A few weeks ago when my kids had a week off of school for Mardi Gras, my family took a trip to Hawaii, visiting the islands of O’ahu and Kaua’i. We had fabulous time seeing amazing sights such as beautiful waterfalls, enjoyed the food, and saw lots of rainbows. But some of the best parts of the trip involved being near and in the water. Hawaii has some truly spectacular beaches. My kids and I went snorkeling with turtles just off of Waikiki Beach in Honolulu on the island of O’ahu, and we also went snorkeling at Poipu Beach on the island of Kaua’i.
In preparation for the trip, I thought it would be fun to take some underwater pictures and videos when we were snorkeling. Thus, I researched the options, and ultimately selected the Catalyst Waterproof Case for iPhone XS, which costs $89.99 on Amazon. It worked great.
The case
The case is a perfect, snug fit on the iPhone. It takes less than a 15 seconds to open the case, fit the iPhone inside, and then ensure a tight lock on all of the sides.
A port flips open on the bottom of the case so that you can charge it with a Lightning cable, but then closes securely when you are not charging so that no water can get in.
There is a dial on the side which you can turn to flip the mute switch on and off. And there are buttons you can press to increase and decrease the volume — or, more importantly, take a picture when the camera is underwater. You can’t tap an iPhone’s screen when it is underwater, so having access to the volume up button, which you can press to take a photo, is critical for underwater photography.
The case comes with a lanyard which you can wrap around your wrist. That way, even if your iPhone were to slip out of your hand (which never happened to me), the lanyard would stop it from sinking in the water.
The edges of this case have rubber on them, giving you some protection if you drop your iPhone. This is smart because there is probably a higher risk of dropping an iPhone when it is wet.
The back of the case is designed so that the two cameras can take pictures and videos.
With the iPhone in this case, I had no trouble touching the screen of my iPhone. Just touch the plastic cover and the iPhone’s screen registers everything. You can also talk on the iPhone as a phone even when it is in the case; both the microphone and the speaker still work.
If you are going to be using your iPhone in an environment in which it could be exposed to the elements — water, snow, dust, sand — this case seems to provide great protection.
Pictures and videos
The main reason I purchased this case was to use the camera underwater. And for this purpose it worked very well, as you can see for yourself. I was able to get some great pictures and fantastic video using this case. Here are some sample pictures:
Note that I reduced the size of all of those pictures to make this page load more quickly. For an example of a higher quality photo, you can click here to download a 3.6 MB version of the fourth picture.
Most of the pictures I took in this case were underwater pictures, but sometimes I would take an above-water picture and those came out well too with the case on. For example, there was a monk seal resting on the beach next to where we were snorkeling, so I took this picture with my iPhone in the case:
Pictures in this case came out nicely, but I especially enjoyed using this case to take video. As good as the iPhone is as a camera, I think that it is an even better video camera. And that is definitely true when underwater. Here is a two minute video, in 4K, showing some of the great results that you can get when filming underwater video. I also included some above-water clips so that you can see that, even with the case covering the iPhone, it did a great job of picking up colors such as the blue sky and the orange-and-yellow sail on the catamaran:
Conclusion
At $89, this is not a cheap case. I always have reservations about purchasing a more expensive case because whenever I upgrade to a new iPhone, the case won’t work with the new phone. But if you are going to be using your iPhone in an environment in which you want to protect it from the elements, this case works really well. And even when you are in less extreme environments, you could use this as a “normal” case to give the iPhone additional protection against bumps and scratches.
If, like me, you want to take underwater photos and videos, this case is great fun. I have some amazing videos of my son and daughter underwater playing with fish and checking out turtles, and these videos will be fun for my family to watch for many decades. I look forward to using this waterproof case again when my family takes a beach trip this summer. When I’m on the beach, I won’t need to worry about sand, and when I’m in the Gulf of Mexico, I won’t need to worry about the saltwater, and I can even take pictures and videos.
If you are looking for a waterproof case, I can definitely recommend the cases sold by Catalyst, including this model for the iPhone XS.
Click here to get the Catalyst Waterproof Case for iPhone XS ($89.99 on Amazon)
Click here to get the Catalyst Waterproof Case for other iPhone models