The smartphone market, it seemed, was in a race to turn phones into phablets, with each new smartphone being released sporting yet a bigger screen size. The one company that didn’t seem to fall into this race is Apple, until the iPhone 5 – but even then, the screen was restricted to a rather reserved 4 inches, much off the average of its competitors. There has been speculation suggesting the iPhone 5S may go even bigger with the screen, but on the recent earnings call with Tim Cook, MacRumors points out he has other ideas.
My view continues to be that iPhone 5 has the best display in the industry. We always strive to create the very best display. Some customers value large screen size. Others value other factors such as resolution, color quality, white balance, reflectivity, power consumption, compatibility of apps, and portability. Our competitors have made some significant tradeoffs in many of these areas to ship a larger display. We would not ship a larger display iPhone while these tradeoffs exist.
iPhone 5S
Whilst Tim Cook does not explicitly deny Apple are open to the idea of creating an iPhone with a 4+ inch display, he does mention that the supply manufacturers simply cannot create such a big screen with the quality and attributes Apple expects that are present in the smaller displays. This is probably why Apple chose 4-inches – it was the biggest they could go without compromising quality.
Consequently, it is safe to assume that firstly Apple won’t go back to a 3.5-inch display for the iPhone 5S, and they’re not going any bigger in the foreseeable future, so it’s safe to assume that the iPhone 5S will feature the same 4-inch display as found on the iPhone 5.
Whilst not a revolutionary breakthrough, it is the first confirmed feature of the unreleased iPhone 5S.