iPhone buying guide: Best iPhone to buy in 2024

Deciding which iPhone to buy has always been tricky. Which screen size is best for you, and how much storage do you need? Should you save money by selecting an older model, or should you splash out on the latest iPhone? Which iPhone is the best compromise between specs and value for money?

In this article we talk you through each of the phones currently available from Apple, to help you decide which is best for you. We discuss iPhone prices, specs and features, paying particular attention to the cameras, screens and durability, so you should leave feeling much more confident about which iPhone you should get.

For more help with your choice see our reviews of the latest iPhones (linked below) and our Best iPhone comparison chart where we compare all the new iPhone with the ones still on sale.

• iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max review
• iPhone 16 and 16 Plus review
• iPhone 15 Plus review
• iPhone 14 review
• iPhone 14 Plus review

What iPhones does Apple sell?

When you include both the larger and smaller sizes, there are nine iPhones in Apple’s current lineup.

We’ll start of by looking at how the design of each handset differs, so you can tell which iPhone is which at a glance, before going on to discuss how the iPhones compare in other ways including screens, cameras, safety features, specs and battery life. You can also find out all about the new features in the latest iPhones in our iPhone 16 guide.

You might also want to check out our best iPhone deals, and comparison of every iPhone that is available to buy today.

Before we start, a quick-at-a-glance comparison of the iPhones:

1. Apple iPhone 16

Price When Reviewed: £799

Best Prices Today: £799 at Amazon£799 at AO£799 at Apple

The iPhone 16 is similar to last year’s iPhone 15, but the new processor supports Apple Intelligence, a suite of generative-AI features that Apple is rolling out through several iOS updates. It also delivers much longer battery life and includes a new Camera Control button to make it faster and easier to launch your favorite photo app and take pictures.

Read our full Apple iPhone 16 review

2. Apple iPhone 16 Plus

Price When Reviewed: £899

Best Prices Today: £899 at Amazon£899 at AO£899 at Apple

A larger version of the iPhone 16, with the same specs and features, outside of the obviously larger display. The only place the iPhone 16 Plus differs in performance form the iPhone 16 is in its significantly longer battery life. After all, if the phone is bigger, it can fit a larger battery inside.

3. Apple iPhone 16 Pro

Price When Reviewed: £999

Best Prices Today: £999 at AO£999 at Apple£999 at argos.co.uk

The Pro version of the iPhone 16 once again comes in a titanium shell, and offers slightly better performance and battery life than the standard iPhone 16.

The photo and video capabilities are where the Pro models stand out. They include a 5x telephoto camera, a sharper 48-megapixel Ultra Wide camera, and support for high-end formats like ProRAW, HLG video, and video recording at up to 4K and 120fps. And yes, it includes the new Camera Control button.

Read our full Apple iPhone 16 Pro review

4. Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max

Price When Reviewed: £1,199

Best Prices Today: £1199 at Apple£1199 at John Lewis and Partners

Just as the iPhone 16 Plus is simply a larger version of the iPhone 16, so too is the iPhone 16 Pro Max just a larger iPhone 16 Pro. In past years, the Pro Max version would have some distinguishing feature (like better telephoto camera) but that isn’t the case this year.

The iPhone 16 Pro Max does get a big boost in battery life from its larger battery, however.

5. Apple iPhone 15

Price When Reviewed: From £699 (Was £799)

Best Prices Today: £681 at Amazon£681 at John Lewis and Partners£699 at AO

The standard iPhone 15 model doesn’t get all the bells and whistles of the Pro models, but it does offer some great new features in comparison to 2022’s iPhone 14. For example, the non-pro iPhones now have the Dynamic Island instead of the notch. The iPhone 15 camera is significantly better than the iPhone 14 camera, now up to 48MP and with Smart HDR 5. You’ll get USB-C instead of Lightning. The processor is the A16 Bionic, as seen in the iPhone 14 Pro.

6. Apple iPhone 15 Plus

Price When Reviewed: £799 (was £899)

Best Prices Today: £793.61 at Amazon£793.61 at John Lewis and Partners£799 at AO

The same phone as the iPhone 15, only larger! You get a bigger, longer-lasting battery with the larger size, but the features and performance are otherwise identical.

Read our full Apple iPhone 15 Plus review

7. Apple iPhone 14

Price When Reviewed: £599 (was £699)

Best Prices Today: £549 at Amazon£549 at argos.co.uk£593.61 at John Lewis and Partners

Introduced in 2022, the iPhone 14 brought new camera features like the Photonic Engine, better low-light photos and the Action mode, which weren’t available on the iPhone 13. The biggest problem with the iPhone 14 is that it’s not that much different to the iPhone 13 in many other ways, with the same generation chip and practically identical appearance.

Read our full Apple iPhone 14 review

8. Apple iPhone 14 Plus

Price When Reviewed: £699 (was £799)

Best Prices Today: £699 at AO£699 at argos.co.uk£699 at John Lewis and Partners

Introduced in 2022, this iPhone is identical to the iPhone 14 except for one big difference: it’s bigger. If you prefer a larger iPhone, but don’t want to spend a lot of money, this is the iPhone for you.

Read our full Apple iPhone 14 Plus review

9. Apple iPhone SE (2022)

Price When Reviewed: Was £419, then £429 (64GB)

Best Prices Today: £379 at Amazon£429 at AO£429 at Apple

Apple introduced the iPhone SE 3rd generation in spring 2022. It’s the cheapest iPhone you can buy, and, now that the iPhone 13 mini is no longer sold by Apple, this is Apple’s smallest iPhone. Plus if you want or need a Home button – perhaps because the lack of a button could cause accessibility problems, although there is a way to add a software Home button if you need to – this is the only iPhone that has one.

If you are looking for an iPhone for an elderly relative, this might be the one, see: Best iPhone for seniors.

Read our full Apple iPhone SE (2022) review

How much do iPhones cost?

Brilliant news for 2023: Apple has reduced pricing across most of the range (and across the whole range if you are based in the U.K.) Below you will find pricing for U.S., U.K., Canada and Australia (scroll across to see pricing in your region).

You don’t have to pay full price for a new iPhone though. Read our iPhone deals roundup for more advice on getting the lowest possible price from various different resellers. We have also collected the best deals for the iPhone 16-series in the U.K. and the best deals for the iPhone 16-series in the U.S. in separate articles.

Design: How do the iPhones compare?

Apple

There are two big new features in the iPhone 16 line: the Camera Control button and support for Apple Intelligence.

Camera Control is a new button, flush with the iPhone body, that resides about 2/3 of the way down the right side, so it is under your finger when held in landscape orientation to take photos or video. Press it to launch your desired camera app, press it in that app to act like a shutter button. You can lightly tap or swipe on it, too, to control various camera options within apps.

Apple Intelligence is a suite of AI features that is being released in waves, starting with iOS 18.1 and continuing in updates through 2025. There are writing tools, image generation, image recognition, “Genmoji” emoji generation, and new capabilities for Siri. Apple Intelligence is also available on iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max, which Apple no longer sells. It is not available on the iPhone 15 or any prior model iPhone.

In our testing, the iPhone 16 line offered a big boost in battery life over prior models, too.

The iPhone 15 and 15 Plus are very similar to the iPhone 16, but with slightly slower performance, less battery life, no Camera Control button, and no support for Apple Intelligence.

If you go back to the iPhone 14, you’re also going to lose out on the Dynamic Island–instead of the little pill-shaped cutout for the front camera and sensors, you’ll have a notch at the top of the screen. Apple and app developers use the Dynamic Island to display all sorts of live information.

Here’s how the dimensions and colors compare:

Screen: How are the iPhone displays different?

The Pro and Pro Max iPhones have the best screens available on an iPhone. The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max offer ProMotion, which allows for an adaptive refresh rate. The refresh rate goes as high as 120Hz for really smooth scrolling and as low as 1Hz. ProMotion has been a staple of the “Pro” iPhones for years, but new this year to all iPhone 16 models is the ability for the screen to get very very dim (down to 1 nit) while still remaining usable. It’s great for dark rooms.

Thanks to the Always-On screen you will always be able to see elements such as the time and date, notifications and Lock Screen widgets without waking the iPhone. The screen dims to minimize onscreen power usage to preserve battery life and it will turn off should you place it face down or walk away while wearing an Apple Watch. Like ProMotion, always-on displays are a feature of Pro iPhones.

Both the iPhone 15 and 15 Plus also offer a few more pixels than their predecessors, matching the pixels of the Pro and Pro Max handsets this time round.

The screen size may be the most important factor in your decision. If you prefer a larger screen, you’ll want the “Plus” or “Pro Max” version. The iPhone 16 Pro Max has a screen size of 6.9 inches diagonally, up from 6.7 inches in prior years and with the other Plus-size iPhones. It’s a small difference, but one you can notice. The iPhone 16 Pro is larger than the iPhone 16, too: 6.3 inches compared to 6.1 inches.

Camera: How do the iPhone cameras compare?

Jason Snell / Foundry

For many it’s the capabilities of the cameras that sell the iPhones, so it’s no wonder that every year Apple improves the camera on its iPhones, sometimes improving the tech, sometimes the software. The iPhone 16 and 16 Plus still feature a dual-camera array with wide and ultra-wide lenses, while only the Pro and Pro Max offer the additional 5x telephoto lens.

The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max have a 48 megapixel Ultra Wide camera, while the 15 and 15 Plus have a 12 megapixel Ultra Wide. However, the 15 and 15 Plus can now shoot macro photos, a feature that used to be reserved for the Pro models.

There are also new video recording features for the pro models, including ProRes video recording up to 4K at 120 fps, LOG video recording and Academy Color Encoding.

In 2022 the TrueDepth (FaceTime and Face ID) camera was upgraded on the front of the iPhone 14 and 14 Plus, gaining autofocus and improved low-light performance thanks to the wider aperture. It hasn’t changed since then.

All models on sale currently offer Portrait Mode and the Portrait Lighting effects on the rear cameras for images with depth of field. The only camera that doesn’t offer Night Mode is the iPhone SE 3. The iPhone SE 3 also only has one camera on the rear.

Safety features: Emergency protection

Apple added some safety features to all the iPhone 14 series has carried them forward to iPhone 15 and iPhone 16 models. These features include a Crash Detection feature and Satellite Connectivity for emergency phone calls.

Crash detection uses the gyroscope and accelerometer in the iPhones to recognize if the vehicle you are in has crashed. If the iPhone thinks you’ve been involved in a crash, it will call emergency services and notify your preferred contacts (unless you tell it not to).

All phones offer the ability to send an Emergency SOS, but the iPhone 14, 15, and 16 can do so via satellite, which would be useful if you were in an area with no signal. You just need to be able to establish a clear view of the sky, and be in a country that supports the feature (many do now). Thanks to the feature your iPhone can alert the emergency services to your location in an emergency, the iPhone will also contact your emergency contact.

Durability: Which iPhone is the toughest?

Another factor in the choice of which iPhone to choose is how durable the model is. How likely are you to damage the iPhone?

As you can see from the section on design (above) the majority of iPhones on sale right now (except for the iPhone SE 3) offer a Ceramic Shield front, which should mean that the glass on the front is less likely to smash if you drop it. Only the Pro and Pro Max are constructed from titanium (previous generations were stainless steel), which is more durable than aluminum, which all other iPhones are encased in.

All iPhones have a glass back (which is necessary for MagSafe charging). This does mean that if you drop your iPhone with no case on then you are pretty much guaranteed to break the glass on the back. So be sure to pop your new iPhone in a case. For our recommendations see our round-up of the Best iPhone cases.

The other way people damage their iPhones is by dropping them in water. Most iPhones are rated as water resistant to a depth of 6 meters for up to 30 minutes (IP68), the iPhone SE 3 only offers water resistance to a depth of 1 meter for up to 30 minutes (IP67). We still wouldn’t recommend getting your iPhone wet though because Apple will know if it’s gotten wet and it could void your warranty should anything go wrong.

Apple

Specs: Storage and processor options

The A18 in the iPhone 16 models is considerably faster than the A16 found in the iPhone 15, especially when it comes to graphics or AI tasks. The A18 Pro is distinguished primarily by the extra GPU core, though it has super video hardware to support the Pro video features, too.

Each iPhone is available in between three and four capacity options. It’s important to consider how much you need before buying because iPhones don’t have a microSD card slot that will allow you to add additional storage at a later date. For the typical iPhone user, 128GB is probably sufficient. Only the iPhone SE offers less than that, with a 64GB option and we strongly recommend you pay a few dollars/pounds extra to buy the 128GB model.

One reason you may not need more storage is if you choose to sync your data to the cloud. If you pay a monthly fee for iCloud storage all your data will be available on any of your devices, and crucially your photos will be stored in the cloud rather than on your device, freeing up many gigabytes of space. iCloud starts at $0.99/£0.99 for 50GB. See How much does iCloud cost for more information, including Australian and Canadian prices.

Before you decide how much storage you need have a look at your current phone’s usage (go to Settings > General > iPhone Storage) and think about how much space you really need. Read How much storage do you need on an iPhone? for more advice.

Battery life and charging

The iPhone 16 models offer a big boost in battery life over the iPhone 15 and even further over the iPhone 14. In our testing, the difference in battery life was even more pronounced than Apple’s spec sheets indicate—we saw battery life improvements of around 20 percent for the regular models and 30 percent for the Pro models.

As for how you charge the iPhone, fast charging requires a 20W adapter or higher that plugs into either the USB-C on 2023 iPhones, or the Lightning port on older iPhones. All but the iPhone SE 3 can also be charged wirelessly via MagSafe. The iPhone 16 models support faster MagSafe charging when used with a 30W power adapter.

Apple’s official battery life and charging times can be seen in the table above.

Which iPhone should I buy?

The best iPhone you can buy right now is the iPhone 16 Pro or Pro Max, depending on whether you want a larger display or not.

The iPhone 16 and 16 Plus are probably a better value, though. They support Apple Intelligence and have the Camera Control button and have fantastic battery life and performance, so all you’re really giving up is the 5x telephoto camera (you still get a 2x optical crop-zoom mode) and some high-end video features.

You could save money and opt instead for an iPhone 15 or 14, which might appeal if you are upgrading from a particularly old iPhone. Our recommendation would be that if saving money is the most important thing the iPhone 14 is a better choice.

The iPhone SE is missing many of the features of the other iPhones and is really just for the most budget-conscious, though it also is the only modern iPhone with Touch ID, which some consider essential.

Once you have chosen your new iPhone be sure to read our iPhone setup guide.

Buying an iPhone on contract

The two most common ways to buy an iPhone are SIM-free from Apple itself or a third-party reseller (which is where the pricing information throughout this information fits in, because you’ll be paying upfront for the phone, you will own it, and you will then need to pay for a SIM-only contract for minutes, texts and data), or buying an iPhone on contract.

A contract usually starts with an upfront payment that will vary depending on the iPhone model you go for and also how much you’ll be paying each month. That upfront payment is followed by monthly payments, normally for a total of 24 months, after which you own the phone (in most cases). Those monthly payments also cover data, minutes and texts.

The following networks are worth checking for their contract offers:

• AT&T
• Sprint
• T-Mobile
• Verizon

UK readers can find iPhone contracts from the following networks:

• O2
• EE
• Vodafone
• Three
• Tesco Mobile
• Sky Mobile
• Virgin Mobile

And from the following third-party resellers:

• Carphone Warehouse
• Mobiles.co.uk
• E2save
• Mobile Phones Direct

The iPhone Upgrade Program

Apple offers a scheme called the iPhone Upgrade Program, which works with your carrier and starts at $39.50/£42.95 per month. You can then upgrade to the new iPhone each time one is announced, staying on the same or a very similar plan.

You should be cautious about the value this offers, but in some circumstances, it may be the right approach for you.

The scheme works slightly differently in the U.K., where this is for a SIM-free iPhone. You will also need to get a SIM-only contract for your data, minutes and texts.

You do get AppleCare+ included in the Upgrade Program, though, which is a two-year insurance for your iPhone that will cover you for two incidents of accidental damage. You’ll still have to pay an excess fee should you need to use it, but it’ll be much cheaper than having to cough up the full price of a repair.

Second-hand and refurbished iPhones

You’ll have noticed that buying an iPhone doesn’t come cheap. However, if you’re strapped for cash you don’t have to dismiss the idea of buying an iPhone completely. You may be able to get a good deal on one of the older handsets if someone is looking to sell their current handset. Here are or recommendations of the best place to buy a used iPhone.