page_title: IPhone 5
section_title: Critical reception
hierarchical_section_title: IPhone 5 / Reception / Critical reception
caption_attribution_description: English: Image of iPhone 4S' 30pin dock connector (top) and iPhone 5's lightning dock connector (bottom)
context_page_description: The iPhone 5 is a smartphone that was designed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is the 6th generation iPhone, succeeding the iPhone 4S and preceding both the iPhone 5S and 5C. It was formally unveiled as part of a press event on September 12, 2012, and subsequently released on September 21, 2012. The iPhone 5 was the first iPhone to be announced in September, and setting a trend for subsequent iPhone releases, the first iPhone to be completely developed under the guidance of Tim Cook and the last iPhone to be overseen by Steve Jobs. The iPhone 5's design was used three times, first with the iPhone 5 itself in 2012, then with the 5S in 2013, and finally with the first-generation iPhone SE in 2016.
  The iPhone 5 featured major design changes in comparison to its predecessor. These included an aluminum-based body which was thinner and lighter than previous models, a taller screen with a nearly 16:9 aspect ratio, the Apple A6 system-on-chip, LTE support, and Lightning, a new compact dock connector which replaced the 30-pin design used by previous iPhone models. This was the second Apple phone to include its new Sony-made 8 MP camera, which was first introduced on the iPhone 4S.
context_section_description: The iPhone 5 received mainly positive reviews from commentators and reviewers. Tim Stevens from Engadget praised the iPhone 5 for its high resolution screen surpassing that of the iPhone 4s, which he considered to be one of the best phone screens available on the market. Stevens was critical of the new connector, which is incompatible with devices and cables that use the superseded 30-pin connector, although the LA Times reported that this was a change necessary to make the device smaller than its predecessor. Engadget agreed that Apple fulfilled most of the promises stated on its website, such as "better battery performance", "two times the graphics performance" and "two times faster." David Pogue of The New York Times considered the 4-inch Retina display a "nice but not life-changing change", and praised the Lightning connector for its size, sturdiness, and reversibility, while noting its lack of support for older accessories, remarking that "Apple has a long history of killing off technologies, inconveniently and expensively, that the public had come to love". Technology columnist Ed Baig of USA Today was impressed that Apple had met the public's "lofty expectations" for the iPhone 5 in a competitive market. In a repair-ability review, iFixit found the iPhone 5 easier to disassemble and repair than its predecessor.
  Wired reported that the iPhone 5 design, carried on in the iPhone 5s and first-generation iPhone SE, was regarded as "long been the golden child of Apple phone design and a benchmark for phones in general", while the succeeding iPhone 6/6S design was less critically acclaimed as it "felt a little bit wrong, as though you were holding a slick $650 bar of soap". Wired described the iPhone 5 as "elegance rooted in the way the aluminum and glass work together. It felt streamlined, yet substantial, which is different from the iPhone 6, which feels substantial in size alone. Plus, unlike the ubiquitous rounded corners of the 6, the iPhone 5 didn't really look like anything else on the market at the time". However, the iPhone 5's design was not suited to scaling up, in contrast to the iPhone 6/6S which could better accommodate the growing consumer trend towards larger screen sizes and indeed spawned the 6/6S Plus phablet models.
caption: Comparison between the 30-pin port of the iPhone 4s (top) and Lightning port of the iPhone 5 (bottom)
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