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Is the iPhone 12 Mini Worth the Extra $$$ Over an iPhone SE?
I like a small phone. Going from the iPhone4S to the iPhone6 was like stuffing an extra pack of children’s bubblegum in my pocket. And I don’t chew gum. Or have children.
If you go to the Compare Phones portion of the Apple site you’ll see that next to my iPhone6 the 12Mini’s overall size is smaller (yay!), but the screen real estate is actually BIGGER because it extends to the edges with no Home button. Pretty cool.
Then look at the SE (2nd Generation) vs the 12Mini side-by-side. You’re getting a bigger screen (but still small enough for your pocket), 5G, Two Cameras (that actually matters with HDR video, night mode and twice the zoom range), 12MP instead of 7MP images, 4K Video with Audio zoom, the newest A14 chip, the ceramic shield protection (4x better “clumsy” power), MagSafe/Qi charging (no more dirty power cords and ports that fill with lint) and a battery that lasts 20% longer.
But is it worth the extra $300 for the 12Mini?
My pricing logic returns me to my iPhone6 which I bought new for $649 in 2014. That breaks out to about $10/month over the life of the phone — which is still fine, by the way. The SE will probably be “worthy” for about four years because of the 4G, where the 12Mini will likely take you at least five years, and maybe more, because of the…