Full comparison: iPhone 14 vs iPhone 13

In an age of scrutiny, an interesting dilemma arises for those thinking of upgrading their old iPhone. Instead of buying the iPhone 14you can save 110 € e buy an iPhone that, despite being one year old, has the same appearance, a very similar processor and shares many functions with the new generation. However, there are still significant disparities that justify this price difference.

Photographic sensors

We don’t usually go straight to the cameras in our comparisons, but this is by far the biggest difference between the iPhone 14 and the iPhone 13. The 14 has a dual camera on the back, while like the iPhone 13, but the new model includes a faster aperture (ƒ / 1.5 instead of ƒ / 1.6) and a larger sensor to offer better overall performance and improvements in low-light photos.

The iPhone 14 also benefits from a new photon engine calculation system that helps capture more details in difficult lighting conditions and improves features such as foreground blur in Portrait mode. Fixes to low-light photography don’t just mean better photos, they also mean you don’t have to hold the iPhone for that long.

There is also an Action mode for video shooting, it is used to refine stabilization when shooting a moving video. It’s a feature that will make a difference for almost everyone, while previous video features, such as cinematic mode, which came with the iPhone 13, had failed.

It’s not just the cameras on the back of the iPhone 14 that are better than those of the iPhone 13. The selfie sensor, aka the TrueDepth camera, has also been tweaked. This sensor benefits from autofocus and a wider aperture, which will increase performance in low light conditions.

If you primarily use your iPhone for photography, these are all great reasons to choose the iPhone 14 over the 13.

Drawing

iPhone 14 and iPhone 13 have a very similar design, with a few exceptions. Thanks to the changes made to the photo module, it protrudes slightly more on the iPhone 14. Therefore, if you lay the iPhones flat, the iPhone 14 will be slightly raised compared to the iPhone 13. The buttons have also moved slightly, so a la case for an iPhone 13 probably won’t fit the 14.

iPhone 14: 146.7 x 71.5 x 7.80 and 172g
iPhone 13: 146.7 x 71.5mm x 7.65mm and 173g

Another disparity between the two phones is the color finish you can choose from. The colors of the iPhone 13 tend to be darker than the iPhone 14. For example, the iPhone 14 is offered in a pale blue, which contrasts with the dark blue of the 13, and the Product RED finish on the 2022 model also looks more bright than the normal version. Finally, pink was replaced by mauve.

The iPhone 14 (left) is available in blue (pale), purple, midnight, Starlight, and red (vivid). The iPhone 13 (right) is available in green, pink, blue (dark), Midnight, Starlight and red (dark)

Security features

There are two other things that the iPhone 14 has besides the 13, although one will only make a difference if you are in the US or Canada, and the other does not matter, only if you are involved in a car accident.

The first concerns the possibility of making an emergency call via satellite. Therefore, if you are in trouble and do not have cellular coverage, you will be able to call the emergency services as long as you have good visibility of the sky.

Likewise, the traffic accident detection feature (also available on all Apple Watch 2022s) is a feature we should never need, but it can save lives. In fact, the iPhone 14 can detect if you have a car accident and contact the emergency services on your behalf.

The choice between an iPhone or the other in this case is difficult, because on the one hand we have an iPhone that could save you 110 €, on the other we have a last generation that can save lives.

A15 processor

We started this article by noting that iPhone 13 and iPhone 14 share the A15 chip. However, it is not quite the same.

The iPhone 14’s A15 looks more like the 13 Pro thanks to its additional GPU core, but according to our tests, the iPhone 14’s chip is on top of it. It seems likely that the iPhone 14’s A15 chip will benefit from the internal changes Apple claims it has made to help disperse heat. Even though the 14 was identical to the 13, these internal changes could still have led to better results in performance tests. These show that the latest generation offers decent speed gains over the previous one.

If you’re gaming or using other graphics-intensive applications, the additional GPU core might be important to you, but for the average user it might not make a difference.

Another area where the iPhone 14 outperforms its predecessor is battery life. Apple claims that the iPhone 14 can offer up to 20 hours of video playback, compared to the iPhone 13’s 19 hours. We ran the slightly more demanding Geekbench 4 battery tests and came to a similar conclusion. We have 8:57 for the iPhone 14, compared to 8:11 for the 13.

An extra hour of battery life might not seem like much, but if your commute takes an hour, it could make a difference. Twenty hours is not a realistic indication of battery life because it all depends on how you use your iPhone. Probably more important is the time it takes to plug in your iPhone to get enough power to last a working day, and that goes for both iPhones. Receive up to 50% charge in 30 minutes with a 20W adapter.

Warehousing

The other point of comparison between the two iPhones that must be taken into consideration is the storage capacity. Although both phones start with 128GB of storage, price is still an issue. On the one hand we have the iPhone 14 from 1,019 euros with 128 GB of storage, on the other an iPhone 13 with 256 GB of storage, for 1,029 euros. For many, the additional storage space will outweigh the extra features offered by the iPhone 14.

But how much storage do you really need? You may not need as much storage space as you think thanks to services like iCloud and Apple Music. However, from our experience, if the storage space of your new iPhone is less than that of your old one, you will face some difficulties when transferring data between the two devices.

Their similarities

While the differences between the two iPhones are quite significant, they have a lot in common. In fact, these two iPhones are so similar that it’s hard to tell them apart.

Both are equipped with a 6.1-inch Super Retina XDR display with a resolution of 2,532 x 1,170 pixels at 460 ppi, a contrast ratio of 2,000,000: 1, a peak brightness of 800 nits and 1,200 nits (HDR) . They also feature an identical notch, smaller than the iPhone 12. If you want less than a notch, you should look to the iPhone 14 Pro with its new Dynamic Island area.

As we have already explained, there are new camera features on the iPhone 14, but many are identical on both iPhones, so choosing iPhone 13 will not mean sacrificing its features, such as Portrait mode, its lighting effects, photographic styles, Cinema mode and HDR video recording with Dolby Vision in 4K at 60 fps.

If you’re clumsy, none of these phones are more durable than the other. They are both water resistant to a depth of 6 meters for 30 minutes. Both are equipped with a Ceramic Shield front. However, their glass backs (required for MagSafe charging), if you drop your iPhone without a case, they can break easily. We therefore recommend that you protect your iOS with a case.

Which model to choose, the one of 2022 or 2021?

Never have two generations of iPhones been so similar. Even when Apple released an S version of the iPhone every two years, there was a processor difference, but with the iPhone 14, Apple widened the gap between the iPhone Pro and the standard iPhone. Next year we may again see a generational leap in terms of processors between the iPhone 14 and its successor, which will definitely receive the A16.

But should we focus on the processor? When considering a new iPhone, the processor’s capabilities may be considered less important than the length of Apple’s support for that processor. We can assume that iPhone 13 and 14 will both lose iOS compatibility at the same time, but not for many years.

The big news between the two iPhones are the improved camera capabilities of the iPhone 14, which includes better (faster) low-light photography and Action mode. The latter is undoubtedly the most salient feature and the one that many are likely to use, unlike Cinematic Mode, which arrived with the iPhone 13. In our opinion, Action Mode is the only reason to upgrade to the iPhone 14 if you don’t take a lot of videos or don’t care about Action mode, you can safely stick with the iPhone 13 and save some money.