Apple Announces the iPhone 5s, A New iPhone With a Built-In Fingerprint Sensor

At today’s event in Cupertino, California, Apple has announced the new iPhone 5s that features a new Touch ID fingerprint sensor built into the home button that can be used to unlock the phone or authenticate iTunes purchases. The 5s features an aluminum body with chamfered edges — just like the iPhone 5 — and will be available in Space Gray, Silver, and Gold.

The iPhone 5s features a new A7 processor, which Apple claims is the “world’s first and only smartphone” with a 64-bit chip. The new A7 processor will provide faster performance and graphics, and will work alongside the M7 motion co-processor that measures the accelerometer, compass, and gyroscope. Apple says the 5s has better battery life than its predecessor with up to 250 hours of standby, 10 hours of 3G talk time, and 10 hours of LTE browsing.

Apple has also redesigned the camera for the 5s. The new iSight camera is still 8-megapixels — just like the iPhone 5 — but features an f/2.2 aperture and a 15 percent larger sensor. The iPhone 5s has a new flash with two LEDs, one warm and one cool, to improve the color balance of photos. The iSight camera also has a burst mode than can shoot up to ten frames per second, and a Slo-Mo option that can shoot 720p video at up 120 fps.

The iPhone 5s will begin at $199 for the 16GB model, the 32GB version will cost $299, and the 64GB model will cost $399 with a two-year contract. It will be available on September 20th.

iOS 7, the newest version of Apple’s mobile operating system which was first announced earlier this year at WWDC 2013, will release on older iPhone and iPad models on Wednesday, September 18th.

Apple also announced the iPhone 5c, a lower-cost plastic iPhone available in various bright colors.

For more coverage on the iPhone 5s, head over to CNET.