Apple iPhone XR – A Fresh Take On the Budget King!

The iPhone XR was launched in 2018 making it over three years old and yet it's still one of the most popular refurbished iPhones being sold in 2021. And that's not a bad thing by any means, it's a solid phone but is it really worth buying?
To answer the question straight out of the gate, yes, a refurbished iPhone XR is worth buying. I do believe a refurbished iPhone XR is still absolutely worth the price and I think the vast majority of buyers will be more than satisfied with it.
It's fast, it has a nice large display, the camera is good and all in all, there's not much to complain about going to this phone from an older iPhone like a 6s or a 7, it feels like a real upgrade. The battery life will be a major improvement for sure but you're also getting the full-screen design with the notch and Face ID, you might be wondering if you buy Apple iPhone or an Android device.
Let's back up and bit here and start with the design of the iPhone XR.
Design & Build Quality
The iPhone XR has a glass front and glass on the back sandwiching an aluminium frame and considering this was meant to be the cheap option when it came out. The build is very premium and it's helped further by the IP67 water and dust resistance as well as wireless charging.
From the front, the iPhone XR looks pretty similar to nearly any other newer iPhone with a notch and near bezel-less display. There's, of course, no home button so to navigate you'll be using the gesture system and you have Face ID to unlock your phone.
Display
The display itself is 6.1 inches which in my opinion is a great size although the screen is probably where you'll hear the most complaints from tech enthusiasts. The resolution is only a bit above 720p and it is a Retina LCD display which means colours won't be as vibrant as an AMOLED. That being said, the screen still looks good for the vast majority of people it'll more than do the job and I doubt most will have many complaints although if you're coming from an Android with an OLED panel you might want to go for a refurbished iPhone 12 as this will be a bit of a downgrade. But I think everything looks sharp and I really don't see the display as too huge.
Camera
On the back, we have a single camera lens unlike the iPhone 11 which has two. The camera is 12 megapixels and pictures still look quite good from it and we do also have the ability to take portrait photos just like on the newer iPhones. The XR can take some great shots as long as you have good lighting and the video is great as well with up to 4k 60 frames per second recording capabilities.
The Selfie camera is okay at 7 megapixels there's not much to say here, it'll do a fine job for Zoom or Facetime and Snapchat.
Overall, the iPhone XR’s camera isn't a concern for me, the big thing is that you are getting a fairly significant upgrade in that department. The XR does an excellent job and will do you just fine as it does really hold up well. The biggest reason for that is thanks to its great specs.
Performance & Price
With the A12 chipset and three gigabytes of ram, it runs ios 14 like a champ and I have no doubt it'll be just as good on the iOS 15. You can do anything on this phone any game, app or whatever it is you want to do, it's gonna feel smooth. And almost to the point of what an expensive flagship phone can provide. Apple has really been pushing the limits of smartphone processors as of late and the XR is no exception, it performs really strongly especially for a three-year-old phone. It should continue to be that way for the foreseeable future because it's still being sold and came out in only 2018, I would guess that it has at least two to three years of updates if not even possibly more. It's tough to say just how long it'll get but we're at the point that I really don't think it'll ever feel slow. I wouldn't worry too much about longevity when it comes to the iPhone XR, I'm not going to waste too much of your time here talking about every single little aspect of the iPhone XR. The price of an iPhone XR 128gb starts at around $530.
Wrapping Up
A refurbished iPhone XR is great and it's worth the price and if you would rather not pay extra for the iPhone 11, it's going to do the job and it's going to do it well. A refurbished iPhone XR price in Australia is one of the reasons why you buy it and I absolutely still recommend buying it in 2021.
Overall the iPhone XR is a great phone and I fully recommend it considering it is three years old at this point, it holds up really well so hopefully, this review helped you out.
Read More:
iPhone XR: Everything You Need to Know About the iPhone XR.