I bought the iPhone Air twice!

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There is something special about the iPhone Air. I will not be doing it justice if all I said was that the iPhone Air is thin and light (which it most certainly is). I have previously written about the hypocrisy of the iPhone Air in my lifestyle.

I pre-ordered the iPhone Air at launch, and I explained the reason:

Within two weeks of receiving the iPhone Air, I returned it for a full refund. Thank you Apple!

Why... Well, even though this may be an opportune time to list all the compromises of the iPhone Air, those are not the reasons I returned it (well, perhaps partly).

People who follow my journey know I carry two phones, and my other phone, my Android phone, is a foldable. When I got the iPhone Air, I did not have a foldable because I had traded it in for the Pixel 10 Pro Fold (details here). Anyway, the question that was on my mind was, will the iPhone Air be a delightful companion to my Android foldable?

Foldable have their own compromises, the biggest being subpar camera and battery life. For this reason, I carried the iPhone 16 Pro (which had a great camera but meh battery life). Interestingly, the iPhone Air also has the same compromises.

Therefore, I decided I will wait for the Pixel Pro 10 Fold to arrive and then buy the iPhone Air to live with my 2 phone carry lifestyle.

On 9 October, I got the Pixel 10 Pro Fold. I am so happy with this device, and being without a foldable for a month was painful.

Anyway, a few days later, when I was at the Apple Store, I bought the iPhone Air. I like to talk to people, so I took this opportunity to have a chat with the Apple salesperson.

According to him, the iPhone 17 series has been selling great, particularly the iPhone Pro and iPhone Pro Max. They sold so well that there were none in stock that day. He said he had plenty of the iPhone Air in stock in all the variants. That did not give me confidence about the iPhone Air, but I bought it anyway.

The Feeling 😶‍🌫️

OMG, it feels so freaking good to hold. So comfortable.

The only selling point of the iPhone Air

It is the only iPhone that is currently on sale, which makes me smile every time I hold. It is like holding a piece of glass, it's like I am on the cutting edge, holding a prototype of an iPhone years before its launch. It feels great.

Do yourself a favour; just holding the iPhone Air will make you happy. It is the perfect-size iPhone for 2025 and beyond.

Noteables:

Even though it has the slowest charging speed, it charges relatively quickly, likely because it has the smallest battery in the lineup.
One speaker in the iPhone is not a deal-breaker most of the time. I seem to notice is when I am watching a video and I can tell the sound is coming from my left.
The one camera that it has is very good.
No macro mode, which I mostly used to take close-up images of serial numbers on stuff, lol
No cinematic mode either. This is handy.
The front camera is exceptional for selfies.
USB 2 transfer speeds is a non issue for me because I cannot remember the last time I connected an iPhone to my computer to transfer stuff. It would have been really nice to have. I cannot think of why Apple couldn't have given us USB3 speeds. The only reason would be MONEY 🤑
6.5 inch appears to be the perfect display size
Putting a case on it is a criminal offence in my book. You lose most of the thin and light advantage, and importantly you lose the great feel in the hand as well.

BATTERY LIFE 🔋

Surprisingly, the battery life of the iPhone Air was decent, but when you compare it with other slab phones, it is clear the battery life is not its strong point.

The following is my battery usage when only using the iPhone Air (note; I did not use any other phone during this period and I was at home on Wi-Fi):

As you can see, the battery life for such a thin and light phone is decent. Actually surprised myself how good it was. If we lived in an iPhone Air-only bubble, personally, perhaps I would be happy with the battery life.

The fact is that we do not; there are other iPhones that have significantly better battery life. Honestly, the iPhone Air has the worst battery life in this year's lineup, as shown in the following test:

To save you from watching the video, the following is how long each phone lasted in their battery test:

iPhone Air - 7h, 18m
iPhone 16 - 9h, 51m
iPhone 17 - 10h, 28m
iPhone 17 Pro - 10h, 48m
S25 Ultra - 11h, 58m
iPhone 16 Pro Max - 12h, 15m
iPhone 17 Pro Max - 13h

If you are in the US, the battery life is even better on the Pro models because the SIM card tray was removed to add extra battery. The above test was done on the UK version of the phone (thats the one sold in Australia), which does come with a physical SIM card tray.

The iPhone 17 Pro gets 3.5 hours (25%) more battery life than the iPhone Air
The iPhone 17 Pro Max gets 6 hours (over 50%) more than the iPhone Air.

Now, if you 100% know that the iPhone Air battery life is more than sufficient for your needs and you do not use the telephoto and ultraWide camera, the iPhone Air is the perfect phone for you.

For me, as it is, it isn't suitable for my needs. I usually give my iPhone to my family, and for most of them, the iPhone is the only computer in their life. They want a bigger screen, better battery life and the best camera possible. Don't we all 😆

The iPhones I buy are usually kept in the family for 3-4 years, and battery life gets worse as the iPhone ages, so it makes financial sense to buy the best one possible.

I bought the iPhone 16 Pro last year, and no one in my family wanted this phone. My mum, who has the oldest iPhone, the iPhone 13 Pro Max was not interested because it has a smaller screen. I totally understand this. Even my eyesight is not as good as it was. The iPhone 17 Plus would have been perfect for her 😥.

10 days after buying the iPhone for the 2nd time, I returned the iPhone Air.. AGAIN!

The reasons are not dissimilar to my reasons for returning it the first time around.

I am a father, a husband and I take lots of pictures. Daily, I missed the ultra and the zoom lens on the iPhone Air. Parents will know the difficulty in taking pictures of their kids.

IPhone Air gets great reviews by YouTubers, as did the iPhone Mini. One thing that most viewers probably are not aware of is that most YouTubers have other phones and real cameras for their needs.

For me, my mobile phone is my only camera. Foremost, my mobile phones are tools that are required to get the job done and last me the whole day doing that job. As a tool, the iPhone Air disappoints both in terms of feature set and battery life. As a luxury object, it's my favourite iPhone in recent times. I considered getting it to use as my home iPhone (now that is a crazy thought lol)

I envy those who can live the iPhone Air lifestyle. In 2025, that is not me.

BUT, I am confident that there is an iPhone Air in my future. Precisely the same way, I have an iPhone 13 Mini that I still use every day.

To that end, I cannot promise you I will not buy an iPhone Air for the 3rd time around. And that is a tremendous compliment on the design and execution of the iPhone Air. Good Job Apple.