5 reasons why I love my iPhone 6s

Today is a big day for Apple fans, with millions of them finally able to buy the new iPhone 6s. My own phone came at 8 AM this morning via UPS, and I’ve been using it for the last few hours. So far I’m hugely impressed with the iPhone 6s, I think it’s the best smartphone I’ve ever used.

Bear in mind that my previous phone was an iPhone 6 Plus, which I also enjoyed at first but ultimately found was a bit too large for me in terms of daily usage and portability. So I decided to give the iPhone 6s a try, and I’m very glad I did.

Don’t get me wrong, the iPhone 6 Plus and 6s Plus are great phones, and have certain advantages. But the smaller iPhone 6s is just a better fit for my hands and needs.

5 reasons why I love my iPhone 6s

So what is it about the iPhone 6s that has impressed me so much? Read on and I’ll share the five reasons why I love my iPhone 6s, and why I think it’s the best iPhone that Apple has ever created.

1. Hey Siri – One of the biggest reasons I wanted to upgrade to the iPhone 6s was the ability of the phone to have Hey Siri always on, even when not connected to a power source. This is possible on the iPhone 6s because of the new M9 motion coprocessor, and it works great!

Setting up Hey Siri takes less than a minute as you go through a few prompts so your iPhone 6s can learn what your voice sounds like. But it’s well worth doing for the convenience factor alone. You don’t even have to pick up your iPhone to get Siri to do something for you.

For me this is an awesome feature because it cuts down on the amount of holding of the phone, tapping and that sort of thing. That matters to me because I’ve had some pain in my hands recently from too much use of computer keyboards, mice, trackpads, etc. So Hey Sir lets me put my iPhone to work with just my voice, and it works very well indeed.

Frankly, once you get used to Hey Siri being on all the time, you will wonder how you got by without it over the years. Yes, it’s that convenient when you want to look something up. send a text, make a phone or FaceTime call or do a bunch of other things.

On the iPhone 6s, Siri really becomes a true virtual assistant. He is ready and waiting for you when you need him. By the way, I say “he” because I like the Australian male voice of Siri, not the default female voice. It’s much more fun for Siri to have the accent of a hot Aussie guy than a chick that sounds a bit like the Star Trek computer.

2. Touch ID speed – When the first reviews of the iPhone 6s came out, some reviewers noted how fast Touch ID is on the new iPhone. Boy, they weren’t kidding! I barely see my lock screen now when I press my thumb on the home button. The iPhone 6s goes right to the home screen, and all I see is a millisecond glimpse of the lock screen!

The speed of Touch ID on the iPhone 6s is only a downside if you have cool lock screen wallpaper and you want to see it. It’ll flash by so fast you won’t be able to savor it. Aaah well, you can always opt to press the home button with your fingernail and then touch it with your actual finger print when you want to go to the home screen.

3. Ebooks – I love to read on my phone, and one of the things I worried about was that reading wouldn’t be as good on the smaller screen of the iPhone 6s. But that turned out not to be an issue at all. I still see plenty of text on the iPhone 6s, and it’s much more comfortable to hold while turning pages than the iPhone 6 Plus.

Text on the 720P screen of the iPhone 6s also looks terrific. I’ve heard some folks lament that the iPhone 6s doesn’t have a 1080P screen like the iPhone 6s Plus, but so far I haven’t cared about that at all. Maybe it’s just my eyes, but I can’t see much of a difference between the two models when reading ebooks (or doing other things for that matter).

So as an ebook reader, the iPhone 6s is a great device in its own right, even though it doesn’t display quite as much text as the larger iPhone.

4. 3D Touch – 3D Touch is one of the most heralded new features of the iPhone 6s, and with good reason. It has the potential to change the way we use our phones in a big way.

When I first started using my phone, I pressed on iBooks to see what would happen with 3D Touch and I was delightfully surprised by a menu that popped up with my three latest books and a search box for the iBooks store. Talk about convenient! I didn’t even need to open the app to find a book in the iBooks store.

I also tried it with Safari and saw a menu for the reading list, bookmarks, new private tab and new tab. So it can be quite convenient if you want to quickly access your reading list or bookmarks in Safari too.

It’s going to be a lot of fun to see how developers use 3D Touch in the days ahead. It has the potential to add some terrific functionality to any kind of app. I’m particularly interested in seeing what happens with games. Game developers are some of the most creative people around, so I think we’re in for a real treat once they start integrating 3D Touch into games.

Note that you can adjust the sensitivity of 3D Touch by going into Settings then Accessibility. I preferred the lighter setting, but you can experiment to see which setting works more comfortably for you.

5. Size – As I noted above, the iPhone 6s is a much better fit for my hands. I truly loved my iPhone 6 Plus, but as a daily driver it was just a bit too much for me. But the iPhone 6s hits that sweet spot between having a larger screen than older iPhones and being extremely comfortable to hold.

It’s also much easier to fit in a shirt or pants pocket, and tote around. I could do that with my iPhone 6 Plus, but the added bulk made it somewhat awkward in comparison to the iPhone 6s. I fully recognize that others will find the iPhone 6 Plus to be a perfect size, and more power to them. But the iPhone 6s is the perfect size for me.

But what about the new camera in the iPhone 6s?

Now some of you will have read this far and wondered why I didn’t include the new camera, 4K video, etc. in my list. Well it’s not that I don’t value those things, it’s just that they are secondary to me compared to what I listed.

I’ll still enjoy the new camera, but it’s not one of my top new features in the iPhone 6s. I’m a very casual camera user, so I’ve always been quite happy with the camera in each of the iPhones I’ve owned and I think it will be the same with the iPhone 6s.

But your mileage may vary considerably in that regard. One of my friends is a true camera-fiend and he is going to love the camera in the iPhone 6s. And he’ll probably love the 4K video too. I’ll stick with the 60 FPS of 1080P video though, as I think it looks better.

The iPhone 6s is the best iPhone yet

So far I’m loving the iPhone 6s, I think it’s the best iPhone I’ve ever owned and the best phone that Apple has ever created. Yes, it’s that good when you add the new hardware to the new software features. Take as a whole, it’s simply the best smartphone I’ve ever used. 

And I even think that the iPhone 6s is a better all around phone than the iPhone 6s Plus, for the simple reason that it does everything the 6s Plus does (with the exception of OIS), but in a smaller form factor. The iPhone 6s Plus is also a great phone, but – for me – OIS, the larger battery and the 1080P screen come at the price of some additional weight, as well as the loss of some portability and simple comfort while using it.

I am somewhat puzzled though on why Apple didn’t just call the iPhone 6s the iPhone 7. There’s so much that’s new in it and it’s such a significant upgrade in some ways that I think it would have been more accurate to ditch the “s” label this time around and just call it the iPhone 7.

The name of the phone aside, I’m very happy with how well it has performed for me so far. I feel comfortable with it in a way that I never quite felt with the iPhone 6 Plus. I feel like I’m using a phone again, and not a mini-tablet. And the new features add real value to the iPhone 6s and set it apart from all previous iPhones.

So if you’re on the fence about getting the iPhone 6s, I recommend that you take the plunge. I think you will be delighted with the phone once you have it in your hands.

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