New Design in ‘Pacific Blue’
The entire iPhone 12 lineup — Pro and non-pro models alike — received its most significant design overhaul in about six years, moving to a flat-edged design that’s reminiscent of the iPad Pro while also heartening back to the iPhone 4 and iPhone 5 era.
The new design actually offered a slightly sleeker aesthetic, despite the flat-edged sides, but has the practical aspect of allowing the 5G antennas to be more adequately exposed through the stainless steel sides.
As with last year’s iPhone 11 Pro, Apple has gone with a surgical grade stainless steel band, although it’s even more striking and pronounced in this year’s model, which is also available in four colours, which Apple’s newly-minted Senior VP of Marketing, Greg “Joz” Jozwiak, described as “elegant silver, rich graphite, stunning gold, and pacific blue.”
The silver and gold versions more or less mirror last year’s iPhone 11 Pro versions, although Joz noted that this year Apple is using a high-power magnetron coating process to give the gold edges an even more stunning finish.
Graphite, on the other hand, is effectively the new Space Grey, although as with the Apple Watch Series 6, there are likely some subtle differences in the shade, for all intents and purposes it’s the darker iPhone model.
The real star this year is the new Pacific Blue, which replaces last year’s Midnight Green with what appears to be an equal amount of elegance. While the non-pro iPhone models have always leaned toward more vibrant and fun colours, Apple has decided to keep the colours in its higher-end lineup more muted and classy, as befitting of their “Pro” status. Midnight Green was, in fact, the first time that a mainstream iPhone had gained any colour beyond the basics, and it seems that Apple has started a trend here.
As before, the rear glass is also precision-machined, and like the iPhone 12 the iPhone 12 Pro models will also incorporate the new specially-designed Ceramic Shield glass that Apple developed in partnership with Corning.