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iPhone 6s: The real reason you should be excited about Apple’s 2GB RAM bump

Published Sep 25th, 2015 11:55AM EDT
iPhone 6s 2GB RAM Speed
Image: iFixit

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We finally know how much RAM the iPhone 6s will have. Rumors have long claimed that Apple will use 2GB of RAM on the iPhone 6s series, and reports following Apple’s announcement event reinforced them – yet the iPhone maker never acknowledged this detail.

Meanwhile, iPhone 6s launch day arrived and the fearless team at iFixit tore through the new models almost immediately after the Australian Apple retail stores opened up for business on Friday. One of the team’s revelations concerned memory, but iFixit also revealed one more significant detail about it the new iPhone’s memory. 

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According to the official teardowns, the iPhone 6s models come with 2GB of LPDDR4 memory. This detail might not be important for many iPhone buyers, but plenty of others – especially those customers interested in specs – will be thrilled to hear it.

LPDDR4 happens to be the latest memory standard available to smartphone makers, one that Samsung introduced earlier this year before the Galaxy S6 came along. And, just as expected, Samsung did make use of LPDDR4 RAM on the Galaxy S6 series – in fact, it’s Samsung that’s providing the memory of the iPhone 6s as well, while SK Hynix makes the memory in the iPhone 6s Plus.

What’s so great about Samsung’s memory? Well, LPDDR4 memory happens to offer up to twice the speed of LPDDR3 (which is used in the iPhone 6 series). That means up to 3,200 Mb/s theoretical rates compared to 1,600 Mb/s for LPDDR3. Additionally, the new RAM standard also helps out with energy consumption, being more battery-friendly than LPDDR3.

Official iPhone 6s benchmarks proved the device is insanely powerful, capable of reaching the same score in Geekbench 3 as the 12-inch Retina MacBook. While that might not be of interest to regular iPhone users, what they should know is that the iPhone 6s really brings over a significant speed in performance, and the speedy RAM should definitely come in handy.

Check out the following video to see what faster RAM means for regular smartphone usage (starring Samsung smartphones, but you’ll get the point).

Chris Smith Senior Writer

Chris Smith has been covering consumer electronics ever since the iPhone revolutionized the industry in 2008. When he’s not writing about the most recent tech news for BGR, he brings his entertainment expertise to Marvel’s Cinematic Universe and other blockbuster franchises.

Outside of work, you’ll catch him streaming almost every new movie and TV show release as soon as it's available.