Check out top features of iPhone 8/8+

Many people are still waiting for the premium iPhone X to hit the market in November. But in the meantime, iPhone 8 shoppers have started to receive their brand spanking new phones.

 So let’s begin..

New glass body

These phones have a full glass back to go with the glass faceplate. The glass itself is a custom Apple design in partnership with Corning that’s hardened even more than in the past. Time will tell how it stands up over time to drops and scratches, but early results are promising.

Increased base storage

When picking up a new phone, the base model no longer starts at a paltry 16GB or 32GB of internal storage. The cheapest iPhone 8 model now comes with 64 gigabytes of flash storage by default. This is great, especially as app sizes increase and we get to capture higher-frame rate 4K video at 60 frames per second.

Louder speakers

The stereo speakers are now 25 percent louder than they were in the iPhone 7 series. That includes the earpiece that acts as the second surround speaker alongside the grill on the bottom. Bass has also seen some notable improvements. It sounds louder and more full than before and is great to go alongside video HDR support—better video and better audio.

HDR support

Like the latest iPad Pros and the new Apple TV 4K, all models of iPhone 8 and iPhone X now support Dolby Vision and HDR10. You can see the designation inside of the iTunes Store, or in compatible apps like Netflix that have rolled out support.

Better cameras

While the front and rear cameras on the new iPhones have retained the same megapixel count like on last year’s phones, they’ve been completely reengineered. The’s a new color filter (Apple’s design), a larger and faster sensor and deeper pixels. That will result in faster no-lag photos, better action shots and much improved low light performance.

The Apple designed ISP embedded in the A11 Bionic system-on-a-chip also helps with hardware-assisted noise reduction, which dramatically improves sharpness in low-light conditions versus the software algorithm that older iPhones use for imaging.

Portrait Lighting effects

Portrait lighting effects (launching in beta, not unlike last year’s launch of Portrait mode on iPhone 7 Plus) offer several options that aim to replicate professional DSLR and studio lighting effects. As a photographer and videographer, I’m not sure how I feel that software is replicating effects that take a lot of time and effort to pull off.

Apple-designed GPU

The new in-house created GPU embedded into the main system-of-a-chip is Apple’s first mobile GPU design so obviously that’s a major accomplishment because they’re no longer using off-the-shelf PowerVR GPU blueprints from Imagination Technologies. It’s a three-core design that provides thirty percent faster graphics over the A10 Fusion chip inside the iPhone 7 series.

Wireless charging

Apple’s embraced the Qi (pronounced “chee”) wireless charging standard, which is to say you can now use any Qi-compatible wireless charger to power up your iPhone.