iPhone X vs. iPhone 11: All the specs, and which to buy in 2020 - CNET

When the iPhone X was unveiled to the world in the fall of 2017, Apple CEO Tim Cook called it "the biggest leap forward since the original iPhone." That's partly because at the time, the iPhone X was Apple's largest phone yet, complete with an overhauled design. Gone were the thick bezels and the physical home button of its predecessor the iPhone 7 and virtually all previous generations of iPhone. Instead we got a bar-raising phone that featured a near edge-to-edge display and for the first time we were introduced to Face ID. 

The iPhone X also set a new bar in terms of price, starting at $1,000. Two years later, in 2019, the iPhone 11 was announced as follow-up to the iPhone XR. It's not the most innovative phone ever, but it is, as Apple billed it, the iPhone for (nearly) everyone. 

iPhone X is stainless steel, but the iPhone 11 is nearly drop-proof

The iPhone X is a thing of beauty that is worth appreciating based on its aesthetics alone. Its sleek, nearly all-screen appearance looks elegant and helped set new design standards for iPhones. In fact, even though it's older than the iPhone 11, it's arguably more modern in look and feel. That's because it's lighter, thinner, and smaller than the iPhone 11. (For specific numbers, you can scroll down to our specs chart below.)

It's also crafted out of stainless steel, which is typically one of the design hallmarks of a premium phone. The iPhone 11, meanwhile, uses an aluminum frame with glass on the front and back. But for all its minimalistic beauty, the iPhone X is not a durable phone and should absolutely be used with a good case. Yes, it does have an IP67 rating, which means the phone is fully dust protected and can also withstand being submerged in 1 meter (about 3.3 feet) of water for up to 30 mins. Although it's lower than the iPhone 11's IP68 rating (which doesn't bother me so much), it was how the iPhone X fared during CNET's drop tests that was the big letdown.

The iPhone X cracked at a single three-foot drop. The iPhone 11 withstood eight different drop tests on hard concrete, including a drop from 11 feet high (though the cameras didn't survive). This seemed to back up Apple's claim that it has used the most durable glass ever built into a smartphone on the front and back of the iPhone 11. The glass was custom-made for the iPhone by Corning, the American company behind Gorilla Glass. 

Read more: What happens when you drop the iPhone 11 in water?

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iPhone X has a smaller, sharper, more premium display

Another key difference between the iPhone X and iPhone 11 is screen technology. The iPhone X is the clear winner in this category because it has a higher resolution display with better build quality. While the iPhone 11 dons a larger LCD display, the iPhone X features a more compact OLED display with a 2,436x1,125-pixel resolution, which is higher than the iPhone 11's resolution (1,792x828). In general, OLED displays serve up better image quality with blacker blacks and whiter whites, but they're also more costly. When I compared the iPhone X and iPhone 11 screens side by side, however, I didn't notice a difference in quality, in both dark mode and normal.  

The iPhone 11 lacks a telephoto lens, but has better cameras overall

Apart from price, cameras are one of the biggest and most important differentiators between the two iPhones. While both devices have dual 12-megapixel rear cameras, they differ in the type of lens built into them. Where the iPhone 11 has a wide and ultrawide camera, the iPhone X has a standard lens and a telephoto shooter, which gives the iPhone X an advantage because it's better for zooming into a photo without losing quality. But even though the iPhone 11 lacks the much-loved telephoto lens, it has better cameras in general and it can pull off 2x digital zoom without any obvious loss of detail, though it has no optical zoom capabilities whatsoever.  

In addition, the iPhone 11 also has the advantage of the more powerful A13 chipset working in its favor. This hardware combined with new image processing tech like Deep Fusion help make the iPhone 11 cameras some of the best money can buy today. Deep Fusion is a new way for the iPhone 11 to process photos allowing for better indoor shots that are sharper and more color-accurate. It also enables faster autofocus.  

Read more: 5 iPhone 11 camera tricks that will make you a better phone photographer

Shot on iPhone X: Apple's latest camera hits the streets

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The iPhone 11's ultrawide lens, which is a first in iPhones, is also a worthwhile resource to lean on when you're photographing sweeping landscapes. It captures a 120-degree field of view allowing you to fit in more of your surroundings than previous models and injects drama into otherwise mundane scenes. It's probably not something you'll use day-to-day though.

As stellar as iPhone cameras are, low-light photography has long been a relative weakness. But that's not the case in the iPhone 11. You get a new automatic Night Mode feature, which captures impressive photos in near dark conditions. The iPhone X doesn't have the automatic Night Mode feature, so when you take low-light photos they're grainer compared to the iPhone 11. You also get great overall image stabilization, which feels like you're shooting video with the help of a gimbal. There's also a much better selfie camera that can shoot 4K video.

Here are some other camera tools in the iPhone 11 that improves upon what is present on the iPhone X:

• Brighter true-tone flash
• Higher contrast ratio HDR
• Portrait mode can now detect pet faces

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The iPhone 11 has superior battery life and a 128GB storage option 

We've covered the differences in the exteriors of both the iPhone X and iPhone 11, but there's a key difference internally, and that's the aforementioned chipset. At the heart of the iPhone X is the A11 bionic chip, which was Apple's most advanced processor at the time of its launch. Fast forward to 2020, and the A11 chipset is still a speedy processor that when combined with iOS 13.5 should still run very smoothly. The iPhone 11, meanwhile, houses the more power efficient A13 chip, which is also found on the other members of the iPhone 11 family (and the new iPhone SE). Apple claims it boosts the iPhone 11's performance by at least 20% over the iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max and iPhone XR, which used the A12. That includes the speed of the main processor brains and its special-purpose engines for graphics and AI. When we ran processing performance speeds on 3DMark and Geekbench 5, the iPhone 11 came away with the win as expected, but the iPhone X held up well. 

As usual, Apple didn't disclose battery capacity figures, but reports point to the iPhone X carrying a smaller 2,716-mAh battery, while the iPhone 11's equipped with a 3,110-mAh battery. In our video playback tests that loops video while on airplane mode, we found that the iPhone 11 lasted 15 hours, 24 minutes. Meanwhile, the iPhone X lasted 11 hours, 45 minutes. 

As for storage, the $699 iPhone 11 model gets 64GB, which is probably fine for many people. You also have the 128GB version and 256GB versions to choose from, for $749 and $859 respectively. The iPhone X forgoes the 128GB variant, which is widely considered to be the sweet spot in terms of storage options, so you only have the remaining two to decide between.