Apple went straight to iPhone X and skipped the iPhone 9 naming. It’s also a big change, because it was the first Roman numeral for an iPhone model. Many have asked whether there actually was an unreleased iPhone 9 model.
The original iPhone came in 2007 with rudimentary 2G data connectivity, which was a standard at the time. Apple also skipped the iPhone 2 naming and it went straight to iPhone 3G, with the much faster 3G data connectivity. The next model was the iPhone 3GS. Apple used the “S” naming to specify the improved version of iPhone 4, 5 and 6. The iPhone 6 has the first Plus version, followed later by iPhone 7 and iPhone 8 for the improved variants. Apple never explained why there was no iPhone 9, after the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus.
In 2017, the prevailing trend in the market was devices with slim bezels. Apple needed to make a move to avoid lagging behind. Also, there’s nothing terribly exciting with the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus, because they had only a modest bump in specs. The archaic physical home button made it necessary for Apple to use huge bottom bezel for the iPhone 8 models. In 2017, it was the 10th anniversary since the release of the original iPhone. Perhaps, Apple just wanted to have something special for the occasion. In terms of design, the iPhone X was a breakthrough for Apple with all-screen appearance. The iPhone X naming definitely added a dramatic effect for the new phone. It seems to make sense why Apple skipped the iPhone 9 naming. The same thing might happen to the missing iPhone 2 naming. The 3G data connectivity was a big thing in 2008 and Apple wanted to have an impactful marketing campaign with the iPhone 3G naming.
Apple wasn’t the only one that broke the naming system by reinventing new way of naming. Microsoft also skipped the Windows 9, when it released the Windows 10 in 2015 as the successor of the Windows 8.1. It’s simply a practice to signify a major generational leap, in terms of features and capabilities. In fact, Samsung also skipped naming for nine generations, when it released the current Galaxy S20, following the previous Galaxy S11.
In the end, the iPhone X is worthy of its naming. It has a near all-screen design with thin bezels. While the iPhone 8 Plus had 67.4 percent screen-to-body ratio with its 5.5-inch display, the iPhone X achieved 83 percent screen-to-body ratio with 5.8-inch display. Despite the slightly larger display, the pixel density was up from 401ppi for the iPhone 8 Plus to 458ppi for the iPhone X. However, with the same A11 chipset, the iPhone X didn’t offer real performance boost. The real change was with the iPhone XS Max with 6.5-inch display with 84.4 percent screen-to-body ratio and 458ppi of pixel density. Inside, the iPhone XS Max has the improved A12 Bionic processor and faster quad-core GPU. It also came with up to 512GB of internal storage and 4GB of RAM.
The huge display of iPhone XS Max made a real difference for Apple fans, because it could finally match large-sized Android smartphones in the market. Watching movies at 1080p resolution was a pleasing experience with the iPhone XS Max, thanks to its large, high-resolution display. Its OLED panel makes games and movies look colourful and bright with the 1242×2688 resolution. The super-sharp display makes reading text and checking images a nice thing to do. Compared to the basic iPhone X model, the XS Max had 60 percent more improved dynamic range, making videos and photos appear reasonably vivid.
The next question is whether Apple will skip naming again in the future. The iPhone 13 naming seems to bring bad-luck based on western folklore.
