Is iPhone 11 Still Good Today? Still Worth Buying In 2024?

Back in September 2019, Apple released the iPhone 11, and Apple fans were excited about the impressive technology and a new user experience they’d never had before.

The phone welcomed a powerful processor, a solid camera profile, and an enduring battery. 

With the newer models hitting the market, more advanced features are reaching the users and older models seem to lose their footing.

However, the iPhone 11 can be considered a decent everyday phone that you can still use for less exhausting tasks.

Let’s answer the question if this is still worth it in 2024.

Design and Build Quality

Speaking of design, the 2019 iPhone 11 has a hybrid design of fresh as well as familiar looks. The front and back sides closely copy the iPhone XR – a notch at the top, a little bit thicker bezels, and an aluminium frame encapsulating the display.

The rear lenses on the rear are bigger and housed inside a matte glass square. You will find the rest of the body to be with a glossy finish.

Thanks to a dual-ion exchange process, the front and back glasses are tougher, among the toughest in smartphones, in fact.  

Apple gave enough protection to this phone 5 years ago that it still offers great satisfaction to its users. The IP68 water and dust resistance protects the phone against dust particles and water immersion of 2 meters for up to 30 minutes. 5 years on, this rating is a standard for the latest model of the likes of iPhone 14 Pro Max, iPhone 15 Pro, and iPhone 15 Pro Max.

iPhone 11 Price in Australia

The price of the iPhone 11 in Australia starts at AU$ 374. Skyphonez is Australia’s leading eCommerce platform for buying new as well as refurbished smartphones, laptops, tablets, and other tech gadgets.

Skyphonez Australia is committed to bringing the latest phones with incredible processing powers at the best market prices. This ensures you get the premium devices while saving money on every purchase. 

Every purchase is backed by a 30-day money-back guarantee and free shipping across Australia. So, you can buy the premium phones and gadgets in Australia risk-free.

Display

The iPhone 11 has just about the right screen size that offers a fun on-screen experience as well as makes the device more user-friendly and easy to carry. The 6.1-inch LCD display is bright and colourful and looks great but less intriguing than the modern OLED screens, of course. The Liquid Retina HD screen is the same size as the iPhone XR and identical resolution of 1792 x 828 pixels. 

While watching movies on the iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro (which has an OLED display), the colours looked rich and the details were fine. One thing that gave the Pro model an edge was the viewing angles which were broader than the regular model. Also, the contrasts were sharper in the Pro phone.

The phone delivers great brightness at 652 nits which beats the iPhone XR’s 589 nits with the cRGB colour gamut of 113%. However, this number is way behind modern devices like the Galaxy S10 (208.2%) and OnePlus 7 Pro (180%). Experts believe that Apple did this purposefully to not oversaturate the colours.

You will definitely want to know how the phone sounds when listening to your favourite tracks freestyle. The new spatial audio provides a wider soundstage with Dolby Atmos support. Believe it or not, you will occasionally find yourself thinking that you are in a movie theatre. You will hear the sounds of objects falling, cars crashing, and firearms firing.

If you want to consider a cheaper Appple iPhone with some amazing features, then have a look at our iPhone SE review. The phone offers some impressive features at a budget-friendly price.

Camera Capabilities

One of the biggest strides that the iPhone 11 made from the older models is the Night mode. The phone has taken the ride along with the Google Pixel 3, Huawei P30 Pro, and Galaxy S10. The iPhone XR just could not hold its footing in low-light snapping competition with the Pixel 3. 

To see the difference that the iPhone 11 can make, you should take some indoor shots in darker lighting, and you will easily see the details of the objects as well as the colours that will look visible.

Racing the iPhone 11 and Pixel 3 for taking low-light shots, the former wins the race by delivering brighter overall images. The interesting thing is that you can get these types of results without using the Night mode.

Another big advancement is the new 12 MP ultra-wide camera that gives you more flexibility to shoot and you can also have the preview inside the app if you want to. Courtesy of the 120-degree field of view, you will be able to cover more scenes and capture great memorable portrait group shots with your friends and family. 

Apple takes things to the next level with the Smart HDR feature allowing you to use machine learning that is smart enough to recognize the subject and keep the important face details. 

As more smartphones are doing hard work to scale up their videography capabilities, Apple has also buckled up to make the advancements in this department as well. Both the cameras have been provided with 4K support at 60 frames per second. The iPhone 11 has been designed to bring extended dynamic range for better highlight details and smoother motion via cinematic stabilization.

Now let’s have a look at the video action. While shooting videos walking in a park, the iPhone 11’s video delivered more natural-looking colours, nicer gradation, and striking contrast. The footage made with the Galaxy Note 10, on the contrary, was not realistic. The details of surrounding objects were also better with the iPhone 11. 

Apple has redesigned the iOS 13 camera software to make video shooting more integrated with photo shoots. This allows you to take QuickTake footage easily. All you need to do is hold the shutter button to start shooting the video. You can simply slide your finger to the right to continue shooting.

The iPhone XR struggled with selfies, however, Apple has made improvements to the iPhone 11’s 12 MP selfie camera. This lens offers a wider field of view. You can engage the wider angle with a simple tap or by rotating the phone to the landscape position and it will automatically turn on the wide-angle mode.

The front camera feature that created a huge buzz in the tech world was the “slofies”-slow-motion videos at 120 frames per second. It adds a fun layer to the selfies by turning them into sluggishly-moving short videos. The iPhone 11 price seems very reasonable considering its camera capabilities and brilliant software that offers more flexibility.

Performance

There is no doubt that the A13 Bionic processor was the fastest at the time of iPhone 11’s release. This powerful hardware boosted Apple’s lead in the market. 5 years later, it might not be the fastest chip yet it offers impressive overall performance for every task you may want to throw on it. It embraced machine learning, faster CPU, and better graphics rendering.

For those users who love to live stream and binge-watch movies on their smartphones, the iPhone 11 has one weak point – it lacks the 5G. Yes, that’s right. Modern phones offer faster internet speeds which has now become the mainstream feature. If, however, you don’t crave fast internet and prefer to save money, then the iPhone 11 can prove a worthy gadget in your arsenal.

Battery Life

Here comes a huge thumbs-up moment. On continuous web surfing, the iPhone 11 battery lasted beyond 11 hours – this is well ahead of the average time smartphones deliver. With 150 nits of brightness and endlessly surfing over 4G, the battery manages to endure for 11 hours and 16 minutes. 

To give you a comparison, the Galaxy S10 lasted for 10 hours and 35 minutes, the Galaxy S10 Plus lasted 12 hours and 35 minutes, and the OnePlus 7 Pro survived for just 9 hours and 31 minutes. The iPhone 11 Pro Max, however, managed to last longer with 11 hours and 54 seconds. 

There is some not-so-good news. You will not get a fast charger with the box. Yes, you can buy a charger separately to boost the battery faster. The pricier sibling iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone Pro Max come with a fast charger in the box. These 18-watt fast chargers allow you to charge your phone faster. 

Conclusion

For those looking to spend less on great cameras, long-lasting battery, and fast chipset performance, the iPhone 11 is still a great budget iPhone in 2024. The display is bright and colourful, and the images look brilliant. Yes, there are a lot of technological upgrades in the modern models including OLED displays, better RAM capacity, and 5G connectivity. But if you can skip these latest features without feeling down inside, then you can go ahead with the iPhone 11 as a brilliant day-to-day iPhone for most people.