Apple iPhone 7, iPhone 7 Plus launched in India, price starts at Rs 60,000

Apple launched its next batch of iPhones, aka the iPhone 7 and the iPhone 7 Plus at an event in San Francisco on Wednesday. Follow-ups to last year's iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus, the iPhone 7 and the iPhone 7 Plus -- as largely expected -- don't reinvent the wheel, and rather sum up as mere incremental upgrades to their predecessor phones. That being said, the new increments brought in, all work towards refining a product that is already considered by many as one of the best that there is in the market. The iPhone 7 and the iPhone 7 Plus broadly focus on durability, photography and audio aspects.

The new iPhones will be coming to India on October 7. Price starts at Rs 60,000 for the base 32GB variant of the iPhone 7.

Also Read: LIVE updates: Apple announces Watch 2, iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus next

Design wise, the iPhone 7 and the iPhone 7 Plus look more or less similar to the outgoing iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus. Build material is however different this time round. The new iPhones boast of an all glass and metal body. The position of the antenna lines have also changed from their more prominent mid-level placing in the previous models to the more extreme corners of the phones now. Apple still hasn't been able to get rid of them completely, but well, it's a start.

A useful addition, in the new iPhones, is the introduction of water and dust resistance, something which has been part of rumour mills for quite some time now. The new iPhones come with IP67 certification. Speaking of leaks and rumours, there is also no 3.5mm audio jack in the new iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus. Alas! Instead, the phones come with a single connectivity (lightning) port for charging, data syncing and audio out.

The company - as long rumoured -- has designed wireless EarPods called AirPods for the new iPhones. For those of you looking to connect your regular 3.5mm headphones to them, you get a lightning to 3.5mm adapter inside the box. Regular Bluetooth headphones should work fine with the new iPhones though.

The AirPods (including charging case) will be available for Rs 15,400 in India, beginning in late October. The company has said that all models will include EarPods with Lightning Connector and a Lightning to 3.5 mm Headphone Jack Adapter inside the box. 

The new iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus also ditch Apple's clickable home button in favour of a touch capacitive button with support for 3D Force Touch and haptic feedback built into it.

Just like the design, the new iPhones also retain the size of their predecessor phones. While the iPhone 7 comes with a 4.7-inch display, the iPhone 7 Plus has a larger 5.5-inch screen. Both the phones come with Retina HD display, which is 25 per cent brighter than the screen on-board the iPhone 6S and the iPhone 6S Plus.

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Both the phones are powered by Apple's next-generation quad-core A10 Fusion processor. Both the phones run Apple's latest and greatest iOS 10 software.

"The A10 Fusion's CPU integrates two high-performance cores that run up to two times faster than iPhone 6, and two high-efficiency cores that are capable of running at just one-fifth the power of the high-performance cores. Graphics performance is also more powerful, running up to three times faster than iPhone 6 at as little as half the power," the company said about its new processor. 

Apple's iPhone has been facing stiff competition from Samsung's new breed of Galaxy S phones in the camera department. The iPhone 6 (and 6S) was the de-facto go-to smartphone for top-notch camera capabilities once upon a time. The Samsung Galaxy S6, and now the Galaxy S7 have changed that. For the first time, an Android OEM can compete with Apple in this regard. Moreover, others in the trade - like HTC, Sony et al - are slowly catching up. Apple had to come back with something more, something better. Its new iPhones are exactly what the doctor ordered for the Cupertino major, if the company's claims are to be gone by. Apple has incorporated Optical Image Stabilisation in the iPhone 7 while the iPhone 7 Plus comes with dual cameras on the rear.

The iPhone 7 comes with a 12-megapxiel camera on the rear with f/1.8 aperture, OIS and 4 LEDs. The rear sensor is 20 per cent more energy efficient, says Apple. Live photos are supported, so are RAW image files. On the front, there is a 7-megapixel camera, up from the 5-megapixel sensor on-board the previous versions.

Also Read: Like it or not, iPhone 7 & iPhone 7 Plus launch will force Android phones to change

The dual camera setup in the iPhone 7 Plus meanwhile consists of two 12-megapixel cameras: one consisting of a wide-angle lens while another with a telephoto lens. The iPhone 7 Plus with its twin cameras can take pretty impressive photos with shallow depth of field, or bokeh, according to Apple.

The new iPhones are claimed to have the longest battery life ever in an iPhone, according to Apple. The biggest takeaway, though, is that Apple has finally ditched the 16GB base variant, and instead started with 32GB as base memory in its new iPhones. These will be available in 32GB, 128GB and 256 memory options. Prices start at $649 for the iPhone 7 and $769 for the iPhone 7 Plus. The phones will be available in the colours: Jet Black, Black, Rose Gold and Silver.  

The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus will be available for pre-order beginning from September 9, with availability beginning from September 16, in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, UAE, the UK, US Virgin Islands and the US.