Just for reference, last year my friend bought a new Xiaomi 13T for $35 more (so +13%), which destroys this phone by every metric except synthetic CPU benchmarks. Apple really is heavily overpriced.

https://www.gsmarena.com/compare.php3?idPhone1=11410&idPhone...

(Prices listed by GSMArena have no relation to reality for both models.)

The catch being that's a phone from 2022. Sure, if that's acceptable. I was just referring to current models rather than models from multiple years ago

It outperforms samsung A5x series handily, has better battery life, better carrier support, has full warranty from apple, including same-day in-store service. Who cares what year it is from?