My mounting disappointment with the new iPhone 6s

I’ve been an iPhone user since the original came out in 2007 – I’ve been on the 5s for the past two years now but upgrading it to iOS 9 has made the phone feel sluggish so I decided to finally bite the bullet and upgrade to the newly-released iPhone 6s.

I hate this phone. I genuinely HATE this phone.

While I love the increased responsiveness (as a result of the faster processor), and the haptic feedback is a nice little add-on, I’m struggling to reconcile the “pros” with the increasing list of “cons.” They include:

• Poor battery life – I get asked if I want to enter “Low Power Mode” by 4-5pm each day and I’m not even using the phone all that heavily. I’m now convinced that “Low Power Mode” is Apple’s way of using a marketing gimmick to skirt an engineering issue.
• Data connectivity is twitchy. I mean, really – when’s the last time you saw this in the middle of a metropolitan city: 
• Then there’s the form factor. I wasn’t a fan of the iPhone 6’s increased dimensions when it was released last year but I knew I’d be forced to adopt it someday and figured I’d just get used to it. It’s been 3-4 days now and I simply can’t stand it. Here are some practical issues I’m having as a direct result of the phone’s larger size (keeping in mind that I have average size hands for a 6′ man and primarily operate the phone with my left hand):
  • The increased width of the phone means that I can no longer operate the phone solely with one hand – many functions (such as using my thumb to reach the right-most onscreen items) now require me to hold the phone with both hands. It’s supposed to be a phone – not a tablet, I shouldn’t have to do that.

It’s supposed to be a phone – not a tablet

 

• I never feel like I have a solid grip on the phone – it’s so wide that it doesn’t sit securely in my grip and I always feel like it’s about to fall right out of my hand.
• The power button has moved from the top to the right side of the phone and I now find myself inadvertently turning it off all the time with my index finger when I’m holding the phone normally. To add insult to injury, whenever I turn the phone horizontally to take a picture (I use the volume button as a shutter button in this situation), now my right thumb is on the power button and I sometimes inadvertently turn off the phone instead of taking a picture!

Conclusion

I felt this when the iPhone 6 was released and I feel even more strongly about it now: the 6 series form factor is Apple reacting to the competition (larger phones seem to be “the thing” in Android world) rather than using design to do what’s right.

At this point, I’m on the verge of reverting back to my old iPhone 5s. Do you own an iPhone 6(s)? Now’s your chance to convince me why I should stick with it – post your opinion below!

Update
Reddit user sayoohahupthera pointed out that the upcoming iOS 9.1 offers great speed improvements for older iPhones – installing that on both of my phones now! You can sign up for beta access here.

Update II (11/16/15)
Clearly, I’m not the only one…