15 Plus are powered by the Apple A16 Bionic chipset, with a six-core CPU (two performance cores and six efficiency cores), a five-core GPU, and a 16-core Neural Engine for AI/machine learning workloads. It's the same chip used in last year's iPhone 14 Pro, while this year's Pro models get the newer A17 chip. Apple's marketing angle for using a year-old chipset in the iPhone 15 is calling it "proven performance," which is honestly fair—it's still incredibly fast and now has a year of software optimization and real-world testing in the 14 Pro series.

I have no complaints with real-world performance on the iPhone 15. Apps open quickly, multitasking is fluid, games run well, and so on. It helps that Apple is still ahead of the pack in its mobile chips: the iPhone 15 is around 20% faster in Geekbench 6 synthetic tests than the Galaxy S23 Ultra and its Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip.

As with any other iPhone from the past few years, the iPhone 15 is fast enough and responsive for just about anything you can do on a smartphone. You will miss out on the handful of major games in development exclusively for the iPhone 15 Pro and its A17 Pro chipset, such as "Resident Evil Village" and "Assassin's Creed Mirage," but everything else should work well.

The Battery Life

I didn't have much of an issue with battery life on the iPhone 15. My typical smartphone usage is checking emails and messages, watching videos, and occasionally tethering or playing games, but I've been playing more games than normal during my test period. Screen Time reports an average of 5 hours and 20 minutes of screen-on time, usually reaching around 30-35% charge before plugging it in overnight. If you don't use your phone a ton, you might be able to squeeze two days out of a single charge.

It's worth noting that all those cool interactive widgets in iOS 17 can drop your battery life if you have enough of them on your home screen. If you want to keep your iPhone 15 lasting all day, keep your interactive widgets to a minimum. You probably don't need to use that new 80% charging limit, though.

The Camera

The iPhone 15 and 15 Plus have two rear cameras, and they are a decent upgrade from the cameras on last year's iPhone 14. The main camera now uses a higher resolution 48MP sensor instead of the 12MP sensor on last year's phones (and matching the camera on the 14 Pro). Photos aren't actually saved at that resolution, though—the pixels are combined to create a sharper 24MP image. That's similar to what most other flagship and mid-range smartphones do with their main cameras.

The other rear camera is a 12MP ultrawide lens, which pulls double duty as a 120-degree ultrawide and a telephoto. It offers a 2x optical zoom, with digital zoom up to 5x. That's not as impressive as the 10x optical zoom on the iPhone 15 Pro Max or Galaxy S23 Ultra, but it is enough to zoom in on farther-away objects without completely destroying the image quality.

I'm pretty happy with the photos and videos I've captured on the iPhone 15. The 48MP sensor helps create sharper images, to the point where I can pull off some close-up macro photography (with help from the optical zoom). The two lenses also means you can use Cinematic Video and Portrait Mode, adding a customizable depth of field to your photos and videos. The algorithms for those modes still aren't perfect, but they can create some excellent shots with enough tweaking. The default blur for Portrait Mode is too much for my taste, though—I ended up using an F-Stop of 7 or 8 in most of my pictures instead of the default 4.5.

Apple is using a handful of computational tricks to improve the camera quality on the iPhone 15, most of which we've seen before. The "True Tone flash" tries to improve color balancing while taking flash pictures, and Night mode can improve low-light photos by leaving the aperture open for longer and removing image noise.

Video recording is supported up to 4K at 60FPS, with additional 1080p and 720p modes available. The previously-mentioned Cinematic mode supports up to 4K HDR @ 30 FPS, while Action mode (which adds more stabilization) maxes out at 2.8K @ 60 FPS. The iPhone 15 gives you a lot of options for capturing the world around you, and you certainly don't need a Pro-series iPhone to take some fantastic photos.

The front camera is still a 12MP "TrueDepth" sensor and is also used for some Face ID functions. It has improved HDR compared to the iPhone 14, and still supports video recording at up to 4K @ 60FPS. It's capable enough for video calls and some selfies, but if you're taking a group shot or something else where a more detailed image and wider field of view can help, you might want to flip the phone around. The front camera isn't bad, but now there's a much wider gap in image quality with the new 48MP rear sensor.

The Competition

As mentioned earlier, the iPhone 15 starts at $799 in the United States, while the iPhone 15 Plus starts at $899. The most direct competitor is the Samsung Galaxy S23, which was $799 at launch but has gone on sale repeatedly at $699. The Galaxy S23 Plus is also frequently on sale for around $800 or $900.

If you don't want an Android phone, and you don't mind the Lightning connector, last year's iPhone 14 series is almost the same experience. You can buy the phones directly from Apple starting at $699 ($100 less than the 15 series), and mobile networks might give you a better deal. For example, as of the time of writing, Verizon will sell you any iPhone 14 or 14 Pro series phone for $0 (paid through bill credits) if you set it up on a new line.

If you go opt for an iPhone 14 over the 15, you're losing out on the higher resolution rear camera, the USB Type-C port, a slightly worse chip, and the Dynamic Island in place of the notch. The Lightning connector might become more of an annoyance as time goes on, but you definitely don't have to worry about Lightning cables becoming scarce or anything. You can also still use USB-C chargers, portable batteries, or data sync with a USB-C-to-Lightning cord.

Should You Buy the Apple iPhone 15?

The Apple iPhone 15 and 15 Plus are the most substantial year-over-year upgrades for the base iPhones in years. They have new internal hardware (unlike last year), a better main camera, and a smaller screen cutout to replace the big notch. The phones work well, take great photos, and have all-day battery life. There's a lot to like here.

The most important upgrade, and the one that has received the most attention in the tech press, is the USB Type-C port. Apple's phones are no longer excluded from the one-cable-for-everything dream that the Android, PC, and Mac ecosystem has enjoyed for years. I don't want to praise Apple for the switch—the company held onto its stupid fragile Lightning connector and its associated licensing fees for as long as possible, and without supranational legislation forcing its hand, it's possible Apple might have held off on the transition for another year or two.

No matter how it happened, it's great to finally see an iPhone that truly fits in with the rest of the smartphone industry. If you're ready to cut Lightning out of your daily life, the iPhone 15 is a great buy, and it's also a notable upgrade if you're coming from an iPhone 13, 12, or older model.