When setting up your new iPhone you should have the option to wirelessly move the data from one to another. This would be substantially faster than using the lightning connector on the 12. USB 2.0 speed is a theoretical max of 53mbs, while WiFi should be a couple of hundred mbs.

Because it sounds like it works, it probably won’t. That’s the way my life usually goes…hope your experience is different!

Yes it works and Apple actually built a system to copy over files while the device is being set up so they are available quicker. It’s working since iOS 12/13 and the switch to USBC should have zero impact.

But as others have said, you don’t need to tether them. Just keep each of them close by and you’ll be given the option on your existing phone to set up your new one. It will copy over everything outside of Touch ID/Face ID data (as that is stored locally on each device).

The setup process is absolutely painless.

I don’t believe that will work. Should have an option to do it wirelessly, though.

It works for Android phones. There's a migration tool that pops up when you plug two phones into each other. It's worth a try.

https://mastodon.social/@dcseifert/111092267566492229

Seems like I was wrong and you can make it work.

Maybe, but why. Apple has multiple ways to do this seamlessly. You can restore from an iCloud backup or do the wireless device transfer (that always fails for me with nearly 40k images).