Apple unveils larger iPhones, health-oriented watches

Image Courtesy: Reuters

It is that time of the year when tech enthusiasts eagerly wait for Apple to launch a new product. This time though, Apple Inc made only minor changes to its lineup. 

Apple's CEO Tim Cook unveiled larger iPhones and watches on Wednesday at the Steve Jobs Theater at Apple's new circular headquarters in Cupertino, California, named after the company's co-founder.  

The new phones, based on last year`s iPhone X, are named XS and XS Max. The new iPhone XS has a 5.8-inch screen size, while iPhone XS Max is 6.5 inch in size. 

iPhone Xs and iPhone Xs Max are available in three colors – gold, silver and space grey. The two variants come with Super Retina OLED display, 3D touch, True tone display, Dolby vision and HDR10. They are also powered with the most secure facial recognition.

The storage has also been increased for the new range of smartphones. While they come with usual 64 GB and 256 GB storage variants, the third variant offers storage up to 512 GB.

The camera in iPhone Xs and iPhone Xs Max is powered with 12 MP wide-angle camera and 12 MP telephoto camera. The camera has been modified with A12 bionic and ARKit 2. iPhone Xr also comes with 12 MP wide-angle camera. The front camera in iPhone Xr comes with True depth camera system, for best quality selfies.

iPhone Xr, made of aluminum, with an edge-to-edge liquid retina display, comes in six finishes.

Apart from this, Apple also launched the Apple Watch Series 4, which for the first time offers the mechanism to perform Electrocardiogram (ECG). This is the first ever device offering an ECG tool directly to the consumer. The ECG recorded would be stored in PDF format and can be shared with the doctor directly.

Apple Watch Series 4 comes with two more new features – detection of low heart rate, screening of heart rhythm in background and module to alert a user if it detects anything not normal.

Series 4 is also powered to detect a fall. After detecting a fall, it starts a call immediately. It has SOS feature, which would send an alert with the location, in case a person wearing it falls.

Apple Watch series 4 is thinner, with curved edges. The display is almost 30% bigger. Speaker is 50% louder, great for phone calls. The microphone has been moved to the opposite side.

The price of iPhone Xs starts $999 and iPhone Xs Max is priced at $1099. iPhone Xr is priced at $749.

The company is also expected to unveil a new version of its wireless AirPods earbuds with wireless charging and a wireless mat that will be able to charge several devices at once.

The iPhone variants are expected to be available in India from September 28.

(With Agency inputs)