Skip to main content

WSJ: New smaller iPhone real, MobileMe may become free, iTunes music streaming coming soon

Mobile World Congress 2024
Read our complete coverage of Mobile World Congress

tiny iphoneThe rumors of a new, less expensive iPhone are true, reports the Wall Street Journal. The device — which is codenamed “N97” — will be roughly half the size of the iPhone 4, weigh “significantly” less, and sport an “edge-to-edge” screen. The smaller iPhone will also include voice-based navigation, a virtual keyboard and cost roughly half the price of the current iPhone.

Apple currently sells the iPhone to carriers for an average of $625 per phone. With carrier subsidies, customers can get the iPhone 4 for as little as $199. Because of the low cost of the smaller iPhone, says the WSJ, the carrier subsidies would allow users to get the phone for very little, or possibly for free.

Recommended Videos

A free, or at least less-expensive, iPhone would allow Apple to compete with the swarm of “mass-market” (i.e. Android) handsets that have come to dominate the smartphone industry. In fact, it’s curious — and not at all surprising — that this news of a new, more competitively-priced iPhone arrived just after Samsung’s Sunday announcement of the Android-based Galaxy S II smartphone at Mobile World Congress 2011.

It makes perfect sense for Apple to be making moves against Android. In 2010, use of Google’s Android operating system grew by 888 percent globally. That places Android second only to Symbian in terms of market share percentages. (And Symbian, we now know, will not be with us much longer.) Plus, more Android-based devices shipped in 2010 than phones running any other OS. Sources say Apple realized its need to grab a piece from the lower market; and thus, the smaller iPhone.

Last week, Bloomberg made similar claims about a smaller, cheaper iPhone being in the works. But in that version, the phone was $200 without a contract, and measured one-third smaller than the size of an iPhone 4, not half.

Apple is also allegedly “exploring a major revamp of its MobileMe online storage service.” MobileMe, Apple’s cloud computing and device synchronization service that launched in 2008, currently carries an annual $99 subscription fee. But Apple may soon offer the service for free, the sources say.

In addition, an updated MobileMe could become the “focal point” of a new “online music service that Apple has been developing for more than a year,” and may give users access to their iTunes library from their iPhone or iPad. This may essentially confirm that Apple has been preparing iTunes to include music streaming capabilities — a rumor that’s been percolating since Apple bought, and then promptly shutdown, streaming site Lala.com last spring.

With both Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal — respected publications that investors read — saying Apple has a new phone in the works to help the company make money where it’s currently not, we can say with near certainty that the rumored smaller iPhone is true, in one form or another. Neither Steve Jobs nor an official Apple spokesperson would confirm or deny any of these rumors, however, so it’s impossible to say how much of these details will be true come launch day.

Andrew Couts
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Features Editor for Digital Trends, Andrew Couts covers a wide swath of consumer technology topics, with particular focus on…
Instagram will broadcast the Reels you like to everyone. I dread it.
Reels liked by friends on Instagram.

TikTok is currently staring at an existential crisis. If the Presidential miracle doesn’t come through and the social media site shuts down in the US on January 19th, a social media exodus is imminent.

I’ve seen that happen in India, when a platform with 200 million users went dark in a rush. Most didn’t get a chance to migrate. Some never recovered. Instagram happily lapped up the “TikTok migrants” and grew.

Read more
I hated this OnePlus camera mode, but now I see how wrong I was about it
A person using the XPan mode on the OnePlus 13.

I didn’t understand the XPan mode on a OnePlus phone when I first tried it out. In fact, I didn’t like it at all, and passed it off as a silly gimmick to promote OnePlus’s partnership with Hasselblad, which at the time wasn’t quite living up to expectations.

Recently I’ve been using the OnePlus 13, and think it has one of the best cameras on any OnePlus phone yet, so I challenged myself to give XPan another try. I soon discovered I had been completely wrong about it.
Not a history lesson

Read more
The best OnePlus 13R cases for 2025
Someone holding the OnePlus 13R, showing the back of the phone.

The OnePlus 13R is a budget-focused powerhouse with impressive battery life, a surprisingly smooth operating system, and a camera setup that puts others to shame. It manages to pack a tremendous amount of power into a slim form factor, and that's something you want to keep safe.

Now that the OnePlus 13R has made its way to store shelves (for an incredibly affordable price), you should take some of the money you saved and invest it toward a case. Numerous manufacturers have already jumped onboard with everything from MagSafe to wallet cases. Depending on what you're looking for, there's something for everyone — but these are the top five cases we've found.

Read more