Apple announced today that shipping iPhones will have significantly improved battery life than the original estimates, and “optical quality” screen coating that will be much more scratch resistant than the prototypes.

New specs are: 8 hours of talk time (up from 4.5) and 24 hours of audio playback (up from 12).

A talk time chart and competitive analysis vs other smart phones are also available.

That’s pretty high battery life for such a full featured cellular/mobile handset. We’ll be doing some investigating on real-world usage after launch.