The iPhone once again leads Consumer Reports’ smartphone ratings, beating competing products such as the Palm Pre and BlackBerry Storm. The organization considered Apple’s new 3GS handset to lead in categories such as battery life, multimedia, navigation and Internet browsing, while integrating a superior display.

Although the iPhone took the top rank and showed strengths in every category except voice quality, devices such as the Pre, Samsung Omnia and BlackBerry Storm now follow closely behind. Palm’s device achieved higher scores in several important categories such as messaging and multitasking.

Consumer Reports is continuing to evolve its testing criteria for smartphones, recently increasing emphasis on the display, ease of navigation, multimedia and messaging, while placing less importance on voice quality and talk time. Comparing speed and versatility of different platforms, such as the iPhone 3.0 OS and Palm’s WebOS, has proven challenging.

Exclusive relationships between handset manufacturers and carriers adds to the diversity of real-world user impressions. While the iPhone leads among devices, the testing organization considered Verizon to be a standout carrier based on consumer surveys across the country.