Rumors of 4.7 and 5.7 Inch iPhone 6 Spill Out of China

The latest word out of Chinese tech analyst Sun Chyang Xu (originally reported by Chinese site Tencent) is that Apple is planning on releasing two different sizes of iPhone 6 later this year—both of which are bigger than the current crop of iPhones, and one easily hitting the size specs that qualify it for “phablet” status.

A post on TrustedReviews—which points out that Sun Chyang Xu had previously predicted Motorola taking over the X Phone from Google—reports that the analyst is predicting a 4.7-inch iPhone 6, which is seven-tenths of an inch larger than the current iPhone 5 line’s 4-inch screen dimensions. An important detail of the report, however, is that the larger screen will supposedly have the same 1136 x 640p resolution—meaning that the image density will drop from 326 pixels-per-inch to 277.42. That means that the iPhone 6 won’t offer up “Retina-display” level visuals. That handset could launch on June 10 to coincide with the WWDC conference on the same day, says the post.

The post also alleges that the iPhone 6 will also come in a larger form with a 5.7-inch screen and a better (but as yet un-reported resolution), marking Apple’s first phablet. This would jibe with earlier reports we’ve heard about Apple’s plans for the future. For that one, the Sun Chyang Xu predicts a September release.

But while this seems to fall in line with what we’ve heard…man, I still kind of don’t believe it. The phablet category may be gathering steam, but it seems like an uncharacteristic deviation from Apple’s modus operandi of the last several years. Would Apple really want to fragment its own audience by offering an intermediary device between its iPad Mini and iPhone? A phablet iPhone—or iPhablet, if you will—feels to me like it doesn’t fit in with Apple’s habit of only creating and selling the kind of devices that fulfil specific needs. A phablet, to me, does half the job of a phone and half the job of a tablet, and not completely satisfying a user’s needs in either category.

That said, I am also someone who is consistently baffled by the phablet category in general, so clearly there’s a benefit to the device-type that I’m missing anyway. And if anyone can find a way to make a phablet a must-have device, it’s Apple.

Would you buy a 5.7-inch sized iPhablet?