iPhone 4/4S + otterbox case + screen protector = your view?


Recommended Posts

Has anyone put an otterbox case on their iPhone which already has a screen protector on it?

Just wondering if the protector bubbles due to it sitting right near the edges. The wife has a Galaxy S3 but her screen protector doesn't sit as close to the edges & as a result her otterbox case doesn't make the screen protector bubble.

Don't know anyone who has one for their iPhone though.

Has anyone put an otterbox case on their iPhone which already has a screen protector on it?

Just wondering if the protector bubbles due to it sitting right near the edges. The wife has a Galaxy S3 but her screen protector doesn't sit as close to the edges & as a result her otterbox case doesn't make the screen protector bubble.

Don't know anyone who has one for their iPhone though.

I had a SGP Ultra on, then an otter box defender. It didn't bother me at all. Though, since I had to get a refurb Iphone, I only have the otterbox display protector :-(.

Kinda doesn't help though. I like the 'flimsy' screen covers.

In the 2 years i owned my 3GS i always had one on. They fitted well - with no bubbles at all, which meant i didn't notice they were even on (so if i don't notice it then i can't not like it). When they got too scuffed or whatever, i'd change them.

So really need to know how they fair with the otterbox case on as well (ideally the commuter case), as i have until the weekend to switch my 4S for an S3, by which point i'm out of time & would have to stick with the 4S.

Got 3 Iphone 4's (one for wife, kid, myself) and 3 of the otterbox defenders. Daughter has wrecked the case and have replaced it once. Phone is pristine. Wife's phone got dropped down the stairs at the Disneyland parking structure and survived w/o any problems with the phone itself! Neither have had any issues with the screen protector. so A+ in my book!

The only issue it does have is the rubber tends to stick to my pockets a bit when so always having to tuck my pockets back in. Small annoyance.

I have purchased a couple defenders. 1 for each iPhone. 3GS, 4s, 5. On my 3GS, I had already purchased an invisishield before I bought the otterbox, and did not want to loose the protection the invisishield gave the phone, so I actually popped the screen protector that was on the otterbox off. Its actually just attached with a thin glue type substance, very easy to remove and clean. The only downfall I had, was the invisishield is kinda "rubbery" and with the otterbox fitting so tight on the 3GS it caused it to leave indention's in the screen protector on the 4 corners where the case and the screen meet. It did not scratch my screen at all or cut through the screen protector, but it left indention's in it. I have since gotten away from using invisishield because I just hate the way they feel.

As far as on the 4s and the 5. I kept the screen protector that came with the otterbox on and used that with no issues. I did however put a defender on my wifes 4 one time when she already had a screen protector on it and it looked horrible. It didnt bubble, but it had this layer of oil look. I cleaned the crap out of both screen protectors inside and out to see if it helped but it didn't.

So I would say. If you have a nice anti glare or expensive screen protector on your phone already. Leave it and pop out the otterbox screen protector. If not, then just take the screen protector off your device and use the otterbox one.

I don't buy expensive protectors. I bought a pack of 10 for my 3GS from eBay for ?1-?3. Nice & cheap but did the job.

Is the otterbox protector any different from these cheap screen protectors? For the record i don't buy the anti glare ones either. I had one of those once & thought it was horrible.

I also wont be buying the defender if that makes much/any difference? It'd be the less bulky commuter i'd be buying.

I don't buy expensive protectors. I bought a pack of 10 for my 3GS from eBay for ?1-?3. Nice & cheap but did the job.

Is the otterbox protector any different from these cheap screen protectors? For the record i don't buy the anti glare ones either. I had one of those once & thought it was horrible.

I also wont be buying the defender if that makes much/any difference? It'd be the less bulky commuter i'd be buying.

I bought my and my wife's iPhone 4s just before the 5 was released and got an Otterbox for each of them. I would have preferred to just get a screen protector because the Otterbox does bulk up the phone considerably imho. Sometimes it even makes it uncomfortable to hold. The reason for buying the Otterboxes though is because I have twin 3 (almost 4) year old boys that tend to find ways to get their hands on the phones. They aren't nearly as careful with them as my wife and I are. They have been great from the protection standpoint but the area around the font and back cameras get really dirty and require the occasional removal of the phone to clean up. In my situation I wouldn't trade them for anything else at the moment however as I said, I would much rather have just had a screen protector if not for the kids.

On another upside note the Otterbox does come with a click-in belt carrier that servers a dual purpose. The belt clip can act as a nice stand in different configurations if you leave you phone attached to it and can prop your phone at various viewing angles from both a portrait and landscape perspective. The clip can lock into the open position to further modify the viewing angles.

Overall it is a nice protective device for the money but that doesn't change my preference of the bare phone with just the screen/back protector on it.

Good luck on your decision.

I bought my and my wife's iPhone 4s just before the 5 was released and got an Otterbox for each of them. I would have preferred to just get a screen protector because the Otterbox does bulk up the phone considerably imho. Sometimes it even makes it uncomfortable to hold. The reason for buying the Otterboxes though is because I have twin 3 (almost 4) year old boys that tend to find ways to get their hands on the phones. They aren't nearly as careful with them as my wife and I are. They have been great from the protection standpoint but the area around the font and back cameras get really dirty and require the occasional removal of the phone to clean up. In my situation I wouldn't trade them for anything else at the moment however as I said, I would much rather have just had a screen protector if not for the kids.

On another upside note the Otterbox does come with a click-in belt carrier that servers a dual purpose. The belt clip can act as a nice stand in different configurations if you leave you phone attached to it and can prop your phone at various viewing angles from both a portrait and landscape perspective. The clip can lock into the open position to further modify the viewing angles.

Overall it is a nice protective device for the money but that doesn't change my preference of the bare phone with just the screen/back protector on it.

Good luck on your decision.

Sorry, I should have mentioned that I did buy the Defender cases. I'm sure they are thicker than the Commuter but I'm not sure if they provide the same level of protection. It also doesn't appear that the Commuter comes with the belt clip so sorry to have included that tidbit.

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • This sounds like underneath the nice marketing spin, either someone at Adobe got tired of their lazy devs and asked Microsoft to help them sort at least some of Adobe's ancestral spaghetti code to make it go faster, or Microsoft wanted Adobe's crap to run better on Windows to make it look better when compared to Apple, so they offered to intervene. Either way, GOOD.
    • My favorite file manager for Windows 11 finally gets a long-requested feature by Taras Buria Files is among the best File Explorer alternatives for Windows 10 and 11. This free app is packed with all sorts of features and conveniences, but there is one crucial feature that is still missing—Tree View. Fortunately, the latest update in the Preview channel finally delivers it. With version 4.1.4, which is now available for download in the Preview channel, developers implemented Tree View, a new mode that displays folders in an expandable hierarchy. Windows 11's stock File Explorer always had this feature, but it was nowhere to be found in Files until now. Starting with the latest preview update, you can expand each drive and its nested folders without leaving the current location and then open the folder you need in the main view. To try Tree View in Files, update the app to the latest preview version, then click the small arrow next to a drive to expand its content. The developers say they are rolling out Tree View in Preview first to gather feedback from users and improve the feature before bringing it to all in the stable channel. In addition to Tree View, Files 4.1.14 improves the Windows Fonts folder. You can now preview each font directly in Files with no need to open the built-in font viewer. For now, these two features are only available in the Preview channel. For those using the stable release, developers recently released version 4.1.3, with improvements for the built-in tag system, on-demand folder size calculation, and plenty of various fixes. You can check out the full release notes here. You can download Files from the Microsoft Store (paid version) or its official website (free).
    • Who is paying for this 30x scale-up? Its sounds expensive.
    • Millions of users to benefit from Windows 11's new performance boost on Adobe Photoshop by Sayan Sen Despite the advent of AI-generated imagery, Adobe's Photoshop remains one of the most popular tools on this planet. Adobe does not have a publicly reported total user count but it's probably not wrong to assume there are millions. As of 2025, Adobe Creative Cloud has had approximately 41 million paid subscribers, many of whom likely use Photoshop. In addition, more than 166,000 companies worldwide are apparently also using the app. These figures are according to a very recent report by SQ Magazine. Out of them, it is fair to assume that many are probably running Windows. As such, there is good news for these users as Microsoft has announced Photoshop is getting a big 20% performance boost on x86-64 (AMD64) systems and a 13% bump-up on Arm devices. This is definitely great news for them as many have complained about the slow performance and general sluggishness of Photoshop on Windows 11 ever since the advent of the latter back in 2021. If you are wondering how Microsoft managed to do this, the answer lies in a combination of compiler-level optimizations and a technology called Sample Profile Guided Optimization (SPGO). According to Microsoft, Adobe worked closely with the company’s Visual C++ team and adopted the latest MSVC toolchain enhancements together with SPGO to squeeze more performance out of Photoshop’s CPU-bound workloads. Unlike traditional Profile Guided Optimization (PGO), which requires developers to create special instrumented builds and run lengthy training workloads, SPGO gathers performance data directly from optimized release binaries. This means Adobe could collect real-world usage information which gives a major advantage to this technique, as companies could leverage data collected from actual customer workloads rather than only relying on synthetic benchmark runs. In theory, this should allow optimizations to better reflect how users interact with software in the real world. Thanks to this, there are improvements to code layout, function inlining, hot-and-cold code separation, and other low-level tweaks that help processors execute instructions more efficiently. Essentially the compiler is better able to identify “hot” code paths, those which are most frequently executed, and optimize them accordingly.
    • "The 2TB Samsung 990 PRO NVMe SSD hits lowest price in over three months¨ I'd prefer to see the lowest price in over a year
  • Recent Achievements

    • First Post
      Jocimo earned a badge
      First Post
    • Week One Done
      suprememobiles48 earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • One Month Later
      Windows Guy earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • One Month Later
      Prasann earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      Prasann earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      521
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      174
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      90
    4. 4
      Steven P.
      81
    5. 5
      ATLien_0
      70
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!