During the annual Apple Special Event last month, the new iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus were unveiled. A new home button, a faster quad-core processor and a camera with a larger aperture are among some of the new features. The iPhone 7 Plus now has two cameras, which Apple said will be able to get very sharp, close-up photos. Other phones, like the Galaxy Note 7 were also recently unveiled. Students at BVNW have differing opinions on these new iPhones and a competitor, the Samsung Galaxy Note 7.

Junior Dannah Fields said she immediately knew she wanted the iPhone 7 Plus when it was announced. She said one of the things that initially drew her to the phone was the water resistant design.

“It is waterproof, which I like,” Fields said. “You can have your iPhone near the shower to listen to music.”

While some students at BVNW are purchasing the newest phone from Apple, some students are choosing not to. Senior Aya Andalsi said she would not be purchasing it because Apple was changing some features of the phone.

“I thought it was going to be very cool but I heard there were going to be things that were changed like the home button,” Andalsi said. “I don’t like the new button because it doesn’t actually click.

However, Andalsi said she liked other aspects of the iPhone 7. She said liked the lack of a standard headphone jack because it allowed for new features on the phone.

“I think everyone is used to having a headphone jack so they are thinking about how they are able to charge their phone and listen to music at the same time,” Andalsi said. “But instead of one speaker, there’s two speakers now so that’s cool.”

While Andalsi said she liked the lack of the headphone jack on the iPhone 7, some students said this was the most prevalent reason they would not be purchasing the phone. Senior Haley Tipton said this was one of the reasons why she purchased a different phone, the Galaxy Note 7, even though she liked some of the features of the iPhone 7.

“I like the camera quality on [the iPhone 7]  because it’s very clear but I don’t like how there’s no headphone jack,” Tipton said. “It’s very annoying. For this reason, I bought a Galaxy Note 7.”

However, Tipton said this phone also has a downside. Samsung has released a statement that some Galaxy Note 7 phones sold before September 15 have the potential to overheat and explode. Tipton said there is a way to switch out her Galaxy Note 7 for a replacement one that Samsung said will not overheat and explode.

“I still have the [potentially defective] Galaxy Note 7,” Tipton said. “I am definitely planning to get the replacement one from Samsung as soon as I can.”

While Tipton said she liked Samsung phones better, Andalsi said the potential explosive issues on the Galaxy Note 7 were one of the reasons why she likes Apple phones better than Samsung phones.

“I don’t like Samsung phones at all,” Andalsi said. “Samsung is just trying to release a bunch of phones at the same time to compete against Apple and I think that is a reason why the [Note 7] is exploding.”

Although Tipton and Andalsi both said the both the Galaxy Note 7 and iPhone 7 have downsides, they said they would consider buying the iPhone 7 if it had more features they liked.

“[iPhones] have great software on them. The apps are very organized and it just looks cooler [than Samsung devices],” Andalsi said. “I don’t like the home button so if they got rid of this feature I would definitely consider buying it.”