The iPhone 7 Plus already offers pretty substantial upgrades over the iPhone 6s Plus, but what about the iPhone 6 Plus — Apple’s first 5.5-inch smartphone? How much has changed between the two iPhones? Many customers are likely going to upgrade from their iPhone 6 Plus to the iPhone 7 Plus as they reach the end of their two-year contract.

So what exactly sets the iPhone 7 Plus apart from the iPhone 6 Plus? Let’s find out.

Design

• The iPhone 7 Plus features largely the same design as the iPhone 6 Plus, with some minor modifications
  • This is despite Apple saying that the iPhone 7 comes with a brand new design
  • The biggest visual change is the antenna bands at the rear panel being moved to the top and bottom edges giving the phone a cleaner look
  • The iPhone 7 makes use of a stronger Series 7000 aluminium chassis to avoid any bendgate issues that plague the iPhone 6
• The camera cut-out on the rear of the iPhone 7 Plus is also larger than the iPhone 6 Plus
  • This is due to the handset coming with dual 12MP shooters
• Apple has also removed the headphone jack from the bottom of the iPhone 7 Plus
  • Instead, it has introduced a secondary speaker grille
  • It is only for aesthetic purposes, though, and does not house a secondary speaker
  • The secondary speaker is located within the earpiece grille at the top
  • This new speaker is substantially louder than the mono speaker of the iPhone 6 Plus
• The iPhone 7 Plus is heavier than the iPhone 6 Plus — 188g vs 172g.
• To make up for the lack of a new design, the iPhone 7 Plus now features an IP67 certification
  • This makes the phone resistant to water just like the original Apple Watch
  • An IP67 rating denotes that the iPhone 7 Plus can be submerged in water for up to 30mins in 1m depth without any issues
    • It is also dust-resistant thereby not allowing for any kind of dust ingress
  • The iPhone 6 Plus lacks any kind of IP rating
• Apple will be offering the iPhone 7 Plus in two brand new colors: Jet Black and Black
  • The Jet Black color has a glossy finish
  • It will be available only in 128GB and 256GB storage variants
• The normal Black color has a matte finish
• The iPhone 6 Plus is not available in Rose Gold color as well
• The iPhone 7 features a capacitive home button unlike the iPhone 6s which features a physical home button
  • The capacitive home button, however, is able to simulate the feeling of being pressed thanks to Taptic Engine
  • Apple had first debuted this technology on its MacBook lineup in 2015
• The iPhone 7 also features a second generation Touch ID sensor
  • This sensor is significantly faster than the Touch ID sensor found on the iPhone 6
• The dimensions of the iPhone 7 Plus remain the same as the iPhone 6s Plus

Display

• Like the iPhone 6 Plus, the iPhone 7 Plus also comes with a Retina HD 5.5-inch screen with a resolution of 1920 x 1080
  • Both phones have a pixel density of 401 ppi
• The display on the iPhone 7 is 25% brighter than the iPhone 6s Plus, which was already brighter than the display of the iPhone 6 Plus
  • It also offers a wider color gamut range
• The 5.5-inch Retina HD panel on the iPhone 6 Plus lacks 3D Touch
  • Apple first debuted 3D Touch with the iPhone 6s

Performance, RAM, and Storage

• The A10 Fusion chip inside the iPhone 7 Plus is significantly faster than the A9 chip found inside the iPhone 6
  • It is a quad-core chip featuring two low power and two high power cores
  • The A9 chip inside the iPhone 6s is only a dual-core chip
• Apple states that the A10 Fusion chip is 2x faster than the A8 chip inside the iPhone 6 Plus
• The GPU performance of the A10 Fusion chip is also a major step up over the iPhone 6’s A8 chip
  • It is up to 3x times faster than the A8 chip’s GPU
• The iPhone 7 Plus comes with 3G LPDDR4 RAM
  • This is 2GB more than what is found on the iPhone 6 Plus
• With the iPhone 7 Plus, Apple has refreshed its storage tier completely
  • Unlike the iPhone 6, the base storage on the iPhone 7 Plus starts at 32GB
  • There is no 64GB model. Instead, Apple has replaced it with a 128GB variant
  • This is also the first time that Apple is offering an iPhone with 256GB of storage
• The iPhone 7 Plus features a faster (450Mbps) LTE modem and Wi-Fi connectivity

Camera

• The camera on the iPhone 7 Plus is a major upgrade over the iPhone 6 Plus
  • The iPhone 7 Plus features dual 12MP shooters at its rear while the iPhone 66 Plus comes with an 8MP shooter
  • Both phones feature OIS
• The primary 12MP shooter on the iPhone 7 features a 6-element f/1.8 aperture
  • The iPhone 6, on the other hand, features a f/2.2 aperture
  • The wider aperture allows the iPhone 7 to absorb up to 50% more light
• There is also a secondary 56mm telephoto lens on the iPhone 7 Plus
  • This allows the handset to offer 2x optical zoom without any visible loss in image quality
  • The handset also offers 10x digital zoom
  • The iPhone 6 Plus lacks any kind of optical zoom
  • It also only offers 3x digital zoom
• The telephoto lens also allows the iPhone 7 Plus to take photos with a DSLR-like bokeh effect
  • There will be a new Portrait mode in the camera app for this feature
  • The feature will not be available out of the box and Apple will add it via a future software update before the end of this year
• The iPhone 7 Plus can record videos in 4K resolution
  • The iPhone 6 Plus is limited to recording videos in Full HD resolution at 60fps
• The iPhone 7 Plus comes with Quad-LED True Tone flash
  • In comparison, the iPhone 6 Plus features dual-LED True Tone flash
  • The Quad-LED flash is up to 50% brighter
• The A10 Fusion chip on the iPhone 7 Plus features a smarter and improved ISP
• The iPhone 6 Plus cannot shoot Live Videos
  • The iPhone 7 Plus can take Live Photos and the experience is even better since it makes use of OIS
  • Apple will also be making Live Photos API available to developers
• The FaceTime HD camera on the iPhone 7 Plus has also been upgraded
  • It now features a 7MP sensor, up from a mere 1.2MP sensor found on the iPhone 6
  • It is now also capable of recording videos in Full HD resolution

Battery

• The iPhone 7 Plus has the best battery life of any iPhone Apple has ever launched
  • As per numbers from Apple, the iPhone 7 Plus will offer longer video playback and internet usage over the iPhone 6 Plus

All in all, the iPhone 7 Plus represents a huge upgrade over the iPhone 6 Plus. Both phones may look the same from a distance, but both offer a vastly different experience. But are the differences enough for you to upgrade to the iPhone 7 Plus? Drop a comment below and let us know!