I have been using the iPhone 16 for a month. Here’s what stands out

From snapping photos by the beach on a weekend getaway to capturing cute moments with my cats and shooting gear for my CNET stories, I use the iPhone 16 camera often. But almost every time I go to take a photo , I find myself bypassing the new camera control button in favor of the camera icon on my iPhone’s lock screen or home screen.

Apple has big plans for the camera control button that go beyond simply releasing and manipulating the camera. When visual intelligence launches, Camera Control will essentially turn into an AI button, making it possible to ask questions about the world around you via Apple, ChatGPT or Google with the push of a button.

But this experience is not yet a reality. After spending a month using the iPhone 16, my impressions are the same as when I first reviewed it in September. Camera control can be fun to play with, but it’s not a reason to buy a new iPhone. Instead, the iPhone 16’s appeal is about how all the little things — like the Action button, Dynamic Island, and now the Camera Control button — add up when taken together. All of these extras make the iPhone 16 seem like a better value than the iPhone 14 just two years ago when it launched for the same price, without any of these extras.

Otherwise, the iPhone 16 has shown some battery life and performance improvements over the iPhone 15. And if you’re upgrading from an iPhone that’s a few years old, like the iPhone 12, you’ll likely see a step up in camera performance.

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Camera control is not the main attraction

The camera control key, which lets you launch the camera and adjust your shot, is the most significant new feature available on the iPhone 16 at launch — especially since Apple Intelligence isn’t out yet. While the button makes it easier to quickly swipe through camera settings or zoom length, it hasn’t become second nature like pressing the button on my screen.

Honestly, I forget the camera control button is even there most of the time. It’s hard to break a habit, especially for a task like launching the camera that I’ve done a certain way for as long as I’ve used an iPhone. If you’re going to introduce a new mechanism for using something as essential as a phone camera, it needs to be significantly faster or easier. In its current form, I don’t think Camera Control achieves this goal.

That said, you can do a lot more than just launch the camera with that button, including opening third-party camera apps, magnifiers, or a barcode scanner app. As I wrote in my initial review, you can slide between settings to adjust exposure, depth, zoom, picture styles and tone, and you can switch between camera lenses. It might be a useful way to toggle these settings and modes without obscuring the screen with your finger, but it doesn’t seem like it meaningfully changes the photography experience in a way that makes it tempting to upgrade.

On the bright side, it’s somewhat convenient when I’m trying to take a photo with one hand, as it’s easier to tap a button on the edge of the phone rather than the screen when my hands are full. I also liked using the button to preview Photo Styles — which turned out to be one of my favorite iPhone 16 features — while I’m framing my shot.

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The camera is a big step up from older iPhones

The iPhone 16’s camera will feel like a step up if you’re coming from an iPhone that’s several generations old. I compared the iPhone 16’s camera to the iPhone 12’s to see how much it’s changed, and I noticed bolder colors, sharper zoom quality, and more accurate skin tones that don’t look as washed out.

Take a look at the pink flower photo below to see one of the best examples of how the iPhone 16 camera shines over the iPhone 12. The pink color is much more vibrant and realistic in the iPhone 16 photo, and elements like grass and leaves are also sharper.

iPhone 16

iPhone 12

The results show how far the iPhone camera has come in four years. Apple’s latest phone has a 48-megapixel main camera compared to the iPhone 12’s 12-megapixel camera, along with support for macro photography and a closer 10x digital zoom.

Apple has made incremental but significant improvements to the iPhone’s camera over time, which is why the improvement is more noticeable when coming from an older phone. Compared to the iPhone 15, the iPhone 16 gains macro mode, support for the new version of Photographic Styles, an updated main “fusion” camera that Apple says can take photos with 2x optical zoom, better photos in low light when use the ultra-wide camera and the ability to capture space photos and videos for viewing on Apple Vision Pro.

That might sound like a lot, but these are mostly iterative changes that add up in a bigger way when upgrading from a phone that’s at least two, if not three or four, years old.

A closer look at iPhone 16 battery life and performance

Compared to last year’s iPhones, the iPhone 16 performed slightly better than the iPhone 15 in the graphics and overall computing power benchmarks. It also outperformed the Samsung Galaxy S24 Plus in Geekbench 6, the general computing test, but lagged behind Samsung’s phone in the graphics test.

iPhone 16

iPhone 15

Galaxy S24 Plus