But, carrying a £619 starting price, it was prohibitively expensive. However, since Apple unveiled its follow on iPhone 6S Plus, the 2014 phablet’s starting price has dropped.
You can now pick up the iPhone 6 Plus for £539. While it’s still far from cheap, the price is still a marked drop when you compare it to the iPhone 6S Plus, which will set you back £619.
Add to this the fact it’s been upgraded to Apple’s shiny new iOS 9 operating system, and the iPhone 6 Plus is still a fairly compelling smartphone.
We’re working of an updated iPhone 6 Plus with iOS 9 review. Make sure to check back for the update to find out if the iPhone 6 Plus is an iOS-flavoured bargain.
WHAT IS THE IPHONE 6 PLUS?
People want bigger phones, all that extra screen opens up a raft of new possibilities. Don't believe me? Check out the excellent Samsung Galaxy Note 4 that has seen plenty of success.
It took Apple a while, but it finally got there. In typical Cupertino fashion it's entered the phablet arena with an almighty splash.
A big iPhone makes a lot of sense when combined with the Apple Watch. With that adorning your wrist the idea is you won’t need to pull the iPhone 6 Plus out of your pocket or bag all the time. And it does work that way to a small degree, but you'll still find yourself clamouring for a bigger screen whenever you want to do anything even remotely taxing.
The iPhone 6 Plus is really just a super-sized iPhone 6, at least that's exactly what it looks like. There's a more to it than that when you dig a little deeper, though. The big differentiator is that that huge 5.5-inch screen, but some other changes make it a very different proposition to it's little sibling.
This is a phone that displays all Apple's key trademarks. Great screen, superb quality fit and finish and one of the best point-and-click cameras you can find on a phone. Unlike other iPhones it also has excellent stamina – you can get two days of use out of the iPhone 6 Plus if you're careful.
Yes it has a lot of top features, but there’s no escaping how big it is. It will feel enormous to iPhone 5S owners who will initially baulk at its heft, but anyone concerned by its size shouldn't write it off. It really doesn't take very long to get used to it.
Watch our iPhone 6 vs iPhone 6 Plus video
IPHONE 6 PLUS: DESIGN
The iPhone 6 Plus is massive compared to some other 5.5-inch phones like the LG G3 or LG G4. LG worked hard to make those phones as compact as possible and achieved something of a miracle. It's a lot smaller than the 6 Plus in everything barring slimness.
Apple, on the other hand, has duplicated the exact same design as the iPhone 6, and it doesn’t work quite as well with the larger size.
SEE ALSO: Best Phablets 2015
What makes it tricky to handle are the large top and bottom bezels. They’re big and they make the phone taller than it should be, something that could have been a deal-breaker had Apple not made the 6 Plus fashionably slim at just 7.1mm. It also comes with a typically accomplished quality design. The glass and aluminium back merge seamlessly together and the iPhone 6 Plus feels great in your hand.
It’s well balanced and light enough too at just 172g. You’ll happily hold it for hours and that screen is perfect for browsing the internet or watching movies on the hoof.
SEE ALSO: iPhone 6 vs Galaxy S6
Its size means getting to the more inaccessible sections of the screen with one hand can be a struggle and can result in some strained digits. Apple has thought of this issue and has added a feature to the iPhone 6 Plus that brings the top of the screen closer to your thumb.
Tap the home button twice and the active area of the screen drops, giving you access to icons, address and search bars. Unlike on the iPhone 6, which is much slimmer, this doesn’t resolve all the issues caused by a big phone. You’ll still find it a bit of a stretch to get to the sides of the screen unless you’ve got big hands, especially when texting. Most people will need to use both hands to be comfortable in this scenario. Still, it’s an elegant solution that makes using the iPhone 6 Plus much easier day to day.
Just as on the iPhone 6, the 6 Plus has the power button on the right hand side, about an inch and a half from the top. It’s quite easy to reach but if we're being picky we'd say it would have been better if it was a little lower down. It’s the same story with the volume buttons on the left.
Despite the slightly awkward location of the side buttons the iPhone 6 Plus handles well even when you’re using it one handed. It feels like a premium product – no-one can quite match Apple’s superb build quality – although Samsung has come a whisker away with the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge . The iPhone 6 Plus manages to feel both solid and soft at the same time.
There is one area where Apple couldn’t quite get everything to fit smoothly into the body of the 6 Plus. The camera is a little raised from the back so it can fit the sensor with the addition of optical image stabilisation. It only comes out slightly and the edges are chamfered, so it looks good and doesn't snag on material as you put it in your pocket.
They better be large pockets, though. The 158.1mm tall, 77.8mm wide and 7.1mm thick body fits into tight jeans, but not with much to spare – we've found that in some pockets a corner pokes out of the top. Its thinness helps it slide into pockets, but it is larger than some other phones that come with the same size screen.
For that reason the iPhone 6 Plus isn’t quite the design triumph we’ve come to expect from Apple. It’s very well made and feels great in hand, but is just a bit too big. It's nowhere near as problematic to handle as the enormous Nexus 6 , but LG has shown that a 5.5-inch screen can be fit into a body that feels more like a phone than a phablet. Apple could have tried harder to make a bespoke design to this size, rather than zapping the iPhone 6 with a growth ray.
So, if you’re happy with the size of your current iPhone, or if you struggle with larger phones, then you should go for the iPhone 6 as opposed to its bigger brother. It’s a lot more pocketable and big step up from the iPhone 5 and iPhone 5S.
If you do opt for iPhone 6 Plus, though, it’s well worth considering Apple's leather case. It adds very little bulk and provides a super grippy surface to ensure you don’t fumble your phone. The larger phone is little slippery thanks to its curved corners and greater width.
Finally, we need to address the issue that has gone viral – the bendable iPhone. Apple has responded by claiming that there have only been nine cases so far and we believe it. We’ve been using the iPhone 6 Plus in tight jeans while cycling, sitting and walking around for months and it's still as straight as an arrow.
It's a story that has been blown out of all proportion, and seems totally unfounded based on our experience with half a dozen or so iPhones. Put a load of pressure on any phone and it will bend or break, this isn't an issue you should worry about at all
Read more at http://www.trustedreviews.com/iphone-6-plus-review#hwQtsvcUSP48Q4Lo.99
IPHONE 6 PLUS: SCREEN
Apple is often accused of being behind the times when it comes to screen resolutions. The iPhone 6 Plus comes with the highest resolution display ever on an Apple phone. It’s a full HD screen – 1920 x 1080 – with 401 pixels per inch (ppi). Apple calls it Retina HD but in pure number terms it falls behind of the best Android phones. Both the LG G3 and Samsung Galaxy Note 4 come with QHD screens, which means a resolution of 2560 x 1440 and 534ppi / 515ppi respectively.
That sounds like a big difference, but it isn't really. You don’t notice the extra pixels much. The Korean phones are sharper than the iPhone 6 Plus but you’ll have to zoom into text or pictures to notice any difference. In most other respects the iPhone 6 Plus has them beaten. The screen is bright and copes brilliantly in bright sunlight.
Colours are supremely accurate – they remain perfect at every angle and it has the best contrast and black level of any LCD-screened phone. It can’t compare with the perfect blacks that the AMOLED display on the Note 4 can muster, but the natural colours make up for it.
Screen experts DisplayMate also rate the screen on the iPhone 6 Plus, calling it the “best performing Smartphone LCD display that we have ever tested”. This is a very special screen indeed and you’ll love using the extra real estate to play games or watch videos.
The extra space means that the iPhone 6 Plus comes with a bigger and better speaker than the one on the iPhone 6. It is louder but more importantly it also comes with more depth and low end. It’s still mono, but you’ll happily watch your favourite Netflix series.
One issue that is more apparent with the speaker on the 6 Plus is that the grille is at the bottom right where your index finger is when holding it in landscape mode. The iPhone 6 is narrow enough to allow your finger to curve and not muffle the speaker, but this is more problematic on the iPhone 6 Plus. Considering the size of the top and bottom bezels it’s a shame that Apple didn’t choose to place front facing stereo speakers like the ones found on the HTC One M8.
IPHONE 6 PLUS: CONNECTIVITY
It’s been a while coming but the big news is that the iPhone 6 Plus has NFC (Near Field Communication). It’s limited to Apple Pay so you won’t be able to use it to pair with other NFC enabled devices you might have around the home, like wireless speakers, but Apple Pay has a huge amount of potential.
In other respects the 6 Plus has everything you’d expect from a top-of-the-range phone. You get Bluetooth 4.0, AirDrop (Apple’s feature that lets you easily share content from your phone with other Apple devices) and Wi-Fi 802.11ac. That's a lot faster than the Wi-Fi on the iPhone 5S although you will need an 802.11ac capable router to take advantage of this.
The iPhone 6 Plus also comes with a comprehensive 4G/LTE chip that covers 20 bands supports speeds up to 150Mbps. This means that it should work well on 4G networks around the world – a useful fact if you're planning on importing one or you travel widely.
Read more at http://www.trustedreviews.com/iphone-6-plus-review#9xzpI7i7qKhZd9ki.99
IPHONE 6 PLUS: PERFORMANCE
Apple's new A8 processor powers the iPhone 6 Plus. It’s an excellent system on a chip (SoC) that provides oodles of grunt for high definition 3D gaming and means that the iPhone 6 Plus is butter smooth in day-to-day operation.
If you just looked at the numbers you’d be forgiven for believing that the iPhone 6 Plus is a lot less powerful than the Android competition. The A8 is a dual-core processor running at 1.4GHz and is supported by just 1GB of RAM. It sounds paltry when compared to the quad-core 2.5GHz Snapdragon 801 and 2GB RAM of the Galaxy S5.
In fact, the iPhone 6 Plus performs better than the Samsung in some graphic intensive tasks like playing games.
Interestingly, the iPhone 6 Plus also performs a little better in our like-for-like processor tests when compared to its little brother. The wins are small though, just a few percent points.
In the 3D Mark Ice Storm Unlimited benchmark the 6 Plus scores a hefty 17,740 while it manages 2,871 on Geekbench 3. These are very high scores, on par with the Samsung Galaxy S5, which is the fastest of big-name Android flagship phones, and almost 30% faster than the iPhone 5S before it.
The biggest benefits of the A8 SoC, though, come from its graphical performance. The quad-core PowerVR GPU from Imagination Technologies is perfect for high intensity 3D gaming. Games look and perform brilliantly on the 5.5-inch HD screen.
The increased performance comes with some other benefits, too. Touch ID, Apple’s fingerprint recognition feature, unlocks your phone quicker than it does on the iPhone 5S.
The iPhone 6 Plus also uses an M8 co-processor, a tiny processor that keeps track of all data created by the array of sensors. Apple has added a new measurement into the mix, a barometer. This means that the 6 Plus can also recognise altitude, so it knows if you’ve been climbing stairs or hills. Fitness tracking apps can now hook into this information to provide more accurate information about your exercise regime.
The clever thing about the M8 processor is that it’s energy efficient. Battery life would be compromised if sensor data was constantly processed by the main A8 processor. It means that when you’re not doing much with your phone your battery doesn’t drain as quickly. It restricts phone functions when it knows your phone hasn’t moved for a while and is in an area with no signal. Clever stuff.
One feature that some may find lacking from the iPhone 6 Plus is the digitiser stylus. The Galaxy Note series is famous for it and while some people find it useful many others rarely use it. It is a useful addition and if you like taking hand-written notes, drawing or using a pen rather than a keyboard you might want to wait for the Galaxy Note 4.
IPHONE 6 PLUS: STORAGE AND PRICING
Apple has never provided the option of adding a microSD card into its phones and the iPhone 6 Plus is no exception. If you like to store loads of music, games or movies on your phone you’ll need to pay for the extra storage up front.
It comes in three capacities: 16GB, 64GB and 128GB and that final version costs a fortune. In fact at £789/$949 for the top model the iPhone 6 Plus is the most expensive major smartphone we’ve ever seen. Unfortunately, the 16GB model (£619/$749) only provides around 11GB of storage after iOS 8 takes its cut. This means the 64GB model is the one to get. At £699/$849 it’s not exactly cheap, but 64GB should be enough for all but the most avid mobile media hoarder
Read more at http://www.trustedreviews.com/iphone-6-plus-review#tViA21B6Yrk0u6Ok.99
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