It is no secret that the iPhone 12 mini has struggled to sell since its announcement last October, but the possibility has emerged that the smallest member of the iPhone family may be discontinued.

According to MyDrivers, JP Morgan Chase has not only cut its iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 mini production estimates by several million units, but has also confirmed that the lack of interest in the latter will have dire consequences. Citing supply chain sources, the analyst said that Apple will end production of the iPhone 12 mini in Q2 2021.

The plan to potentially end production just three months after the smartphone's launch is not a sign of a successful product. So what exactly went wrong?

The review of the iPhone 12 mini, which called it "a master class on how to do a small, affordable flagship model right," was actually very positive, but there were problems. The most pressing of these was weak battery life: in the iPhone 12 battery test, the mini lasted only 7 hours and 28 minutes. This is well behind the Pro (9:06), Pro Max (10:53), and even last year's iPhone 11 (11:16). [However, it seems unlikely that battery life is the reason the iPhone 12 mini is struggling. Rather, it is more likely due to the awkward positioning of the iPhone 12 mini when compared to the similarly compact but significantly less expensive iPhone SE.

Indeed, the lack of bezel makes the iPhone 12 mini physically smaller despite its 5.4-inch screen; who would pay extra for a mini if the SE offers 80% of the experience for almost half the price?

Conversely, those who want a larger display can simply pay $100 more for the regular iPhone 12, jumping from a 5.4" screen to a 6.1" panel. In other words, the iPhone 12 mini is too expensive to buy on the cheap and too small to be a flagship. In short, the iPhone 12 mini is a perfectly fine phone, but its customer base seems too small for Apple to continue production.

Of course, just because the iPhone 12 mini has not lived up to expectations does not mean that its design is lost forever. Given that the latest iPhone SE adopted the iPhone 8 shell, it would not be surprising if the next iPhone SE does not resemble the mini.