Downsizing to the iPhone 13 Mini:
I've decided to downsize from a 6.2 in iPhone 12 Pro down to a 5.4 in iPhone 13 mini. I want to make my phone just a productivity tool again to help me get stuff done, make calls, search for cafés, and send messages—stopping all the time-wasting apps.
Oh, then why don't you just delete all the time-wasting apps on your iPhone 12 Pro? Well, if I'm going to delete all the time-wasting apps on my 12 Pro, why do I need a bigger screen? I might as well downgrade to a lighter, more practical device that's actually bad at doing the time-wasting stuff. Well, that's the idea anyway, but do you know why?
The Moment That Made Me Switch:
Yeah, really, right now? You are going to do that right now? Okay, you do that. Do you know why I made this switch? One day, I was holding this fat baby, and I was walking down, and I needed to urgently send a text.
I just could not send it with one hand. I just couldn't do it, so I just sat down and watched a few "I Switched to the Mini" videos just to justify my decision, sold the 12 Pro, and picked up a used 13 Mini with 99% battery health. Off the bat, love it.
I have a really healthy habit of trickle-charging throughout the day, so I keep it between 20 to 80%. Um, and I only charge during the day.
I can't help but notice my battery just sitting below 50% right after I read Twitter for like two seconds in the toilet, so I decided to do a day in the life at 100%. So this is the first time I'm going to be charging it to 100%.
Battery Life Experiment:
One more thing—my theory is that it will not survive till 5:00 p.m. Now, the 12 Pro will always survive till 12:00 p.m., even if it's not at 100% in the morning, so let's see what that does.
We're at 100%! Hey, let's go hit the gym—chest, shoulders, chest, shoulders, chest, shoulders, chest, shoulders. That's my workout. I'm going to have the smallest legs by December, watch.
My morning phone use was pretty light—like just music, recorded like three shots, and checked the baby monitor a few times. And we're sitting at 97%. Screen time was 6 minutes, and I'm at 97%. Oh man, this is going to be very interesting.
Since I'm a freelancer, my days are never really the same. Today happened to be a day I'm not actually working, so I'm just chilling out with family. I drop off Joy at Grandma's, then pay my grandpa a visit. This is my grandpa—hello, Internet! He needed help with this Joy Judy thing. He's 94 years old, by the way.
The Tethering Disaster:
It's 9:30 now, and I still have a healthy 80% battery—not bad. I'm in the car right now, and I could easily just plug my phone onto that pad, which will wirelessly charge it. But, um, I'm like going out of my way to not put it on the pad so I can do this "day in the life" thing.
But it's not really a day in the life, is it? Because normally, I would be charging while I'm driving. So I'm just going to go to the cafe real quick with my laptop and rewrite the intro of this video because I just watched the intro—you know, you have that feeling, you watch something, and you're just like, if it wasn't me, I wouldn't watch it.
Here's where this test completely fell apart—when I decided to tether for just a bit over an hour, it pumped through a solid 35% battery. This is pretty crazy.
Final Verdict on the iPhone 13 Mini:
So what's the final verdict with this iPhone 13 Mini? When I stopped tethering for the past three days, it really felt just like the 12 Pro. In saying that, most people who either work at home, work in an office, work in their car—whatever—there's a charger lying around for most of us.
You know, I've got like—how many chargers do I have? I've got like 15 cables right under the table that can charge this thing.
I've got two MagSafe chargers on the table where I can just slap it on and charge it. I've got another wireless charger over there for no reason. Like, when you're sitting down or whatever, just slap it on and charge it.
And when you live like that, it is absolutely fine. And the benefits that you get out of it? Practicality. One-hand use. Gosh, I love every time I take this out of my pocket. It just reminds me—good job on downsizing.
