How to handle image scale on all the available iPhone resolutions?

You don't have to have each image in all scales if it won't be used. Make only the sizes you need and name them according to their width. For portrait full-device-width images, you need 320px wide at 1x and 2x, 375px wide at 2x and 414px wide at 3x.

4" devices used "-568h" suffix for naming their launch images, so I'd recommend a similar naming scheme:

ImageName-320w (@1x & @2x)

ImageName-375w (@2x)

ImageName-414w (@3x)

Then figure out what image you need at runtime:

NSNumber *screenWidth = @([UIScreen mainScreen].bounds.size.width);
NSString *imageName = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"name-%@w", screenWidth];
UIImage *image = [UIImage imageNamed:imageName];

This might break if other widths are added in future, but so far Apple has always required rebuilding the app to support new displays so I guess it's somewhat safe to assume they will continue doing that.

I personally will be doing :

ImageName@2x iPhone 4/4s ImageName-568h@2x iPhone 5/5s ImageName-667h@2x iPhone 6 ImageName-736h@3x iPhone 6Plus

The logic behind this is that it shows a difference between all devices, whereas width shares the same value on the iPhone 5s and iPhone 4s

Edit:

This is just the naming convention I am using for resources that are device dependant, such as a background image taking the whole screen, most of the time all you want is:

ImageName@2x iPhone 4/4s/5/5s/6 ImageName@3x iPhone 6Plus/Zoom mode

For the @2x and @3x discussion, you don't really have to care about that. Care about the point size of the screen, and make sure that there are @2x assets with twice the point size and @3x assets with thrice the point size in pixels. The device will automatically pick the right one. But reading your post I guess you already know this.

For edge-to-edge images, then unfortunately you have to make it for all screen resolutions. So, for a portrait iPhone, it would be 320 points, 375 points and 414 points, where the 414 points one would have to be @3x. A better solution may be to make your images scalable by setting up the slicing in interface builder (if you use image catalogs, that is). But, depending on the image this may or may not be an option, depending whether the image has a repeatable or stretchable part. Scalable images set up like this have very little performance impact.

the @2 and @3 is not the real image scaling, but only represent how much real pixel represent one virtual pixel on screen, some sort of hdpi/xhdpi/xxhdpi/blabla from android universe. it only show to system what image should be used for some device screen.

so if you need to use whole screen image - prepare it dependently of real screen size.

Depending on the graphics in some cases it might work fine when we use just a single image for example a banner with size 414 points width x 100 points height (largest possible width and some fixed height) and put it in a UIImageView that is pinned to the left and right edge of the screen, has fixed height 100 and set aspect fill mode for that UIImageView. Then on smaller devices left and right side of the image will be cut and we will see only the center part of the image.

I've created category for this:

+ (UIImage *)sizedImageWithName:(NSString *)name {
    UIImage *image;
    if (IS_IPHONE_5) {
        image = [UIImage imageNamed:[NSString stringWithFormat:@"%@-568h",name]];
        if (!image) {
            image = [UIImage imageNamed:name];
        }
    }
    else if (IS_IPHONE_6) {
        image = [UIImage imageNamed:[NSString stringWithFormat:@"%@-750w",name]];
    }
    else {
        image = [UIImage imageNamed:name];
    }
    return image;
}

you can take full code here: https://gist.github.com/YGeorge/e0a7fbb479f572b64ba5

I think the best solution for edge to edge or full screen images, is to care about the real screen size in pixel (not in point), and you must check at runtime the model of the device and choose the appropriate image i.e:

image-iphone4-4s.png (640x960/2) for 1/2 screen height, image-iphone5-5c-5s.png (640x1136/2) for 1/2 screen height, image-iphone6-6s.png (750x1334/2) for 1/2 screen height, image-iphone6plus-6splus.png (1242x2208/2) for 1/2 screen height,

there is no need for @?x in this situation of the asker.

i think we should use different size of background images for different devices. Just use @3x scale images for background.

You can detect device with below lines.

#define IS_IPAD (UI_USER_INTERFACE_IDIOM() == UIUserInterfaceIdiomPad)
#define IS_IPHONE (UI_USER_INTERFACE_IDIOM() == UIUserInterfaceIdiomPhone)
#define IS_RETINA ([[UIScreen mainScreen] scale] >= 2.0)

#define SCREEN_WIDTH ([[UIScreen mainScreen] bounds].size.width)
#define SCREEN_HEIGHT ([[UIScreen mainScreen] bounds].size.height)
#define SCREEN_MAX_LENGTH (MAX(SCREEN_WIDTH, SCREEN_HEIGHT))
#define SCREEN_MIN_LENGTH (MIN(SCREEN_WIDTH, SCREEN_HEIGHT))

#define IS_IPHONE_4_OR_LESS (IS_IPHONE && SCREEN_MAX_LENGTH < 568.0)
#define IS_IPHONE_5 (IS_IPHONE && SCREEN_MAX_LENGTH == 568.0)
#define IS_IPHONE_6 (IS_IPHONE && SCREEN_MAX_LENGTH == 667.0)
#define IS_IPHONE_6P (IS_IPHONE && SCREEN_MAX_LENGTH == 736.0)