We’ve been hearing rumours of a new iPhone breed for years, and now it’s finally here. Apple’s new plastic-backed, colour-coated iPhone 5c is an option for a whole new generation of iPhone users. Here’s everything you need to know.
Design
The leakers were spot on this time around; the iPhone 5c looks just like we expected. It has a subtly curved plastic back that comes in blue, green, white, yellow and red. And the back is made from one single part. No joints or lines. iOS 7 will even match to the colour of your iPhone 5c out of the box. Neat!
As Jony Ive puts it: “iPhone 5c is beautifully, unapologetically plastic.” It’s definitely not ashamed of its plastic. Unfortunately, the 5cs come with black fronts instead of the white ones we were expecting. And, well, the white ones would have looked better.
The iPhone 5c also comes with a series of freakin’ hideous silicon rubber cases, each perforated with cheese-grater holes to let the phone’s color shine through. It’s bizarre. The cases come in six colours, at $39 each, but bleh.
Guts
As expected, the iPhone 5c isn’t full of new guts, but it’s not the 4S either; it’s basically the iPhone 5 in plastic. Its brain is the iPhone 5’s A6 processor ,and it has an 8MP camera like the iPhone 5 as well. Unsurprisingly, it also has the same 4-inch retina (326ppi) screen that the iPhone 5 does as well as a lightning adaptor.
It’ also has more LTE bands than any other smartphone out there, alongside dual-band Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0 and all the normal stuff.
The iPhone 5c’s front-facing HD camera is actually an improvement on the iPhone 5’s, however. It’s designed to function better in low-light conditions. And the iPhone 5c’s guts are good enough to handle all the new camera features of iOS 7.
Pricing and Availability
The iPhone 5c comes in blue, green, pink, yellow and white. It will be available in Australia for $739 (16GB) and $869 (32GB) on Friday, September 20. Pre-orders start on Friday, September 13.
iPhone 5c cases will be available in blue, green, pink, yellow, black and white for $39. A new iPhone 4S 8GB model will also be available for $529, keeping smaller screens and 30-pin connectors around one generation more. Hope you like your colours!