I’ve just spent the weekend getting acquainted with the new iPhone 8 256GB and I’m a little bit confused. Why? Simple: this phone costs more than the iPhone 7, but to my eyes, it is more or less identical, and there is no reasonable explanation why this should be the case?

I’ve tried to find something new or experience something that wasn’t there before, but there is nothing. It looks like an iPhone 7 and it kind of performs like one, too. There is nothing, save for the back panel, to indicate that you’re using a new phone.

If I were an iPhone 7 user – or even an iPhone 6s user – I don’t think I’d be particularly impressed by this proposition. Firstly, it’s more expensive and there is no good reason for this. Second, it looks like every other iPhone we’ve had since 2014.

No one else could get away with this; making the same handset over and over again and just changing the internal specs. It kind of reminds me of what BlackBerry was doing before its fall – just blindly pumping out updates and expecting users to simply lap it up.

I know Apple is banking the house on the iPhone X, but the lack of thought that has gone into the iPhone 8 is kind of pathetic. It does NOTHING to excite the senses. Nor does it feel like a new phone.

It looks the same.

It performs about the same as the iPhone 7.

The battery life is still sub-par compared to its larger peers.

The camera is OK, but nothing to write home about.

The display is utterly out of its depth in 2017.

It doesn’t have a headphone jack. I know this is not a new thing, but it still annoys the hell out of me.

It costs MORE than the iPhone 7 and there is no reason for this.

I wasn’t even remotely excited when I unboxed it. I knew what was inside – the iPhone 7 with a new CPU. I even showed it to my buddy over the weekend, asked him to find something new with the phone, and he couldn’t – he actually asked if it was the “final” version.

I then told him it was more expensive than the iPhone 7, the model he was using, and he then proceeded to laugh his ass off.

This is what Apple said about the iPhone 8 at launch:

“iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus are a new generation of iPhone that improve on everything we love about iPhone,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.

“iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus have new glass and aluminium designs, new Retina HD displays and A11 Bionic — the smartest chip ever in a smartphone. Packed with more advanced cameras with Portrait mode and Portrait Lighting, and the highest quality video capture in a smartphone, iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus enable the freedom of wireless charging, all with AR optimisation like no phone ever before.”

And while Apple has made some interesting and palpable changes to the display tech – True Tone, Dolby Vision, and HDR10 – but these do not help with the fact that the display technology it is built on – IPS LCD – is still stuck in the dark ages compared to the OLED displays used by the incoming iPhone X, Galaxy S8, and the LG V30.

In a singular market, where there is ONLY one phone, the iPhone 8 would make sense. No one would mind it in this context, but in our current market, I simply cannot fathom why anyone would actually get up, go out, and buy the iPhone 8?

It’d be like trading in your 12-month-old car for a newer model simply because it has a new button on the radio. It makes NO SENSE whatsoever.

Perhaps this is why NO ONE was queuing up to buy this phone? I mean, why would you? It’s about as exciting as a new diet regime that requires you to eat one large bowel of plain, flavorless porridge every morning before doing a three-mile up-hill run.

I cannot see any reason why you’d buy the iPhone 8 over a cheaper iPhone 7 Plus. Most are waiting for the iPhone X, apparently, and these people are fully prepared to pay over $1000 for that phone. And I get this, to an extent – that phone is, at least, different looking and has some new features.

I know, I know – the iPhone 8 now has wireless charging, Apple’s new A11 CPU, and err… that’s about it. None of this, save for the A11 chipset, is actually new. Android phones have had Qi charging and waterproofing since around 2012.

And while the A11 chipset is brilliant, it’s not something that should concern anyone. No one wakes up in the morning thinking, “Gee, I really wish my iPhone 7 was slightly more powerful…”

The new chipset is NOT a selling point for 99.9% of end users, though it is perhaps the ONLY thing you could actually get even remotely excited about when looking for things to write about when discussing the new iPhone 8.

And the AR technology as well, but that’s available on ALL iPhones and iPads that run on iOS 11, so, again, it cannot be considered a USP for this phone (or the iPhone X).

Whenever I’m using a new phone, I always ask myself the questions listed below. I like to have these answered in my head before writing a review, and this usually takes a week or so, but with the iPhone 8, I had them all answered after day three.

Would I buy this phone? No. Would I recommend this phone to a friend or a family member? No. Is this phone worth more than the iPhone 7? No. Are there better, cheaper alternatives? Yes – lots of them.

Bonus question: Am I excited about using the iPhone X? Kinda.

So, yeah… that’s it, really. Apple’s iPhone 8 is essentially the iPhone 7, just more expensive. It has a couple of new tricks, but nothing that justifies NEW PHONE STATUS. Compared to any of the major Android releases from 2017, it sucks, basically.

I know people will disagree with me on this, claiming Apple is merely doing what it does best – making phones that people want that are familiar and work seamlessly. But this isn’t the point: Apple is the biggest technology company on the planet. It has more resources at its disposal than many governments. It CAN and SHOULD do better, and if it can't or doesn't want to it certainly shouldn't then go out and charge MORE. 

There is no good reason why Apple should treat the iPhone 8 like this. Why release a new one if that’s the case? Failing that, just reduce the price. I mean, the OnePlus 3T from 2016 wipes the floor with the iPhone 8’s internal specs and features (and that phone costs around 40% less).

I get that people like iPhones. I like iPhones. But what I don’t like is stuff like this – it’s boring, it’s too pedestrian, it’s not trying anymore because Apple knows it doesn’t have to, that people will still buy it, and even if they don’t quite a few of them will get the iPhone X instead.

But where’s the magic in that? Prior to launch, I was wondering how Apple would differentiate the iPhone 8 line and the iPhone X line. I figured it’d be on price and design, but I didn’t realize just how bluntly this would be the case. I thought the iPhone 8 would at least have had SOMETHING about it.

But, no… it has nothing. And this to me smacks of Apple abusing its position as a leader in the smartphone space. Like too many artists making music today, it knows that it can put out whatever it likes and the masses will simply suck it up in their droves, never once looking around at the better value, better executed options that are all over the place.

Do yourself a favor: if you want an iPhone in 2017, either save up and get the iPhone X or save A LOT of money and get a reconditioned iPhone 7 Plus instead. It’s cheaper, better, and has more or less all the capabilities of the new iPhone 8.