Iphone Air Is Slim And Sleek, But Not Right For Everyone

WASHINGTON: We're glued to them all day. We take them to bed with us. We use them to capture fleeting moments of joy, and to hear from the people we love the most.

I'm talking, of course, about our phones.

The svelte iPhone Air is a lot of things: an interesting twist on Apple's smartphone formula, a joy to carry around, and a real looker. Still, living with it left me wishing - more than once, even - that I was using a different phone.

Here's everything you should know if you're thinking of upgrading.

The good: The Air's design. I don't have huge hands, so handling the kinds of large phones that have become so popular can be cumbersome. The iPhone Air, even with its 6.5-inch screen, is a big phone that never feels like one.

That, above all else, is the argument for buying this phone, and you already know if that's appealing to you.

At 5.6 millimeters thick, it's a hair slimmer than Samsung's superthin Galaxy S25 Edge, and it discreetly slides into even the skinniest of skinny jeans. And because it's so light - just 5.8 ounces, about the same as a billiard ball - the Air barely feels there.

Pro performance. The Air uses a variant of the chip set found in this year's iPhone 17 Pro line, and it's remarkably speedy - even if the version of iOS 26 installed on it still seems buggy.

The Air is more than enough to deal with your daily routine, and then some.

One nice bonus: Because Apple redesigned the insides of its iPhones this year, the heat you may sometimes feel when the Air is working hard is mostly kept away from your hands.

The questionable: That battery life. Apple's big claim for the Air is that its battery will last you all day. Whether it actually does boils down to your habits. In my testing, I've found that it tends to run for between 7 and 8 hours on a single charge - that's with about 5.5 hours of active,“screen on” use.

That's not awful, but not great either.

For some people, a full workday's worth of power is plenty, and on days I was paying less attention to my phone, the Air usually stuck around for a little over 10 hours.

Just one camera. I've been getting great photos out of the Air's single 48-megapixel main camera - they're vibrant, richly detailed, and they stack up well against images I've captured with this year's iPhone 17 Pro.

It just feels a little lonely. Even Samsung's thin Galaxy S25 Edge has two rear cameras.

There's a reason even Apple's basic iPhone 17 comes with an additional ultrawide camera - it gives you flexibility to find a different perspective on a scene. The 17 Pro, meanwhile, takes things further with an extended zoom range that's come in extremely handy.

The takeaway: A good rule of thumb for gadget shopping is to avoid the first version of anything. The original MacBook Air and Samsung's first Galaxy Fold are great examples of products that kind of sucked at first, but got much better over time.

Unless you're so smitten with this design that you're willing to live with some key compromises, I'd look elsewhere - for this year, at least.

For most people, this year's standard iPhone 17 is a clear winner. It inherited a lot of features that used to be Pro-exclusive, and its battery and cameras offer extra flexibility in case you ever need it.

But if you were thinking of paying for an Air, I think the iPhone 17 Pro is your best option.

It costs the same as an iPhone Air and its MagSafe battery combined, and you'll get much better battery life and a set of cameras that really feel worth the premium. The Pro isn't perfect - not everyone loves the redesign, and it's heavier than it has been for years - but it offers the most room to grow into.

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