The iPhone XR is a

smartphone A smartphone is a mobile phone with advanced computing capabilities. It typically has a touchscreen interface, allowing users to access a wide range of applications and services, such as web browsing, email, and social media, as well as multi ...

developed and marketed by

Apple Inc. Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, in Silicon Valley. It is best known for its consumer electronics, software, and services. Founded in 1976 as Apple Comput ...

It is part of the twelfth generation of the

iPhone The iPhone is a line of smartphones developed and marketed by Apple that run iOS, the company's own mobile operating system. The first-generation iPhone was announced by then–Apple CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs on January 9, 2007, at ...

, alongside the higher-end iPhone XS/XS Max models. Pre-orders began on October 19, 2018, with the official release on October 26, 2018. Launched at $749 in the US, the iPhone XR was the least expensive device in Apple's twelfth generation of iPhones, which also includes the iPhone XS and XS Max, and was therefore considered an "affordable flagship" or "budget flagship" phone at its release. The XR shares key internal hardware with the XS but with features removed or downgraded to reduce the price. The XR features the same processor as the XS and XS Max, the Apple A12 Bionic chip built with a 7 nanometer process. Instead of the OLED screen on the XS, the XR has a 6.1-inch Liquid Retina

LED-backlit LCD An LED-backlit LCD is a liquid-crystal display that uses LEDs for backlighting instead of traditional cold cathode fluorescent (CCFL) backlighting. LED-backlit displays use the same TFT LCD ( thin-film-transistor liquid-crystal display) tec ...

IPS panel IPS (in-plane switching) is a screen technology for liquid-crystal displays (LCDs). In IPS, a layer of liquid crystals is sandwiched between two glass surfaces. The liquid crystal molecules are aligned parallel to those surfaces in predetermined ...

display, According to Apple, the full charge of the XR battery lasts up to one-and-a-half hours longer than that of its direct predecessor, the iPhone 8 Plus. The iPhone XR was available in six colors:

black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

white White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB color model, RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB color model, RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between Violet (color), violet and cyan on the optical spe ...

yellow Yellow is the color between green and orange on the spectrum of light. It is evoked by light with a dominant wavelength of roughly 575585 nm. It is a primary color in subtractive color systems, used in painting or color printing. In t ...

coral Corals are colonial marine invertebrates within the subphylum Anthozoa of the phylum Cnidaria. They typically form compact Colony (biology), colonies of many identical individual polyp (zoology), polyps. Coral species include the important Coral ...

(a shade of pink and orange), and Product Red. It is the second iPhone to be released in white,

and

, the first being the

iPhone 5c The iPhone 5c is a smartphone that was developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is part of the sixth generation of the iPhone. The device was unveiled on September 10, 2013, and released on September 20, 2013, along with its higher-end counte ...

in 2013. Internationally, the phone supports dual SIMs through a

Nano-SIM file:SIM-Karte von Telefónica O2 Europe - Standard und Micro.jpg, A typical SIM card (mini-SIM with micro-SIM cutout)A SIM card or SIM (subscriber identity module) is an integrated circuit (IC) intended to securely store an international mobile s ...

and an

eSIM An eSIM (embedded SIM) is a form of SIM card that is embedded directly into a device as software installed onto a eUICC chip. First released in March 2016, eSIM is a global specification by the GSMA that enables remote SIM provisioning; end ...

. In

mainland China "Mainland China", also referred to as "the Chinese mainland", is a Geopolitics, geopolitical term defined as the territory under direct administration of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in the aftermath of the Chinese Civil War. In addit ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

, and

Macau Macau or Macao is a special administrative regions of China, special administrative region of the People's Republic of China (PRC). With a population of about people and a land area of , it is the most List of countries and dependencies by p ...

, dual

(in a single tray) is offered instead. The iPhone XR was available in three storage capacities: 64 GB, 128 GB, and 256 GB. The 256 GB version was discontinued with the release of the iPhone 11 and 11 Pro; while the iPhone XS was discontinued and replaced by the iPhone 11 Pro, the iPhone XR continued on sale at a lower price point with the iPhone 11 succeeding as the "affordable flagship". The iPhone XR continued to be made available alongside the

iPhone 12 The iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Mini (stylized and marketed as iPhone 12 mini) are smartphones developed and marketed by Apple Inc. They are the fourteenth-generation iPhones, succeeding the iPhone 11. They were unveiled at a virtually held Ap ...

for the following year. The iPhone XR was discontinued and removed from Apple's website after the announcement of the

iPhone 13 The iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 Mini (stylized as iPhone 13 mini) are smartphones developed and marketed by Apple. They are the fifteenth generation of iPhones, succeeding the iPhone 12 and 12 Mini. They were unveiled at an Apple Event in Apple ...

on September 14, 2021. The iPhone XR was Apple's best selling 2018 model. It also became the top-selling and the most popular smartphone globally in Q3 2019. As of September 2020, the iPhone XR has sold 77.4 million units worldwide, making it the eighth best-selling smartphone of all time.

History

The iPhone XR was announced by Phil Schiller on September 12, 2018, at the Steve Jobs Theater in the

Apple Park Apple Park, also known as Apple Campus 2, is the corporate headquarters of Apple Inc., located in Cupertino, California, United States. It was opened to employees in April 2017, while construction was still underway. It replaced Apple Campus as ...

campus, alongside the higher-priced iPhone XS and XS Max, where all three products were showcased to the public. In 2019, Apple started assembling the iPhone XR in India.

Design

Hardware

The XR has a similar design to the

iPhone X The iPhone X (Roman numerals, Roman numeral "X" pronounced "ten") is a smartphone that was developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is part of the List of iPhone models, 11th generation of the iPhone. Available for pre-order from September 26, 2 ...

and iPhone XS. However, the XR has slightly larger bezels, a bigger screen, an aluminum frame, and is available in a wide variety of colors. Similar to other X-branded iPhones, all models come with a black front. The XR has an

IP67 The IP code or International Protection code indicates how well a device is protected against water and dust. It is defined by the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) under the international standard IEC 60529 which classifies ...

rating for dust and water resistance, which means it can be immersed in 1-metre deep water for up to 30 minutes. Released as part of the same twelfth generation, the XR has similar hardware to the XS, but with a few features removed or downgraded to reduce the price. The XR features the same system-on-chip (SoC) as the XS and XS Max, the Apple A12 Bionic chip built with a 7 nanometer process, which Apple claimed to be the "smartest and most powerful chip" ever put into a smartphone. The XR has an LCD display known as "Liquid Retina", which Apple advertised as the "most advanced LCD in the industry", instead of the OLED screen used on the X, XS, and XS Max. The display on the XR has a resolution of 1792 × 828 pixels and a pixel density of 326 ppi, compared with 458 ppi on other X-branded iPhones. However, it has 120 Hz Touch Sample Rate which is the same as the XS and XS Max. Instead of

3D Touch Force Touch is a haptic pressure-sensing technology developed by Apple Inc. that enables trackpads and touchscreens to sense the amount of force being applied to their surfaces. Software that uses Force Touch can distinguish between various ...

, the XR comes with Haptic Touch where the user long-presses until they feel a vibration from the Taptic Engine. The screen-to-body ratio of the XR is 79.3%, much higher than the 67.5% of the iPhone 8 Plus but is still lower than most other phones in its price category. Unlike other phones in the X-series, the XR ships with a single camera on the rear on the phone, featuring exactly the same main camera sensor as on the XS and XS Max, utilizing a 1/2.55" sensor size and 1.4μm pixel size. Unlike the XS, it does not have optical zoom because of the single camera. DxOMark gave the camera on the iPhone XR a rating of 101, giving the title "Top-ranked single-lens phone". Despite the rear single-camera setup, a modified version of Portrait Mode is included. It works unaltered while using the TrueDepth front camera, but with the rear camera, it attempts to calculate the

depth of field The depth of field (DOF) is the distance between the nearest and the farthest objects that are in acceptably sharp focus (optics), focus in an image captured with a camera. See also the closely related depth of focus. Factors affecting depth ...

using a combination of the focus pixels on the image sensor and AI, resulting in more limitations including lower resolution depth data and subjects not being close enough due to the wide-angle lens being used instead of the missing telephoto lens. Just like the iPhone XS and XS Max, the iPhone XR also offers an adjustable depth of field through software, allowing the user to adjust the background

bokeh In photography, bokeh ( or ; ) is the aesthetic quality of the blur produced in out-of-focus parts of an image, whether foreground or background or both. It is created by using a wide aperture lens. Some photographers incorrectly restr ...

effect after taking a photo.

Software

The iPhone XR shipped with

iOS 12 iOS 12 is the iOS version history, twelfth major release of the iOS mobile operating system developed by Apple Inc., Apple. Aesthetically similar to its predecessor, iOS 11, it focuses more on performance than on new features, quality improvemen ...

installed out of the box and is compatible with every update of

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

, including most recently

iOS 18 iOS 18 is the eighteenth and current major release of Apple's iOS operating system for the iPhone. It was announced on June 10, 2024, at the 2024 Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). It was made publicly available on September 16, 2024, as ...

, which was released on September 16, 2024. The iPhone XR is not compatible with iOS 26.

Controversy

Display

Some online media outlets criticized the iPhone XR's display for having a low resolution and a low pixel per inch density, relative to other phones on the market at the time of release at the price point. However, other online media outlets ignored these concerns, saying that under normal use, users should not be able to discern the pixels.

Power adapter and EarPods

Apple, as part of an environmental initiative, removed the EarPods and power adapter from all new iPhone boxes starting in October 2020, including the iPhone XR. Apple claimed that removing these items will reduce e-waste and permit a smaller iPhone box, allowing more devices to be shipped simultaneously to decrease

carbon footprint A carbon footprint (or greenhouse gas footprint) is a calculated value or index that makes it possible to compare the total amount of greenhouse gases that an activity, product, company or country Greenhouse gas emissions, adds to the atmospher ...

. Apple only included a USB-C to Lightning cable, which was compatible with increasingly prevalent USB-C charging sources, but incompatible with the previous (and then more common) USB-A power adapter that Apple included with its devices, leading to Apple recommending users who don't have a USB-C based charging source to use existing

USB Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard, developed by USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), for digital data transmission and power delivery between many types of electronics. It specifies the architecture, in particular the physical ...

-A to Lightning cables or buying a

USB-C USB-C, or USB Type-C, is a 24-pin reversible Electrical connector, connector (not a Communication protocol, protocol) that supersedes previous USB hardware#Connectors, USB connectors (also supersedes Mini DisplayPort and Lightning (connector) ...

power adapter separately.

Notes

References

External links

* * – official site {{Apple hardware *10R Computer-related introductions in 2018 Mobile phones introduced in 2018 Mobile phones with 4K video recording Discontinued flagship smartphones