The iPhone X has gone Super Saiyan and transformed into the iPhone XS Max. This absolute unit of a handset touts the company’s largest iPhone screen in history and comes with a record-shattering $1,099 price tag to boot.
The International Data Corporation forecasts that phablets — smartphones with a display that is least 5.5-inches or larger — are expected to outshine smaller phones by the year 2021. This is not Apple’s first foray into the plus-sized phone market, but the Cupertino-based company has clearly set its sights on stealing the spotlight from the 6.4-inch Samsung Galaxy Note 9 released earlier this year. But unfortunately, bigness — along with some tweaks under the hood — are the only major changes to speak of this time around.
That wasn’t exactly unexpected, it is after all an “S Year” for Apple, meaning that the company’s new trio of iPhones remained largely unchanged aesthetically with incremental upgrades. The most significant this year came in the form of the A12 Bionic chip. Its 7-nanometer design packs more processing power at the cost of less energy with the ability to handle 5 trillion operations per second (compared to the measly 600 billion operations per second that the iPhone X’s A11 chip was capable of.)
The chips alone are basically responsible for most of what makes the XS special, from its new augmented reality capabilities to its sick camera features.
iPhone XS Max Unboxing: A Friendly Reminder to Buy AirPods
Surprise, surprise. We aren’t getting a courtesy pair of $159 AirPods this year either. Instead, 3.5mm headphone jack users will be getting a subtle hint that they should go buy their own pair of wireless earbuds.
This year you’ll instead find the usual pair of $29, wired EarPods with Lightning Connector that began shipping with Apple smartphones with the release of the iPhone 7. But the 3.5mm Lightning adapter — better known by its dongle moniker — will not come with the XS Max this year.
This seems like the next step in Apple’s plans to work toward completely wireless smartphones, which was initially kicked off by the widely-hated abandonment of the headphone jack in 2016. Ditching the dongle is clearly the company trying to wean people off the 3.5mm port.
Fortunately, if you’ve picked any iPhone since the 7, your old dongles will work just fine. If not, you can pick one up for $9 at the Apple store.
iPhone XS Max Unboxing: The Largest Screen of Any Prior iPhone
It goes without saying that the iPhone XS Max will be packed inside. Shoppers will be able to choose from three color variants: silver, space gray, and gold. After picking your preferences, users will be able to choose from 64GB, 256GB, and 512GB storage capacity that cost $1,099, $1,249, and $1,449 respectively.
The iPhone XS Max actually isn't all that much larger than the iPhone 8 Plus.
This year’s top-of-the-line Apple handset will come with a 6.5-inch OLED display, the largest of any iPhone in the company’s history. The phone’s record-setting screen clocks in at 2,688-by-1,242 with 458 pixels-per inch, enabling some crystal clear, 1080p video on Netflix and YouTube. Virtually all of this new screens comes from reducing the size of the bezel, side by side the iPhone XS Max and the iPhone 8 Plus will actually look approximately the same size.
That said, the XS Max will be the heaviest iPhone to date, coming in at 7.34 ounces (208 grams). That’s 1.1 ounces heavier than the XS and 0.21 ounces heavier than the 8 Plus.
iPhone XS Unboxing: Lighting Charging Combo
Ever since Apple upgraded from the 30-pin dock connector of the iPhone 4, of its other phones have come with a USB to Lightning Charger and adapter cable. This standard, wired charging system provides iPhones with 5-watts of power. But if you don’t want to be sitting around waiting for your device to charge you can pick up at 12W USB power adapter for an additional $19.
The XS Max also comes with integrated Qi wireless charging capabilities, so you can also use any compatible wireless charging mat to replace the usual lightning cord.
