Apple iPhone SE (2022) Review: Still worth it in 2023?

Verdict

The iPhone SE 2022 is both a roaring success and a missed opportunity. Internally, this dinky phone makes a strong proposition with top-drawer performance and years of software updates ahead of it. It’s just a shame the same tired design and tiny display are hard to get excited about.

Introduction

The iPhone SE 2022 is Apple’s most affordable 5G device, sitting below the iPhone 14 range.

This is a phone aimed at people who are still using a previous generation iPhone SE, or anything older than an iPhone 8, and it offers notable upgrades on those ageing devices in multiple areas.

With an A15 Bionic chipset similar to the one you’ll find in the iPhone 14, an array of excellent camera features and handy extras often missed at this price like wireless charging and water resistance, the iPhone SE 2022 could be seen as a bargain.

But does an old design and cramped display hamper the experience? Let’s have a deeper look and see how it performed during our lab and real-world tests.

Design and Screen

• One of the smallest displays on a phone
• The design will be familiar to most
• Three colours: Midnight, Starlight and Product RED

Let’s get the elephant in the room out of the way first. The display is the new iPhone SE’s most disappointing feature. Measuring 4.7 inches, it’s small and I find it very cramped when using the on-screen keyboard. I know some people like smaller phones, but for me, this is just one step too far.

It’s also just a fairly mundane panel. There’s no OLED tech for best-in-class blacks, no fast refresh rate for smoother scrolling and a chunky bezel giving the phone a retro look and feel.

Watching videos on it isn’t a great experience and while it gets bright enough to combat a sunny day, it’s not a standout performer when it comes to immersiveness or contrast. Other phones in this price range have OLED panels for deeper and richer colours, many also have 90 or 120Hz tech. This is a cool feature that makes them smoother to use by increasing the number of images per second the screen renders. All-in-all the screen is the biggest area where the iPhone SE 2022 could have been so much more.

The iPhone SE 2022’s design needs little explanation to iPhone fans. I’m sure everyone reading this is familiar with the look of this device as it has been around, in one form or another, since 2014 when the iPhone 6 launched. That’s just shy of a decade ago.

At least the iPhone SE 2022 is fantastically well-built and finished to the same standard as Apple’s other higher-end phones. There’s tougher glass on the front and back (no Ceramic Shield though) and handy extras like the mute toggle and an IP67 rating. Water resistance has traditionally been rare at the price point, but it has also made an appearance on similarly priced rivals like the Samsung Galaxy A54 5G in 2023, slightly lessening the iPhone’s appeal.

The physical home button is a quick and effective way of unlocking, and there’s something reassuring about it. It feels old-fashioned as I have spent so long with Apple’s more modern devices, but if you’re coming from an iPhone 6 to an iPhone 8 or an older SE and you like the button then you’ll be glad it remains.

The size of this phone will be a pro to some and a dealbreaker for others. Next to the iPhone 14 Pro Max, it looks comically tiny; dwarfed by the 6.7-inch screen on the Max model. I know many people who love smaller devices that can be comfortably held in one hand and this device is catering to them. I would still say the iPhone 13 Mini is a better overall size though, as it avoids the cramped display issues of the SE 2022 I’ve experienced during testing.

Camera

• A single rear camera and flash
• Deep Fusion and Smart HDR 4 added from the iPhone 13
• Complete lack of night mode

The single 12-megapixel camera on the back of the iPhone SE 2022 takes really nice pictures in daylight situations. In a well-lit environment, I found the difference between snaps taken with this and with an iPhone 13 are minimal, when viewed on the phone screen. However, this year’s Google Pixel 7a arguably surpasses what Apple has to offer with more advanced shooting modes and better quality.

In terms of hardware, it seems as though the iPhone SE 2022 is using basically the same sensor as the older model. Where the updates come are in the software and image processing, and these are because of the A15 Bionic chipset powering the phone.

The skills of the A15 Bionic and its neural engine allow for both Deep Fusion and Smart HDR 4, two software features that really help picture quality. Deep Fusion works in weaker lighting, helping to bring out more detail and works particularly well at adding more texture to shots. Shoot a snap of someone in a woollen jumper, for example, and the strands of the fabric are far clearer than what I captured on competing Android phones.

Smart HDR 4 focuses on dynamic range and really helps add more pop to photos. You can’t toggle this on or off – it’s just always there – but it helps level out colours, shadows and highlights when you’re shooting on sunnier days. There’s also the Photography Styles feature from the iPhone 13, which alters an image’s profile allowing for it to be cooler or more vibrant.

These are a little bit like filters as they alter the look of pictures, however they have far more control as they’re inserted inside the imaging pipeline rather than just sitting on the top. The styles are nice, and even mimic some of the other phones around. Vibrant, for instance, reminds me a lot of Galaxy S23’s photos in terms of rich colours.

The big missing feature here is any sort of dedicated Night Mode and it’s a real shame. The iPhone SE 2022 shoots the same in daylight as at night and it can’t automatically jump into a dedicated mode to boost brightness. While using the iPhone SE 2022 at a gig, it just couldn’t handle the tough lighting conditions very well, pulling out a rather dark and lacking image. The iPhone 13, along with cheaper options like the Xiaomi Redmi Note 12 Pro+ 5G both handle night photography much better than the iPhone SE.

The 7-megapixel selfie camera is also in need of a freshen-up. Snaps here are a bit dim and lacking in detail. This front camera doesn’t possess the same TrueDepth skills as the notched iPhones, so there’s no Face ID.

The lack of any secondary sensors might also put some people off. Not having a zoom (aside from the digital option) is restrictive, while the lack of an ultrawide does limit creativity somewhat. I can’t think of another phone I have reviewed in the past few years that has just one camera. Saying that, focussing on a very good main camera is better, at least in my eyes, than adding useless secondary zoom and macro cameras that are nothing more than window dressing.

iPhones have, for the last few generations, excelled at videography. The iPhone SE 2022 might not have the stabilisation skills to match the flagship Apple phones, but the video I captured was stable and colourful, with realistic skin tones. The gimmicky portrait video Cinematic Mode isn’t here (likely due to the lack of multiple focal lengths) but you can still shoot up to 4K 60fps.

Other missing features you’ll find on the pricier iPhone 14 and 14 Pro series include ProRes and HDR recording and RAW capture. None of these are big misses for a phone like this in my opinion and will likely remain exclusive to the Pro phones Apple makes.

Performance

• Powered by the same A15 Bionic as the more expensive iPhones
• Larger battery than the previous iPhone SE
• Up to 256GB storage

It’s on the inside where it really counts for the iPhone SE 2022. While the design feels tired, the internals are bleeding edge and in some ways not far off what’s powering the iPhone 14.

But it’s not just the benefits of speed boosts and better gaming performance that having a high-end chip brings. Arguably the biggest upgrade is longevity and how long this phone will be supported. Buy the iPhone SE 2022 now, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it pick up iOS updates for at least seven years based on Apple’s support for past iPhones we’ve reviewed. The original iPhone SE, for example, was released in 2016 and only stopped receiving software updates with iOS 16 in 2022.

Long software support, both for security patches and new feature updates, isn’t something you’ll really find on Android phones at this price. Samsung currently boasts some of the best upgrade promises for its mid-range blowers, offering four OS upgrades and five years of security patches, but pick up a Motorola, Realme or Xiaomi device and you’ll be lucky to get two years of updates.

I see the iPhone SE 2022 as a phone that’ll last and that could be a real reason to choose this over most of the competition if you don’t want to upgrade your phone regularly.

The actual chipset used here is the A15 Bionic – the chipset found in the iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Plus. It’s among the fastest mobile silicon around discounting the A16 Bionic of the Pro models, outshining the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 and even the newer Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 in benchmarks and flying through every real-world task we threw at it during testing.

To have that power in a phone that not only costs less than £500/$500, but one that’s also this small is incredibly rare.

In the Geekbench 5 test – a synthetic all-around performance benchmarking tool – the iPhone SE 2022 matches the scores of the iPhone 13 Pro and beats the Galaxy S22 Ultra, though it can’t quite beat the newer Galaxy S23 Ultra and its custom Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy chipset. Still, that’s two phones that cost more than double its price.

Benchmarks don’t mean everything, and in real-world use, the iPhone SE 2022 shines. The dinky display means I can’t see this being a favourite for mobile gamers, but the phone can easily play top titles like Genshin Impact and Asphalt 9 if you wish. I have liked having the power in a small form-factor for photo editing in Lightroom too.

Apple never mentions the amount of RAM inside its phones, but the iPhone SE 2022 has an extra 1GB when compared to the older model. The 4GB at play here should again help with that longevity aspect and, of course, ensure apps stay in memory longer, which will help launch times.

The new SE is the cheapest Apple phone to support 5G thanks to the Qualcomm modem inside. Unlike the iPhone 13 series there’s no mmWave 5G, so if you’re in the USA or other locations where the faster 5G tech is live, then that’s something to note. I wouldn’t upgrade to this phone purely for 5G, even though I am starting to notice its benefits more, but it’ll be a nice feature to have a few years down the line. Again, it all feeds into the idea that the iPhone SE 2022 will last a long time.

Battery Life

• Improved endurance when compared to the previous iPhone SE
• No included charger, no MagSafe
• A full charge in roughly an hour

The first thing that can be said about the battery life here is that it is a notable upgrade over the iPhone SE 2020. It does not have a physically larger battery inside, but the more efficient chipset helps it eke more juice out.

When you’re not using the phone it barely drops at all – leaving it unplugged overnight saw a mere 2% battery drop and tasks like music streaming, browsing Safari and WhatsApp messaging all sip juice slowly. If you’re a very light user who cares about battery first and foremost, it is worth looking at this phone. During my time with it, the new SE has never struggled to make it through a full day of standard use.

An hour of Netflix streaming with the battery set to a comfortable brightness took the battery down 5%, which isn’t that surprising considering the small display and comparatively low resolution. I can’t say I’ll be watching hours of Netflix on this screen though, given its size.

But this is still a meaty processor along with a fairly small cell and when pushed the battery drain is visible. Gaming is a noticeable culprit, as is anything that pushes the chipset to work hard. Just as it’s easy to make it through a day with light use, it’s equally easy to burn through 20% of an extended gaming session and some Google Maps use. The addition of 5G On: Always isn’t overly kind on endurance, especially if you’re using it for a lot of downloads.

There’s no charger inside the box, so if you don’t have one around I would suggest investing in a USB-C plug that can charge at least 20w. At this speed, you’ll get a full charge in just over an hour. Wireless charging is much slower and there’s no MagSafe support for that extra fast wire-free charging.