5 issues the iPhone 17 must must succeed

With the iPhone 16 and 16 Pro firmly within the rearview mirror (and nonetheless awaiting their Apple Intelligence improve), there’s time to begin studying the tea leaves as to the place Apple will go subsequent with its star product. The iPhone 17 ought to meaningfully enhance on the iPhone 16 launched this 12 months, should not it?

At this level within the smartphone’s life, it is possibly flawed to count on Apple to dramatically reinvent the smartphone. There’ll all the time be a display, and apps, and a number of cameras to play with. However based mostly on the recent sluggish sales performance of the corporate’s smartphone, it does look like one thing must be finished to maintain prospects . Protecting what’s already leaked out about Apple’s subsequent iPhone in thoughts, this is the best enhancements the corporate ought to add to the iPhone 17 to make it stand out.

It is time to carry easy scrolling and an always-on display to the bottom iPhone

The professional variations of Apple’s iPhone have had easy, high-refresh charge shows for years. Apple first launched it is 120Hz ProMotion show on the iPhone 13 Pro, and allowed the show to be “always-on” (shifting to a low refresh charge to preserve battery whereas nonetheless displaying info on the display) on the iPhone 14 Pro.

Earlier than then, all iPhones had 60Hz shows, and since then, the bottom iPhone and iPhone Plus fashions have nonetheless had 60Hz shows. Except you’re feeling the graceful swiping and extra lifelike animations of a 120Hz iPhone for your self, you seemingly will not discover a distinction between a ProMotion and non-ProMotion show side-by-side.

Apple has already finished a superb job of optimizing its software program for 60Hz. However there are advantages, just like the always-on show, that might make an iPhone 17 with a ProMotion show extra usable, too. StandBy Mode is feasible on all of Apple’s present iPhones, however it solely works to its fullest extent on an iPhone with a ProMotion show that may show the time, climate, and different info all-day relatively than if you wake the display. Reports suggest Apple may give all of the iPhone 17s its ProMotion show.

Associated

Smartphone display refresh rates: What does Apple ProMotion and 120Hz mean, and does it matter?

With the arrival of 120Hz shows on smartphones, we reply why it’d (and won’t) be necessary and what it means.

2 Extra brilliant and saturated colour choices

The iPhone has settled for uninteresting, metallic colours for too lengthy

Within the decades-long pursuit of making minimalist, refined {hardware} design, Apple has deserted a way of enjoyable and character. You continue to see it in animations and small particulars of the corporate’s merchandise (that the bezels of your telephone seem to bulge as you regulate the quantity in iOS 18 is a latest instance), however the exterior of the corporate’s merchandise is decidedly buttoned up. Nowhere is that blandness extra obvious than within the firm’s colours. Practically each Apple product options uninteresting, pastel variations of brighter, extra attention-grabbing colours. They typically look extra just like the steel they’re partially constructed from than any adjective Apple makes use of to explain them, and that should change.

These are gadgets which are virtually glued to most individuals’s fingers. They need to be an expression of their sense of favor, not be ruled by Apple’s environment friendly manufacturing practices. The iPhone 16, which options an ultramarine blue, brilliant pink, and greenish Teal, is a step in the appropriate path. If we’re not returning to the deeply saturated colour choices of the iPhone 12, then the iPhone 17 ought to a minimum of sustain the pattern Apple began with the iPhone 16. Let’s get a pink or yellow telephone once more!

Associated

Why I’m buying the iPhone 16 over the Pixel 9

Apple is aware of methods to discourage switchers.

3 A bigger, extra environment friendly battery

Smartphones ought to final for a number of days on a single cost

iFixit / Pocket-lint

Battery life has been constant on the iPhone, however it hasn’t radically improved in a very long time. Your telephone lasts “all-day,” which interprets to a full day and a few change with regular use, and longer if you happen to solely have a look at your telephone to test the time (the corporate measuring battery life in video playback solely makes issues extra complicated). The truth that Apple could be so constant given all the brand new issues iPhones are anticipated to do is commendable in its personal method, however it’s time for issues to alter. Google and Samsung telephones are capable of get multi-day battery life largely by means of software program optimization. Apple’s Low Battery Mode can get you out of some scrapes, however it does not examine to the Extreme Battery Saver choice on Pixels.

Battery efficiency on the iPhone 17 must be higher, both by growing the dimensions of the battery within the telephone itself or higher optimizing iOS to stretch how lengthy the telephone can be utilized. On some degree, any firm goes to be restricted by battery chemistry, but when Apple is leaning in direction of practical enhancements to the iPhone relatively than aesthetic ones, battery life needs to be excessive on the checklist. The corporate is reportedly exploring building its own batteries and is at present utilizing a new kind of adhesive that makes batteries simpler to take away and exchange, however how these adjustments may translate to the battery lifetime of the iPhone down the street stays to be seen.

Associated

How to set a Charge Limit in iOS 18 to prolong your battery life

In case you have an iPhone 15 or 16, you possibly can select how a lot your battery will get charged.

4 An expanded position for Digital camera Management

New buttons open all kinds of prospects

The jury continues to be out on whether or not the iPhone 16’s Digital camera Management button is a significant new enter technique for the iPhone. One factor that has turn out to be clear is that it feels good to make use of, and Apple has plans to develop it with software program updates (the corporate is including a two-step shutter in some unspecified time in the future sooner or later). The benefit of Digital camera Management isn’t solely that you would be able to press it at a number of ranges of stress, however it’s additionally a contact floor in its personal proper. Which begs the query: What if Digital camera Management did not simply management the digital camera?

The iPhone already ships with a multi-functional enter within the Action Button, however Digital camera Management completely feels able to doing extra. Apple plans on utilizing it as a visible enter for Apple Intelligence, however it may simply as simply turn out to be a scroll wheel for interacting together with your iPhone with out having to the touch the display. Smartphones have featured scroll wheels and these sorts of contact surfaces earlier than. The Asus Zenfone 9 featured the same button that could possibly be used to scroll the telephone, and the location of Digital camera Management, which is a bit too far up if you maintain your telephone horizontally, however far more snug if you maintain the telephone vertically, would match excellent. The iPhone 17 ought to develop the position of Digital camera Management to make it extra integral to how you utilize your telephone.

Associated

Halide has made me a smartphone photography convert

Your iPhone is already a superb digital camera, Halide is an app that makes you wish to use it as one.

5 A brand new thought apart from making the iPhone thinner

The iPhone does not must visibly change so long as it functionally improves

A rumor dominating the present crop of iPhone 17 leaks is the concept Apple is planning on retiring the iPhone Plus (the spot within the lineup beforehand held by the iPhone mini) and changing it with a new slimmer iPhone 17. This new telephone would characteristic a redesigned digital camera bump, and may even draw inspiration from the dramatically thinner M4 iPad Pro Apple launched in 2024. I perceive the need for an iPhone that appears dramatically totally different from those that got here earlier than, and I’ve typically been fascinated by how a lot Google adjustments the design of the Pixel between yearly releases. A thinner telephone is not actually sensible, although. It might depart much less room for a battery, and require all kinds of different adjustments to make the telephone work.

Apple could be higher served making an iPhone 17 Plus that works higher than a wholly new iPhone 17 “Slim” or “Air” that appears totally different. Modifications needs to be pushed by some tangible profit first relatively than anything. iPhones aren’t actually that heavy or thick anyway, until you are utilizing an iPhone Professional Max. This recreation of creating issues thinner so to make them thicker, with an extended battery life does not should be performed anymore. It is not novel, and it does not result in a greater telephone.

Associated

How Danny Boyle’s 28 Years Later is being shot on the iPhone 15 Pro Max

The long-awaited sequel to the zombie flick is not some guerilla ‘Shot on iPhone’ marketing campaign.

The iPhone 17 needs to be higher, not totally different

If there’s one rule Apple follows, it is that it avoids leaping into something with two toes first. Modifications come slowly if they arrive in any respect, and are available lengthy after folks have requested for them. I am not anticipating the iPhone 17 to be a reinvention of the smartphone. I simply hope that if it will really feel incremental, the adjustments do make the telephone higher. It’s totally straightforward for Apple to relaxation on its laurels, however making the display smoother or battery life longer, whereas not as thrilling as a redesign, would make everybody comfortable.

Apple iPhone 16

This 12 months’s iPhone 16 line blurs the road between the “Professional” and the base-level iPhone by providing a brand new digital camera button and the Motion Button, alongside the A18 chip.