Today we are taking a closer look at the new BANG!CASE for iPhone 14 Pro/Max and iPhone 15 Pro/Max. The interesting new iPhone cover debuted in mid-April courtesy of Bitmo Lab – an sspai and JSAUX brand – as what the company refers to as “the world’s first phone case with three customizable buttons.” It essentially adds a new button to your phone, acting as a sort of second Action Button you can customize to do any number of things. This high-tech approach to smartphone cases is also joined by an interesting clear case back to show of the tech required to run the button, some LED action, and you can still land one at 20% off ahead of launch next month. Head below for our hands-on impressions in the latest edition of Tested with gadgetnewsonline.
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The BANG!CASE has already soared past its Kickstarter crowdfunding goal and is scheduled to begin shipping units to backers in June 2024. Regularly $50, there are still early bird deals available for the time being, allowing you to lock one in at $39.99 for both iPhone 14 Pro/Max and iPhone 15 Pro/Max.
Take a closer look at the specs:
- Available for iPhone 14 Pro/Max and iPhone 15 Pro/Max
- Customizable BANG!BUTTON
- Connects to iPhone over Bluetooth
- Full MagSafe array
- Magnetic charging to power the BANG!BUTTON
- Button covers
- See-through case back
- 12-Month Warranty
gadgetnewsonline’ Take
First let’s talk about the physical design here before we get into the BANG!BUTTON action. In terms of actual build quality, this is essentially your usual plastic TPU-style frame, albeit one that feels a little bit more high-end than many of the budget brand options out there. You’ll find rubberized plastic button covers for everything including the actual Action Button and the BANG!BUTTON itself alongside the usual raised edge to protect your camera array.
The bezel or frame of the case is a little bit more rubberized and pliable-feeling than the see-through back panel, which presents a hard, stiff housing for the visible tech internals in place here, as well as for the round MagSafe array.
I really like this clear exhibition case-back vibe here. Some of the cases out there that have this sort of technical design, made to look like you’re seeing through into the internals of a smartphone or something like that are cool, but this, in some ways is the real thing, and it shows. There are some graphics printed on the clear window to accentuate the actual tech housed below, but for me they just sort of add to the visual appeal of the overall look. Perhaps I could have also done without them, leaving the raw circuits, slim battery, battery LEDs, and Bluetooth chip to shine on their own, but I’m certainly not mad at this graphical approach.
Having said that, please stop plastering giant text in big bold lettering on your case! Okay, yes this is a me thing and anyone who knows my case reviews knows I hate big giant branding like this. Many folks aren’t bothered by it, and it doesn’t even cross their mind, I’m just not one of them. In this case, it is down in the bottom corner and doesn’t completely ruin the vibe for me, but I wish it wasn’t there at all.
The BANG!CASE ships with a USB to magnetic charging cable. It connects to a port/magnetic array (this thing looks really cool alongside the rest of the vibe here) on the top right corner of case back to charge up the internal battery that allows the Bluetooth pairing and BANG!BUTTON to run. It was able to hold its charge for weeks for me, but it certainly would have been cool if the company could have figured out a way to steal some juice from the MagSafe connection instead – charge the case’s battery while your MagSafe charger is juicing up your phone – maybe this is overly wishful thinking, I’m no engineer.
One other quick thing to point out for the physical side for things here is the thickness. It’s actually not that thick at all, despite housing all of the aforementioned tech. I mean I didn’t think it was going be like a big chunky battery case or anything, but I did think it would be thicker than what we are getting here – it’ adds about 4mm in thickness to the back of your iPhone. Nice.
It looks pretty sweet with the BANG!CASE wallpaper too:
Okay, now let’s BANG! it out. As mentioned above, this case features a BANG!BUTTON. It essentially acts like a second Action Button resting just below the power/home button on iPhone 15. It is an entirely customizable button users can program to trigger “thousands” of different commands by way of iPhone’s Accessibility and AssistiveTouch features within iOS.
It works like this; connect the BAG!CASE to your iPhone via Bluetooth, just like any other Bluetooth device – headphones, speakers, and so on. You Long press the BANG!BUTTON itself and a blue LED on the back of the BANG!CASE lights up to indicate pairing mode. Everything worked great for me on my first try here.
And then it’s time to customize the BANG!BUTTON. As mentioned above it supports single press, double press, and long press, so three commends at a time. It only takes a few minutes to setup.
You go to Settings > Accessibility > Touch and engage AssistiveTouch. Then you just locate BANG!CASE in the Devices menu and hit Customize Additional Buttons.
From there, you simply single tap and a menu will pop up to add a shortcut, commend, etc. The same goes for the double tap, and long press. Honestly, writing this all out just to give you a better idea of how it works might be making it sound more cumbersome and lengthy than it is, but it’s really quite simple and fast…and I’m no back-end iOS magician by any means, for the record.
For anyone who hasn’t dabbled in the Accessibility, Touch, and AssistiveTouch action on iOS, the options for adding system commands and more to your BANG!BUTTON are massive. Screenshot, Siri, Apps Switcher, Lock screen rotation, open Camera, Apple Pay, Control Center, and a whole lot more.
It also integrates with Apple’s Shortcuts app/feature. So you can also program the BANG!BUTTON to trigger a whole host of tasks in one go. Take a pic and share it on social with one tap, turn on your smart lights at home with one tap, and so on.
The whole thing is pretty cool if you ask me, and I’m not really even the type to really dig in and even need it to do any of the many super interesting and useful things it is capable of, again, with one-tap (or double tap or long press).
It looks great (if you’re into this sort of the vibe) works as intended, and you can still score one at 20% off right now – $39.99 down from the $50 MSRP. If you think you’re going to put the BANG!BUTTON to work and like the aesthetics here, that’s probably not a bad price. There are cases out there with faux tech internal designs from known brands without a sweet extra Action Button of sorts that cost that much or quite a bit more.
Buy the BANG!CASE for iPhone 15 Pro/Max or iPhone 14 Pro/Max
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