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Android users: What screen size should iPhone 6 buyers choose?

If the rumors are true, Apple will soon offer 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch iPhones. Android users have enjoyed those sizes for years. What are the pros and cons?

Rick Broida Senior Editor
Rick Broida is the author of numerous books and thousands of reviews, features and blog posts. He writes CNET's popular Cheapskate blog and co-hosts Protocol 1: A Travelers Podcast (about the TV show Travelers). He lives in Michigan, where he previously owned two escape rooms (chronicled in the ebook "I Was a Middle-Aged Zombie").
Rick Broida
2 min read

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CNET

Okay, Android users. It's time to reach across the aisle, to engage in a little friendly bipartisanship. Because we, the "Apple fanboys," the "iSheep," need your help.

According to a Wall Street Journal report earlier this week, Apple will announce two new iPhone models this September: a 4.7-inch version and a 5.5-inch version.

For those of us who have squinted at 3.5- and 4-inch iPhones for as long as we can remember, this is good news indeed. But it also poses quite the conundrum: Which size to get?

You, the Android faithful, have enjoyed larger smartphones for years. The 4.7-inch Moto X , the 5-inch Galaxy S4 , the 5.5-inch LG Optimus G Pro -- you've had ample opportunity to test-drive these and other pocket-busting models, so who better to advise the iPhone user who's ready to trade up?

I know, I know -- you want to remind us that we're dumb to buy Apple products, that iOS steals all its best features from Android, that if we want a bigger screen, we shouldn't bother waiting for the iPhone 6. Because Android FTW!

Let's just take all that as read and move on to the question at hand. Which is the better screen size, 4.7 or 5.5 inches? Is the latter too big? The former not big enough? One complaint I'm always hearing is that bigger phones can't be operated with one hand, that you can no longer sweep a thumb across the entirety of the screen. True? And, if so, have you learned to live with it?

Also, what's the pocket damage? Does a 5.5-inch smartphone just crush your ability to, say, sit cross-legged on the floor? How about a 4.7-incher?

As a runner, I typically shoehorn my iPhone into a stretchy waistband called a SPIbelt. My 4S fit just fine; my 5S is pushing it. I'm thinking a 4.7-inch iPhone 6 would be difficult, and a 5.5 simply too large to carry that way. Owners of phones of that size, are you able to take them out for exercise?

Bottom line, oh wise Android users: What screen size do you think iPhone 6 buyers should choose -- and why?