Apple iPhone SE review: everything you need

What do you look for in a newly iPhone ? The top of the list likely includes barrage animation and camera quality. There are a crowd of other spectacles and features you ’ d credibly put down lower on the tilt : travel rapidly, sieve choice, size, extra cameras, and then on .
But the most authoritative thing for that tilt comes not from the specification, but from the fact that you ’ rhenium looking for an iPhone — something with access to iMessage, FaceTime, a huge library of bang-up apps, authentic software updates, and more. You could cross-shop with Android phones, but the trade cost is getting higher every year .
That ’ sulfur why I ’ meter beaming Apple has resurrected an old idea and released another iPhone SE. It starts at $ 399 for a model with 64GB of storage. For people who want an iPhone, it makes buying a brand-new earphone for less than $ 700 a whole distribute easier. Before this week, you ’ d be choosing between refurbs or switching over to Android .
Pointing out that the iPhone SE is an iPhone is excess, but it ’ sulfur significant for people who don ’ triiodothyronine want to switch. It ’ south besides a guarantee of a infrastructure grade of timbre. That makes this revue childlike : how much are you giving up when you ’ re only paying $ 399 ?

Less than you might guess .

Our review of
Apple iPhone SE (2020)

Verge Score

8.5

out of 10

Good Stuff

  • Good battery life
  • Software updates for years
  • Camera good in light and great at video

Bad Stuff

  • Tired design with big bezels
  • Small screen compared to every other phone
  • Noisy low-light photos

Buy for $399.00 from Apple
Buy for $399.99 from Best Buy
If you have always held an iPhone 8, iPhone 7, iPhone 6S, or iPhone 6, then you already know the basic shape of the 2020 iPhone SE. It has a 4.7-inch screen with big bezels above and below, a big circular home button on the bottom with a fingerprint detector embedded in it, and nicely curved corners and edges .
It ’ s what you credibly still think of as the basic iPhone, even though the new ones have bigger screens, Face ID, and those notches. Apple ’ second had this design since 2014, and it ’ s sticking with it. Keeping that design is probably a big reason for the low cost. There ’ south no need for Apple to retool its factories to build it .

Apple’s iPhone SE







I get all of that, but I besides get that this design looks tired in 2020. There are many comparably priced Android phones that have managed to reduce their bezels. That ’ s not just an aesthetic consideration, either. Smaller bezels mean you can fit a bigger screen in a smaller earphone body .
The bezels are a fuss, but the build quality is not. Apple ’ s long history with this telephone design means that it ’ s rock-solid. There ’ mho no flex, no gross seams, no gaps. The 4.7-inch LCD expose is deoxyadenosine monophosphate good as ever, with True Tone to help color-match your surroundings .
It ’ s an iPhone, and there ’ s a comforting sense of casualness to it .
For those of you hanging on to the original iPhone SE in the hopes that Apple would make another small call : I acknowledge you and your sadness. This is merely the way phones are these days. I will say it ’ s a very common experience for people to resist bigger screens and then love them when they last give in, but that may not be yours. If it helps ( it won ’ metric ton ), there aren ’ t any good bantam Android phones right now either .
As with the iPhone 7 and 8, the dwelling button international relations and security network ’ t a physical button, but simply a touch on the bottomland that gives you a haptic tapback when you press it. I ’ thousand glad to say that Apple hasn ’ thyroxine skimped on the haptics on this earphone : they feel great .
It ’ s only IP67 water resistant, so it ’ randomness all right to get wet, but don ’ t leave it in water for excessively long. It ’ sulfur glass on the back, excessively, to enable radio receiver charge. Both are proportional rarities at this price point .
The last hardware thing I ’ ll note is there is no earphone jack. It ’ s lone worth pointing out because most cheap Android phones still do offer a earphone jack. Apple includes Lightning EarPods in the box but not an arranger. It besides has Apple ’ s standard dinky 5W charger, so while the iPhone SE supports fast-charging, the include charger doesn ’ metric ton .



Inside that companion shell, there are two major upgrades to the iPhone SE : the processor and the television camera. Let ’ s lecture central processing unit first .
It has the A13 Bionic, which is impressive because it ’ s the lapp central processing unit as the iPhone 11 Pro. There is no fast processor in a smartphone for any monetary value. So yes, the iPhone SE is fast, but that ’ s not why the central processing unit matters .
The central processing unit is significant because it ensures that the iPhone SE will get OS updates for many years to come. I distillery have the original iPhone SE, released in March 2016, and Apple supported it with the latest io update last year. Four years late, and that iPhone has the most up-to-date software .
The battery lasts a day, but not much more



Most android phones — from the cheapest to the most expensive — lead out at two years of updates. even the best, Google ’ s Pixel line, are only guarantee updates for three years. As I said last workweek, it ’ s not good about the $ 399 price ; it ’ s about how often you have to spend it. No other call at this price will concluding equally long as the iPhone SE will in terms of software support .
Speaking of longevity, barrage animation on the iPhone SE is wholly right but not stellar. I ’ megabyte getting through a full moon day, averaging between four and five hours of screen-on time. I was hoping the A13 Bionic central processing unit would unlock the longer barrage life we got with the iPhone 11, but it seems that was by and large about battery size, and the SE has the lapp size battery as the iPhone 8 .
It ’ south adequate for today, but in a few years, you may be turning to a battery case on the regular or seeking out a repair patronize to replace your battery.




The iPhone SE has precisely one 12-megapixel television camera on the back and a 7-megapixel selfie camera on the front. There are two ways of looking at these cameras, both valid .
The first is, for a $ 399 earphone, the cameras are absolutely great, and any complaints or gripes should be promptly dismissed given that price. The second is that they ’ re quite good but have some thwart shortcomings that Apple could have overcome, even at this price point .












In any sort of bright lighting conditions, the iPhone SE takes absolutely adorable photos. They ’ re uninfected in the details, color-accurate, and good the right come of acuate. Dynamic range is besides quite good. In fact, in daylight conditions, it can be hard to tell the difference between this $ 400 earphone and a $ 1,000 iPhone 11 Pro .

Apple says that this iPhone SE is able to do more than it differently would because of that A13 Bionic processor. It allows for portrayal manner ( or, more specifically, more kinds of portrait modes ) on both cameras, for model. Apple has given this capability a very Apple-esque technical appoint : “ monocular depth estimation. ” But unlike the single-lens portrait mode on Pixel phones, the iPhone SE international relations and security network ’ t taking advantage of sub-pixel calculations. It ’ south using machine learning models to estimate astuteness of field .






I think that the iPhone 11 Pro manages portraits slenderly better than the SE. But I besides think that, by and large, portrait modes on phones all break down when you look close .
The A13 Bionic besides enables Apple ’ s enhanced HDR and semantic rendering features. The former ensures the background doesn ’ triiodothyronine get excessively blown out, and the latter knows what you ’ re taking a photograph of and works to light it better. I particularly noticed both when taking photos with a bright sky in the setting — a photograph that would have tripped up any iPhone before the XR ( and possibly would have done a number on the XR, besides ) .
This is all bang-up, but the disappointment comes with low-light photography. The iPhone SE just doesn ’ deoxythymidine monophosphate do a well there as it does in other situations. There ’ south no nox mode, and in black light, there ’ s just besides a lot noise. It ’ s about like the whole camera stack panics and overcorrects, specially on portraits .






Video on the iPhone SE is deoxyadenosine monophosphate thoroughly or better than most android phones at any price
I ’ m not certain why the A13 Bionic allows the iPhone SE to gain all of those early benefits but not better night shots. I ’ m not going to say that night mode is a clear problem by any elongate, but Google has been doing it on bargain-priced hardware for a couple of years nowadays, so it ’ randomness surely possible. And Apple ’ mho television camera would, in theory, be up to it, given the processor is the same as its more expensive phones .
But before you put a pate on the Pixel 3A or the approaching Pixel 4A, I want to point you to the iPhone SE ’ s video recording capabilities. It absolutely punches above its burden class, with 4K brace both optically and with software, extended active scope, and the option to go arsenic high as 4K at 60fps. If you can get better television performance out of any telephone that costs less than $ 500, I ’ d like to see it .

bottomland line : if you ’ rhenium upgrading from any iPhone older than the XR, I think you ’ ll see a mark improvement. If you ’ ve been hanging on to anything american samoa old as the master SE, 6, or 6S, the improvement will be dramatic .



The iPhone SE shines a bright, clarifying lighter on the entire smartphone diligence, putting flush Apple ’ s own top-end phones in crisp relief. What are you paying for when you spend $ 800 or $ 1,000 or even more for a telephone ? The tilt turns out to be more about niceties than necessities .
As I write this, I have an iPhone 11 Pro, Galaxy S20, OnePlus 8 Pro, and Pixel 4 XL within arm ’ randomness reach. Each has a multicamera system, an advance biometric recognition arrangement, and a boastful, closely bezel-less OLED display. In the case of the Android phones, they besides have high refresh rate screens that make everything count radically placid .
There are identical few things you can ’ thyroxine do on an iPhone southeast
Is all of that worth the monetary value ? Sure, for a fortune of people. Is any of it necessity ? other than low-light photography, there ’ s about nothing that I do on those $ 1,000 phones that I can ’ t do equally well on the iPhone SE. It is fast, capable, reliable, and companion. I ’ d miss those advanced features and more expansive displays, but not adenine much as you might think .
If I were buying the iPhone SE, I ’ five hundred badly consider spending the extra $ 50 to upgrade the storehouse to 128GB, just in lawsuit I ’ vitamin d want it three or five years down the road. That timespan is the reason the iPhone SE is a big deal. No early call that costs less than $ 500 can claim to be this full, nor last that retentive .
The iPhone SE is not just a well deal. It ’ randomness besides a actually dependable smartphone .

Agree to Continue: iPhone SE (2020)

Every ache device now requires you to agree to a series of terms and conditions before you can use it — contracts that no one actually reads. It ’ s impossible for us to read and analyze every one one of these agreements. But we ’ rhenium going to start counting precisely how many times you have to hit “ agree ” to use devices when we review them since these are agreements most people don ’ thyroxine take and decidedly can ’ triiodothyronine negotiate .
To use an iPhone SE, you have to agree to :

  • The Apple terms of service agreement, which you can have sent to you by email
  • Apple’s warranty agreement, which you can have sent to you by email

These agreements are nonnegotiable, and you can not use the earphone at all if you don ’ t agree to them .
The iPhone besides prompts you to set up Apple Cash and Apple Pay at frame-up, which far means you have to agree to :

  • The Apple Cash agreement, which specifies that services are actually provided by Green Dot Bank and Apple Payments, Inc, and further consists of the following agreements:
  • The Apple Cash terms and conditions
  • The electronic communications agreement
  • The Green Dot bank privacy policy
  • Direct payments terms and conditions
  • Direct payments privacy notice
  • Apple Payments, Inc, license

If you add a credit card to Apple Pay, you have to agree to :

  • The terms from your credit card provider, which do not have an option to be emailed

Final total : two mandatary agreements, six optional agreements for Apple Cash, one optional agreement for Apple Pay

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