In one of the worst-kept secrets, Apple today announced the next generation of iPhone, the iPhone 4.
Speaking today at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference in San Francisco, Steve Jobs announced the slimmest smartphone ever. Here are the highlights:
- 24% thinner than the iPhone 3GS (9.33mm)
- Front facing camera – video calling (called FaceTime), but initially over wi-fi
- 4 times as many pixels (326 ppi)
- Uses a micro-SIM card as they “need the space”
- Onboard gyroscope for games (6-axis motion sensing)
- Camera upgraded to 5 Megapixels with LED flash
- Video editing on the iPhone – “iMovie”
Available in Black or White. In the US, pricing the same as 3GS – that’s $199 for 16GB model, $299 for 32GB model (on a 2 year contract)
The iPhone 4 ships in the UK on June 24th 2010.
Also covered by Jobs – the next release of the OS – renamed from iPhone OS to iOS.
iOS 4.0 has over 100 new features, including:
- Multitasking
- Message threading in email
- Folders for apps
- Addition of the Bing search engine
- iBooks (now on iPad) will be on iPhone
A Gold Master Candidate of iOS4.0 is ready – and the final version will be out on 21st June for existing iPhone users (free).
Apple also announced that on the 1st of July, they’ll enter the advertising market by launching iAds – mini-adverts that developers can add to their applications (and get 60% of the ad revenue). When you click on an ad, it opens within the application, not in the browser.
Some of Steve Jobs live demos failed – 570 people in the audience with an active wi-fi connection stealing all of the bandwidth. He asked the audience to shut down their laptops and stop live blogging.
So, the hype has started – and we’re three weeks away from queues of people desperate to get the iPhone 4…