Seven things you need to know about Apple's iPhone X

Apple has dropped three new iPhones on the market -  iPhone X, iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus.

Apple has entered a new era in their own smartphone revolution with the release of iPhone X. Raising the standards of their devices even higher, iPhone X features Face ID, OLED screens, a heavy price tag and a clear focus on a new type of smartphone experience.

"iPhone X marks a new era for iPhone — one in which the device disappears into the experience," says Jony Ive, Apple's chief design officer.

"For more than a decade, our intention has been to create an iPhone that is all display. The iPhone X is the realisation of that vision.

"With the introduction of iPhone ten years ago, we revolutionised the mobile phone with Multi-Touch.

"iPhone X enables fluid new user experiences — from unlocking your iPhone with Face ID, to playing immersive AR games, to sharing Animoji in Messages — it is the beginning of the next ten years for iPhone," comments Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.

Here are the seven key features of Apple's iPhone X:

1. All-screen design: Elegant meets durable

By far the most definitive feature of Apple's iPhone X is the all-screen display.

iPhone X's all glass front and back are constructed from 'the most durable glass ever' and held together by a surgical-grade stainless steel band.

The device features seven-layer colour processing, allowing for precise colour hues and opacity and a reflective optical layer further enhancing rich colours.

2. Super retina display

Yes – the iPhone X has a OLED screen, a first from Apple.

This device can display colours better and brighter than any preceding devices, including true blacks, a million-to-one contrast ratio, improved system-wide colour management and HDR display supported by Dolby Vision and HDR10.

The addition of True Tone adjusts the white balance of the display to match the surrounding light for a more natural, paper-like viewing experience.

Apple has ditched the Home button. Instead, users can swipe up from anywhere in iOS to go home.

iOS 11 has been completely redesigned to cater to the Super Retina display of iPhone X.

3. Introducing A11 Bionic

A11 Bionic features six-core CPU design, two performance cores that are 25% faster and four four efficiency cores that are 70% faster than the Apple's A10 Fusion.

Battery life has been increased by 2 hours – in comparison to iPhone 7.

4. Face ID: The new authentication system

Customers can unlock their iPhone X by simply looking at it. Using a TrueDepth camera system made up of a dot projector, infrared camera and flood illuminator, Face ID maps and recognises faces, and is designed to prevent spoofing by photos or masks.

How it works:

Face ID is powered by A11 Bionic and uses depth-sensing technologies to securely identify a face to unlock iPhone, enable Apple Pay and gain access to locked apps.

Face ID projects more than 30,000 invisible IR dots. The IR image and dot pattern are pushed through neural networks to create a mathematical model of your face and send the data to the secure enclave to confirm a match while adapting to physical changes in appearance over time.

All saved facial information is protected by the secure enclave to keep data secure, while all of the processing is done on-device and not in the cloud to protect user privacy.

5. New portrait mode  

TrueDepth, the same tech that enables FaceID, ramps up Potrait Mode on the iPhone X camera.

Portrait mode with Portrait Lighting on both the front and rear cameras brings dramatic studio lighting effects to your selfies and portraits, and adds a shallow depth-of-field effect in five different lighting styles.

6. Animoji – bring your emoji to life

Based on the same TrueDepth camera and A11 bionic tech, Animoji analyses facial expressions and turns them into different animated emoji.

7. Qi wireless charging

iPhone X is charged on a wireless charging station – AirPower.

The charging station is coming to stores in 2018, but Apple didn't stop there – Apple's new charging mat allows iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X users to charge three devices at the same time, including Apple Watch Series 3 and AirPods.

Australian and Kiwi customers will be able to pre-order iPhone X from Friday, 27 October and the devices will be in stores from Friday, 3 November.

iPhone X comes in silver and space grey in 64GB and 256GB models. Prices start at AUD$1579 or NZ$1799 for the 64GB model and AUD$1829 or NZ$2099 for the 256GB model from Apple's website, through Apple Authorised Resellers or selected carriers.