iPhone 16 vs iPhone 13 mini: Should you upgrade?

Small phones are unfashionable. Even Apple, which was one of the last holdouts of compact handsets, abandoned the form factor years ago. The iPhone 13 mini was the last regular iPhone with a screen smaller than 6 inches, and while the iPhone SE lineup exists, it's still fair to say that small iPhones are off the menu.

The iPhone 16, which is coming September 9, will be the smallest and most affordable by a long shot, but sadly, it will be nowhere near the iPhone 13 mini when it comes to overall compactness and value for money. 

How will the upcoming iPhone compare?

Well, although three years will have passed since the iPhone 13 mini broke cover, there wouldn't be that many differences between the compact old champ and the upcoming iPhone 16.

Naturally, the two will differ in terms of size. In this corner, we got a very single-hand friendly iPhone 13 mini with a 5.4-inch screen that weighs just 141gr; in the opposite corner, you have a 6.1-inch device that's taller, wider, thicker, and heavier. 

Both phones employ the same general design language with the now iconic flat displays and frame, which has been slowly adopted by nearly the whole industry. At the front, the iPhone 16 will come with the Dynamic Island punch-hole design, whereas the iPhone 13 mini has the older notch design language. 

Two important new changes coming to the iPhone 16 will be the Action Button, first introduced on the iPhone 15 Pro/Pro Max. This one substitutes the signature ring switch of old and allows you to assign different features to the Action Button. Another significant change will be the rumored Capture button, which will be positioned on the right side of the iPhone 16 and allow you to quickly start capturing photos or videos. 

At the rear, the camera islands are also different. The iPhone 16 will actually feature vertically aligned camera lenses to allow the device to capture spatial video intended for the Apple Vision Pro headset. The iPhone 13 mini, on the other hand, features the signature diagonally aligned camera lenses. 

The iPhone 13 mini features IP68 water and dust-resistance, and the iPhone 16 will, too. 

The iPhone 13 mini was available in Starlight, Midnight, Blue, Green, Pink, and Product RED. Meanwhile, the iPhone 16 will be available in Black, Green, Pink, Blue, and White colors.

As we mentioned, the iPhone 16 will arrive with a 6.1-inch display, a standard display size on all regular iPhones since the iPhone 11. 

We anticipate no major changes for the iPhone 16 screen, which means that we should expect an OLED Super Retina XDR screen with 60Hz refresh rate. One thing that could change is the maximum peak brightness of the device, which could go way up, probably near or above 2,000 nits. 

Meanwhile, the iPhone 13 mini also comes with an OLED screen with a 60Hz refresh rate. The peak brightness is pretty standard, at around 1,000 nits, but the main and most important thing about the iPhone 13 mini is the super compact size and the minuscule display, as of today's standards. 

The iPhone 16 will arrive with the Apple A18 chip. Just like the Apple A17 Pro that powered the iPhone 15 Pro Max and iPhone 15 Pro last year, this chip will be built on a 3nm manufacturing node, ensuring exceptional performance and efficiency. 

The iPhone 13 mini comes with the Apple A15 Bionic chip, built on a 5nm manufacturing process. Although this one will be quite outdated when the A18 range of Apple chips arrives, phones equipped with the A15 Bionic don't really feel too outdated or sluggish. Still, not a good outlook for the potential future-proofness of the device, which is about to be sunset in a couple of years' time. 

One major change coming to the iPhone 16 could be the use of 8GB of RAM on board, 2 more than the 6GB most previous iPhones have featured. The reason for that could be the higher hardware requirements that on-device AI processing entails. As a comparison, the iPhone 13 mini boasts 4GB of RAM, which sounds unimpressive in comparison, but RAM isn't such a major issue with iPhones. 

Also read: iPhone 16 AI features: Here is what to look forward to

In terms of software support, Apple has officially promised that all of its phones are getting at least five years of software support. However, the company usually underpromises when it comes to device support, as many iPhones older than five years are regularly getting supported for much longer. Case in point, the iPhone Xs series released in 2018 is slated to receive the iOS 18 update. 

Both the iPhone 16 and the iPhone 13 mini both boast dual cameras. However, there are some essential differences, as one could imagine.

The main camera of the iPhone 16 will be a 48MP one, which will let you take more detailed pictures and allows you to take pictures at 2X zoom with nearly optical quality. The 12MP ultra-wide camera is mostly similar to the one on the iPhone 13 mini. The iPhone 13 mini, on the other hand, boasts dual 12MP cameras, a main and an ultra-wide one. 

One major change is the camera layout. Unlike previous iPhone models, which have diagonal camera alignments, the iPhone 16 will adopt a vertical layout, which has not been seen since the iPhone 12 days. The reason for this repositioning is to allow the new iPhone 16 to record spatial video, which can be watched on the Apple Vision Pro headset.

No surprises: we expect the iPhone 16 to dominate when it comes to battery life. 

Not only will the upcoming phone boast a much larger battery than the iPhone 13 mini, but it will also feature a much faster and therefore efficient chipset. We expect the iPhone 16 to boast a 3,561mAh battery, whereas the iPhone 13 mini has a 2,406mAh battery, which sounds tiny by comparison.

Charging-wise, we might get some major upgrades, too: we can get up to 40W wired charging on the upcoming iPhone 16, up from 27W on the iPhone 15 series. We could also get upgrade in MagSafe speeds, 20W vs 15W on previous iPhones. However, it's a bit more logical to assume that Apple will keep this upgrade for the iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max. 

Oh, and the iPhone 13 mini comes with a Lightning port, while the iPhone 16 will use a USB Type-C connector. 

Here's how the iPhone 16 vs iPhone 13 mini specs will compare once the former launches this September.

The iPhone 16 will probably not be the promised phone that will succeed the iPhone 13 mini. However, it could be the best bet for iPhone 13 mini users: it falls right within the three-year update period, it will introduce major improvements to the performance, battery life, camera image quality, and finally, it will provide you with access to Apple Intelligence, which will surely be a big thing in the coming years. 

That said, there's another device that could be up iPhone 13 mini users' alley: the upcoming iPhone SE 4th Gen. We've heard some intriguing things about the device, but it's still uncertain when and what features it could boast, so nothing is certain.

The iPhone 16, on the other hand, is coming in less than two months' time, so as certain as death and taxes.