Snippet: The iPhone Mini’s Long Goodbye is Complete — But It’s Not All Bad News ☇

Allison Johnson for The Verge:

The departure of the iPhone Mini was a drawn-out affair that started last year. Apple announced the iPhone 14 series with no successor to the 13 Mini. But the Mini stuck around through most of 2023 with the rest of the 13 series, and it was available new from Apple right up until Tuesday’s iPhone 15 announcement. Without a Mini in the 15 series — no surprise there — and the 13 Mini dropping from Apple’s retail lineup, the small iPhone is now really, truly gone. […]

But have you ever thought to yourself, “Oh no, I forgot my phone,” and then experienced pure joy as you realized that, no, you did not forget your phone — it’s just so small that you couldn’t feel its weight in your pocket or bag. That happens to me over and over when I switch from a big phone back to my iPhone 13 Mini, and it is a thrill.

As a 12 mini user for the past three years, I’ve really enjoyed the size and capabilities of the device with one exception—the battery was just okay to begin with and over time the wear was evident (the replacement battery I got is already starting to show its age, too). Some of this is probably due to being the first iPhone with 5G and that being a battery hog, while also the need for a much smaller battery. The 13 mini rectified some of that and part of me wonders if I should’ve upgraded in 2021. Nonetheless, from a usability standpoint, the minis were delightful and never felt like a weird, bad scale-down of iOS, unlike some of the weirdness of the 6 Plus through 8 Plus models in the past.