Consumer Reports calls Apple’s BendGate controversy “overblown”

There has been a lot of controversy regarding the new iPhones due to numerous reports of the phones bending. This is an issue that a handful of iPhone 5 users had experienced in the past so it is definitely not new per se. However some are arguing that the issue has been overblown and while Apple has offered the media a look at their testing facility, we’re sure some are still a little doubtful. Well the folks at Consumer Reports have decided to put the new iPhones to test themselves and have included other phones as a form of comparison.

Turns out the iPhone 6 Plus bends more easily than the Samsung Galaxy Note 3, less easily than the HTC One. When 43 million people have seen something with their own eyes — say, Canadian videographer Lewis Hilsenteger bending an iPhone 6 Plus with his bare hands — it’s not easy to counter the impression left on the popular imagination. Apple did its best on Thursday (see Apple Rebuts Complaints of Bending iPhones). Consumer Reports did better, putting six smarthphones under an Instron compression test machine and measuring the results. “So what’s the bottom line for BendGate?” asks electronics editor Glenn Derene in the attached video. “Well, based on our comparative tests here at Consumer Reports, while not the strongest phones on the market, fears of a serious design flaw on the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus seem overblown.” Best part: Where, for comparison purposes, Derene tries — and fails — to generate the 80-lbs. force needed to break four pencils at once (2:15).