I'm not an iPhone user but I can comment based on my photography background.

You are not supposed to use macro mode in the sample you provide because the subject (food) is far away. Macro mode is for close up range (e.g. as close as 2 cm for iPhone 14 series). Example of macro shot: https://i0.wp.com/9to5mac.com/wp-content/up...fo&w=2000&ssl=1

Having said that, the "blurry"/out of focus area is due to iP14PM larger sensor size. The larger is the sensor size (and also lens aperture in general, but iP14PM and iP11 have same f/1.8 aperture), the more background blur you will get. Mind you this is not a software trick like portrait mode. In fact, the purpose of portrait mode is to emulate the large aperture out of focus blur like a DSLR and no software trick could recover the blurred image as well. This is an inherit effect of going for a larger sensor size.

I do not have an iPhone to test but the situation you mentioned is actually very common for large sensor and/or lens aperture. Take a look at the following diagram:



Basically, if the lens focus at the center of your subject, whatever further away from that point will gradually become out of focus. This is because the focus distance from your lens to center (red line) and the top (green line) are different. For camera with small size sensor or aperture, this behavior is not as significant because it has a larger focus zone and will only start to see out of focus part when it is very further away.

You can use this aperture simulator to understand the behaviour: http://www.andersenimages.com/tutorials/exposure-simulator/
Choose aperture priority.
Then set the aperture slider to f/1.4 (means more light goes into the sensor). Notice whatever behind the subject is blurred.

Their aperture value are roughly the same, IP14PM f/1.78 vs IP11 f/1.8
but their sensor size is really different:
https://forums.macrumors.com/proxy.php?imag...739f8ecdebddf8b

If we take into account of sensor size, we can normalize their aperture value to 35-mm equivalent (full frame sensor) so that they are comparable. After a series of calculation, that would be f/6.3 for IP14PM and f/10.2 for IP11P.

Here’s the aperture scale. Each step down lets in half as much light:

f/1.4 (very large opening of your aperture blades, lets in a lot of light)
f/2.0 (lets in half as much light as f/1.4)
f/2.8 (lets in half as much light as f/2.0)
f/4.0 (etc.)
f/5.6
f/8.0
f/11.0
f/16.0

We can approximately say that the IP11P only let in a quarter of light vs IP14PM.

Unfortunately, iPhone (and most phones) has a fixed aperture. IIRC, Samsung S9, S10, and Sony Pro-i have dual aperture system. The new Huawei Mate 50 series have variable aperture (f/1.4 to f/4.0).

Yes. Not only IP14PM, all other Android phones with similar or larger sensor size has the same characteristic.

Yes. I'm sure the whole page will be in focus.