"Reliable and fast" is exactly why TouchID was so great when they introduced it. They aren't just nice-to-have features, they're the bare minimum requirements for this kind of thing -- a feature that you use constantly, and which gates your access to all other features.

> "Reliable and fast" is exactly why TouchID was so great when they introduced it.

Although it wasn't particularly either when it was first introduced.

I think you misremember. Here’s Daring Fireball on the iPhone 5S (https://daringfireball.net/2013/09/the_iphone_5s_and_5c):

“Once you’ve added a fingerprint, subsequent scans of that finger are nearly instantaneous. Touch ID is way faster than “fast enough”. I’d call it “I can’t believe it works this quickly” fast. It’s also very accurate — only a handful of times over the past week have I had to try a second time, and each of those times, I hadn’t really squared up my finger with the sensor.”

I know many people regard DF as overly biased, but as I recall, the general reception for Touch ID was very positive. Let me know if you find a review that says otherwise.

> Let me know if you find a review that says otherwise.

Personal experience from having got a 5S at launch. And every iPhone with Touch ID since.

Fair enough! It works great for me.

Oh, I can't deny it's absolutely amazing and almost invisible now - my 7 only has trouble when there's moisture involved. But the early iterations were definitely clunky (but still fairly amazing as a technology, I can't deny that!)

I'm expecting Face ID to be the same - kinda clunky but amazing on the X, almost frictionless on the XI, and then almost completely transparent on the XII.

I wouldn't class it as revolutionary either, but it /is/ innovative.