Apple’s new iPhone 16E started shipping today and I’ve just received mine. This is now the company’s entry-level iPhone replacing the 3rd-gen iPhone SE, though with a $599 starting price, it’s $170 more expensive than its predecessor.

I told Paul a couple of days ago that I was planning to buy this new iPhone 16E to replace my 3-year-old 2nd-gen iPhone SE (yes, I’m really old-school). Paul then told me he had been thinking about purchasing one, but since my iPhone was very old by today’s standards, he gently proposed buying this new iPhone 16E for me so I could review it… I’m not a professional reviewer, but I’ll do my best 🫡

To be honest, I’m a big fan of “good-enough” technology. I like to keep using my gadgets as long as they do their job. My previous iPhone SE, however, had just 64GB of storage and I had to delete stuff from it every time I needed to install a software update. It was really time for an upgrade.

I chose the 256GB iPhone 16E in black, and this model is priced at $699 in the US. I don’t like flashy colors so black is perfect for me. I also purchased Apple’s official iPhone 16E silicone case in black, which is priced at $39. There are probably better third-party cases on the market, but I’m okay with the basic choice.

The iPhone 16E uses the same design as the iPhone 14, except that there’s a single rear 48MP “Fusion” Camera on the back, a USB-C port for charging, and a new Action button replacing the previous small switch to toggle an iPhone’s ringer on and off. This new Action button serves as a Ring/Silent switch by default, but it can be customized to open other apps like the camera, flashlight voice recorder, and more.

I was impressed by how seamless the process of setting up this new iPhone was. I could either use iCloud to restore all my stuff or transfer my data from my previous iPhone, and I chose the latter. It took approximately 15 minutes to transfer everything, then another 5 minutes to install the latest iOS 18 update, and I was ready to go.

This is my first time using Face ID, which I always thought would be less convenient than Touch ID, but it actually works really well. The absence of a Home button on the iPhone 16E also takes some time to get used to, but the new navigation gestures are pretty easy to learn.

Overall, I really like the design of the iPhone 16E, and it’s nice to have a bigger and nearly borderless screen. The flat sides also remind me of the old-school iPhone 4, which was the first iPhone I ever bought.

If you already have a recent iPhone, you probably won’t be impressed by what the iPhone 16E has to offer. Under the hood, however, this new affordable iPhone comes with the same A18 chip as the regular iPhone 16 (with one fewer GPU core), 8GB of RAM to run Apple Intelligence features, and Apple’s first C1 cellular modem.

Thanks to this more power-efficient in-house component, the company promises up to 26 hours of video playback on the iPhone 16E, which is four hours more than the standard iPhone 16 and almost as good as the 27 hours on the iPhone 16 Pro. It’s a bit too early to judge the battery life of this phone, but I’m looking forward to seeing if the iPhone 16E lives up to Apple’s promises.

I’ll be playing with the iPhone 16E over the weekend, and I’m planning to publish my full review next week. Let me know in the comments if you’ve also purchased this new entry-level iPhone.