Today I did something I swore I’d never do: I bought a white iPhone. Like my fellow Cult of Mac colleagues and many of you readers, I too bought a brand spanking new iPhone 5. Deciding not to brave the crazy lines, I took my chances and waited till later in the day before I picked one up.
Black has always been my color of choice when it comes to iOS devices. I’ve always owned black iPhones, iPads and iPods. But for some reason I decided to go with white this time around, and I’m happy I did. The white iPhone 5 is absolutely gorgeous.
The two-toned back plate on the iPhone 5 means that color choices aren’t as simple as “white” and “black” anymore. You’ve got “white & silver” and “black & slate.” The brushed aluminum on the back of the iPhone 5 is darker on the black version and shinier on the white version. The new backplate gives each iPhone 5 color variant an even more distinctive look.
It’s hard to see the difference until you’re actually holding the device, but the iPhone 5 sports a tiny metallic band around the edges of its antenna frame. This band is super bright. When the sunlight hits the iPhone 5 the right way, the edges reflect light like nobody’s business. The shiny outer band combined with the white body and bright aluminum back plate just sells the whole package. I’m not dissing the black iPhone 5, but I feel like Apple really hit a home run with white this time. Sure, it’ll show scratches and dirt more easily than the black iPhone, but I’m fairly careful with my iPhone anyway.
I’m not really into cases, but I’ve always thought that woodgrain cases look better on the white iPhone. Wooden backplates like the Monolith really shine. Aesthetically, I feel like black is restricted to metallic and primary color-based case designs. I never bothered with woodgrain cases before because my iPhone has always been black. Not that I’ve gone white, I’ll experiment more.
Yes, your color preference is purely a matter of your own aesthetic taste. In the case of the iPhone 5, I think white is the new black. What about you?
(I also bought a white iPhone 5 because that was the only color that was left in the store — but let’s just keep that between us.)
