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Marques Brownlee - iPhone 12 Pro Max Review: The Biggest Ever!

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Author: Marques Brownlee
Categories: Creativity & Design
Tags: creativity
Views: 2 · Last viewed: 2026-10-16 08:48 UTC

Short Summary

Main recommendation: The iPhone 12 Pro Max is the best choice if you want the biggest iPhone, with the best battery life, the largest screen, and the most comfortable large-format experience for videos, typing, and photo editing. The reviewer found its new camera system offers little noticeable improvement over the iPhone 12 mini or other new iPhone 12 models, so the camera alone is not a strong reason to pay more for it.

Key Points

  • The iPhone 12 Pro Max is Apple's biggest phone, with a 6.7-inch display that is the largest screen Apple has put in a phone, and a slightly higher resolution.
  • It has the biggest battery of the new iPhones and lasts noticeably longer, with the reviewer often ending days around 25 percent battery after six to seven hours of screen-on time.
  • It is the only new iPhone with a new camera system: a physically larger main sensor that is 47 percent larger, with sensor-shift stabilization, plus a new 2.5x telephoto lens.
  • In side-by-side tests against the iPhone 12 mini, the reviewer saw little difference in regular or low light, aside from slightly better edge sharpness in some wide shots.
  • The display does not have a high refresh rate, which the reviewer attributes most likely to battery constraints.

Details Worth Noting

  • Concrete instructions: No step-by-step instructions were given.
  • The 2.5x telephoto lens is around a 65mm equivalent, versus 52mm for the 2x lens on last year's model. The maximum camera zoom is 12x instead of the usual 5x or 10x.
  • Portrait mode on the Pro Max is most comfortable at 1x, since 2.5x is less ideal for portraits; the iPhone 12 Pro offers portrait mode at 1x and 2x.
  • Reachability is difficult: you cannot reach all four corners with one hand, unlike with the mini.
  • The gold finish's back is more off-white sand with a matte finish, while the rings and steel sides are the gold parts, and they collect fingerprints easily.
  • Night-time videos still show haloing glows around point light sources, and the Pro Max does not fix this.

Bottom Line

The iPhone 12 Pro Max is worth it mainly for its size, screen, and battery, not for its camera upgrade, which is hard to distinguish from cheaper new iPhones in everyday use.