so this is the iPhone 16 Pro And in this episode I'm going to talk to you about why this is my main phone and why I'm still using this after using it for about 90 days now [Music] So what is up guys Nick here helping you to master your technology And to get this video started I do want to give you some context here so you know where I'm coming from with this video So I did make a video why this is my main phone here in 2025 about two months ago on my second channel the more Nick Acriman channel which if you want to go check out you can I post things I don't usually post on this channel But I talked about why I've been loving this product and I still have not switched off of it Now to keep things in context the other day I also did a 9-month review on this phone Now the review is more of my standard take on this This is going to be more personal where I talk about why I personally keep using this product So let's go ahead and talk about the very first one and that's going to be its comfort and size in daily use Now I know you would probably think "Oh well tech YouTubers going to be using the most highestend top-of-the-line device and that is true I do tend to really stick to the ultras and the Pro Maxes of the world But lately I've been really digging the more comfortable size even though this 16 Pro Max is in many people's eyes the top dog in the iPhone lineup Uh this is essentially the same phone just in a more comfortable size format Now where it really tends to feel more comfortable is one-handed use Even though it does have these thin bezels which have made it a little bit more wider than the 15 Pro which I think is even more comfortable than this I like the improved battery and the improved thermals on this phone over the iPhone 15 Pro I also find it much more comfortable when you're using this product in bed at night For example if you got to write your schedule for the next day or you're reading you're reading some content you're watching a quick video Uh just when you're laying down and you don't want a huge phone hitting you in the face you know when it falls in your face I'm sure some of you've had that happen before This one is just a little bit easier to grip It's just a little bit more comfortable in that space Um and also with this size I've noticed that even though this size is smaller I haven't really found it to be um a problem when it comes to displaying content the iPhone 16 Pro Max wasn't really showing me an extraordinary more amount of content And while I do like the media experience better on the Plus or Pro Max uh for watching a video generally this is still big enough It's kind of somewhere in between the uh older 6.1 and like the older Max's uh 11 Pro Max so 6.5 in range phones and the newer iPhone So it kind of feels like that but into a smaller body Um so size and daily use has been phenomenal It's also got enough heft that when this phone the iPhone 16 Pro is in your pocket it doesn't really feel like uh you can't feel it You definitely feel it there uh while also not weighing down your pocket So it strikes a really good balance between weight thinness size It's not super thin but it's definitely thin And uh it's overall just a really good balance somewhere in between And I just haven't wanted to get off of it I'm trying I'm thinking about man should I just use the big screen Like I get more space but I just really haven't found myself um coming to feeling like I have to do that Especially considering on the iPhone space we don't split screen on the Max and we don't have anything taking real capabilities of that larger display So I thought when I was coming from the Pro Max that I was going to be really suffering when it comes to the battery life but this phone really shocked me and lasting pretty much all day every day Yes Does it get lower than my max by the end of the day Absolutely it does But here's the kicker I find that I don't feel as sucked into using this phone quite as frequently as the 6.9 in Pro Max So I'm not actually hooked to this phone as frequently which is good for less distraction I would say than the monstrous Pro Max And so the battery life while the Pro Max did offer me about an hour and a half to two hours more battery life dayto day um it's I kind of use this phone about an hour to an hour and a half less than the Pro Max I mean the Pro Max I'm like using it more and not even going to my iPad Whereas with this one I find myself going to my iPad for more media consumption and using this more as a phone And so with that difference I probably use my phone about an hour and a half less on this phone So it kind of balanced out That's not an excuse for this having worse battery life It definitely does the Pro Max but at the end of the day I'm still using it because I don't feel like I'm stressing over the battery life while still maintaining a nice one-handed comfortable size So that comfy cozy feel um while still having really good battery life for the dayto-day And uh of course any phone you start playing a lot of games you start running the GPS you are going to drain this a lot faster than usual So do keep that in mind It's not immune to that or anything like that I'm not trying to make it seem like that I'm just saying that it kind of does balance out if you find yourself using it a little bit less just due to it not being such a distracting super large product in your hand So when it comes to the performance I don't really care how you know what game you're playing what you're doing on here You do get fantastic experience for this phone It just it really just doesn't matter what you're doing whether you're playing FreeFire you're playing PUBG you're playing Call of Duty uh you get good experience This phone I thought with the 16 Pro and Pro Max the heat was going to be basically gone forever Um but it's definitely not gone you can still get warm especially if you're using a non-Apple charger and you're charging it while playing just like any other phone It can warm up It's not going to warm up anywhere near the degree of the 15 Pro series did And you do have better sustained performance over your experience playing for a while So it's not going to let you down in those aspects But what I will say is that you know it has amazing performance with a little bit of a less fast animation So I don't find it to feel as snappy as a Samsung S25 Plus Edge regular any of the series of the S25 competitors I don't find it to be that fast but it still retains that smooth feel especially on the production software iOS 18.5 I'm not running the 26 beta on here I'll be running that on my 16 Pro Max you've been seeing Um and it's only going to get better when 26 becomes more smooth So it it's just a really smooth day-to-day performance It's not overly snappy It's not slow whatsoever and all your apps just kind of run flawlessly So it's something that just falls into the background of your day-to-day life and you're not really going to miss anything when it a beat when it comes to performance So and updates do come in super regular as you expect with Apple devices So I'm I'm happy to report you'll have a good time no matter what you're doing here on the iPhone 16 Pro It's it's been a really good time with speed and performance It has So when it comes to the camera reliability and results I've been getting very good overall results You can see great dynamic range and the clouds there Really accurate colors and just a really easy to use experience You can even see some good detail on these bricks on this house over here Um you can also see that some things when you zoom really in if you're far away can get a little bit hard to see but uh it does have the same amount of zoom as we find on the Max So I don't feel like I'm missing anything And I like the size and hitting that camera control button has been fun But the ability to go 25x is really good for this small phone You can also punch in on the 1x to go different millimeter ranges So this definitely feels like a prolevel experience with the camera and you don't really feel like you need to use uh any other camera You can do 4K 60 The video looks phenomenal on social media and I don't feel like when I'm using this that I have to use any other iPhone in the lineup It feels like it has the best of both worlds of the smaller size but the camera of the larger phone So again with that balance of a sweet spot kind of feels like what I thought about the 13 Pro years ago Now when we talk about the display quality of course we do have an OLED panel here so it looks pretty good Also it doesn't look super different than like the 15 Pro series in terms of balance and accuracy It's pretty similar but I really like how this iPhone is not oversaturated under saturated It kind of strikes a good sweet spot The dynamic island you probably are used to by now but it tends to get in the way a little bit more on these smaller pro So I'm not a fan of that Of course you can see with darker backgrounds that it doesn't seem to affect it too much But as we kind of zoom in here you'll see it a little bit more Let me go ahead and go to a brighter image You can see if there's a darker section you won't be able to tell too much But if I zoom out you can just kind of watch it in this older version and it looks pretty good On the whole I don't really consume a ton of videos on here except for just quick checking things Um so again it does reduce the distraction a bit But if you do want to consume videos it never felt like it was too small Um this is a good display to consume content on Never felt too small in my day-to-day use Now if I go over here to the to read an article for example let's go ahead and find out something going on in tech world So let's go ahead and read about this right here for example Actually let's just go here Text will look incredibly sharp here So definitely going to have no issues with that Let's read something about the iPhones And you'll see incredibly sharp text really no issues whatsoever there So I definitely like the overall resolution the overall color balance and also it gets plenty bright However I am looking forward to seeing more brightness as this phone doesn't get quite as bright as the competition It still never let me down In everyday use the display has been smooth and great So this is one of the reasons why I'm still using this product And the next one is the integration of hardware products Like the Apple Watch Ultra integrates extremely well with this product However I do use G-Shocks pretty regularly but the Apple Watch is my main smartwatch for tracking fitness and things of that and of that sort And um definitely I find that you know the ability to switch out bands and stuff like that is pretty cool Um but just the way this matches up with the iPhone and the Apple Watch app here it feels very compact and like a nice portable setup using this and the smaller Pro Um versus the Max feels like a little bit of a heavier setup for for sure But if you want even lighter setup you can get a smaller Apple Watch like a Apple Watch uh SE 42 mm something smaller like that it'll feel even like a lighter setup than this one right here But combining this with AirPod Pros the iPads the Macs and all of the iOS 26 integrations coming it just feels very cohesive uh and very cozy with this size So it's one of the things I like about this product right here Build quality and durability also is pretty superb Although I found out the hard way that this is not bulletproof here in terms of quality You'll definitely if you drop it you will see some nicks and marks I got some here on the iPhone 16 Pro Max I've gotten over it but at first my OCD was going out of control for stuff like this And people wonder why uh my phones look clean because I cannot stand little scuffs and scratches on my device Yes I'm one of those people I don't like it especially when I pay those prices I don't like it I don't like those scratches and scuffs all over the device Now a speaker and microphones have been pretty good on here And compared to other phones I've used I think my favorite phone next to this one is going to be the Galaxy S25 Edge just simply because it's kind of like similarly light uh to lighter phones And for competitors it's definitely going to be similar performance and a lot of specs to this phone with a little bit worse battery life So Nick you've been talking about everything you like about it praising it but is there anything you don't like about this phone after this becoming your main device And we pro you probably think that oh he's just going to switch pretty quickly I'm I do have to rotate phones for reviews but me personally I'm probably going to switch again with the new 17 series so that's pretty obvious But um the what I don't like about this phone right here is I don't like the dynamic island I just simply don't like how it takes up space on the display I know it's it's pretty fun to use for some people but it's just I don't like it I rather have no dynamic island full screen on here as well I also don't like how this phone I don't really like the weight of it I know I can feel it in the pocket but I'd like to see thinner battery technology and a thinner design on the future Pros I don't know if I'm going to see that We'll probably just see that with the Airs but it's just not my favorite thing I I wish this had all this power but a little bit lighter Um I know you got to make some compromises if you want longer battery life but we're seeing with the carbon batteries that it is it is a possible thing to do And other than that I don't have really too many other complaints about it The camera control button has been a little glitchy a couple of times That has been a little bit annoying but I really struggle to find too many problems with it It just doesn't have a lot of problems Uh it's not a problem phone It's one of the best ones you can buy right now So let me know your thoughts about the iPhone 16 Pro Do you think I'm off base Are you like "No way I'm sticking with the Ultra I'm sticking with the Max of the world You're just using that because you're having a little you're having a little hiatus from your favorite big boy phones Let me know your thoughts I'd like to discuss with you down below how you feel about cozy one-handed flagships versus big boy max big boy ultra flagships down below in the comment section of this video Thumbs up if you enjoyed it Subscribe if you haven't already and I will catch you all in the next one Nick here Be sure to be well and peace