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Hey, what's wrong with a small iPhone?
Is Apple an oddball because its phones continue to be relatively small? It's a stance that seems to run counter to Android smartphone design trends.
iPhone 4S.
(Credit: Apple)Is a bigger iPhone a better iPhone?
The iPhone rumor du jour this week was about a big screen. In fact, "iPhone 5" rumors going way back almost invariably cite a bigger screen. Sizes run the gamut from 4-inch screens to 4.2-inch to, now, 4.6-inch.
The iPhone currently has a 3.5-inch screen.
And that's just fine with me. A smartphone should be as small as possible. Certainly not BlackBerry Curve small but not so big that it isn't compact. It's a phone, after all.
The brave new big-honking-iPhone world that Reuters claimed is coming (only to be shouted down and debunked by Apple blogs), isn't one I'd necessarily look forward to. I don't need to haul around something brushing up against the mini-tablet category (e.g., a Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket). I have a real tablet for that.
Though I may be in a minority with this opinion.
That's not to say Apple can't do better. After all, there are large tracts (relative to the size of the iPhone's face) of do-nothing plastic on the front of the iPhone (see photo above) that could be better utilized as screen real estate.
And that's not to say I'd object to a slightly larger iPhone. But I'd be perfectly happy with an iPhone 5 with essentially the same chassis and the same Retina display, but with an edge-to-edge screen all around.
So, here's my question, is it retrograde for a smartphone to be small? (And note that the latest rumor says the next iPhone's screen size won't change). Should Apple worry about defying a big-screen smartphone trend in the Android world?
