An Apple iPhone was pitted against a Nokia N95 in a mobile phone smackdown. The N95 was found to have many desirable features, but it’s just too expensive, according to CNN Money on Friday.

The Nokia N95 appeared at first to be a bit chunkier, but, in fact, was really lighter and seemed more rugged. The N95 has a GPS system and it runs on the faster 3G network. However, where the N95 really shined is in its application support and being an unlocked phone out of the box.

"As it’s an unlocked phone, you can pretty much do whatever you want with it. Don’t feel like using Nokia’s own turn-by-turn direction service? No problem - you can download the one made by competitor Garmin (Charts). The same goes for any widget, e-mail programs or mobile Web sites," Michal Lev-Ram reported.

The iPhone, however, has a better user interface which won hands down and has a larger screen, 3.5 inches compares to the N95’s 2.6 inches.

The phones tied on call quality, Wi-Fi, and both were deemed weak on texting. The bottom line, however, was that the freedom of the N95 at US$700 may not be worth the extra $300 compared to the iPhone. Were the prices the same, the N95 could give the iPhone "a run for its money," the author concluded.

iPO notes that battery life was not mentioned in the smackdown. However, it has been discussed previously here, and the iPhone fared very well.