Na China, marcas como Huawei, Xiaomi, Honor e Vivo já disputam um mercado onde os dobráveis estão longe de ser uma novidade. Para o iPhone Duo, o desafio será diferenciar-se das rivais e transformar a dimensão do ecossistema da Apple numa vantagem, sobretudo através das aplicações, apontam os analistas da Omdia.
In case you were unaware, Apple unveiled the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max last week, alongside its first-ever foldable, the iPhone Duo.
Naturally, the iPhone 18 Pro preorders quickly followed suit, with rebates of up to AU$1,595 when you trade in an old phone, and accompanying SIM plans from AU$39/m.
While it’s always nice to have the latest tech, a fresh product launch also means an older device is ripe for discounts, and that’s certainly the case for the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max.
Apple may have discontinued both models from its online store, but retailers and telcos, including Amazon, Optus and Vodafone, still have stock — including the popular Cosmic Orange colour — meaning you still have time to score one at a discount. Whether you just want to save money, aren’t fussed with having the latest iPhone, or you simply prefer the colour options of the iPhone 17 Pro series, now’s a great time to take advantage of any offers.
Buying outright
If you want to buy outright, then Amazon and Optus are great options, although if you’d prefer to shop at the former, you’ll want to hurry as the retailer doesn’t have stock of all sizes and all colours.
If you’d prefer the smaller iPhone 17 Pro, Amazon no longer has stock of the base 256GB variant. Instead, the most affordable option is 512GB for AU$2,197 in Deep Blue, or AU$2,229 in Cosmic Orange.
Optus arguably has some tempting offers of its own. Not only can you split the cost of either the iPhone 17 Pro or iPhone 17 Pro Max into monthly interest-free instalments over up to 36 months, but all colours and storage sizes are in stock.
And, for a limited time, you can pair either iPhone with Optus’ Small plan, which has currently been reduced to just AU$39/m while the included data has increased from 60GB to 100GB. These benefits only apply to the first 12 months, after which the plan reverts to its regular AU$60/m for 60GB data — at this point, I’d recommend you check out the best SIM-only mobile plans for a more affordable option.
If you’re able to, it’s cheapest to pay the device off over 12 months, as you can see in the table below.
Repayment
Device/month
Months 1-12
After month 12
Total during device term
12 months
AU$166.56
AU$205.56/m
Device paid off
AU$2,466.72
24 months
AU$83.28
AU$122.28/m
AU$142.28/m x 12
AU$3,186.72
36 months
AU$55.52
AU$94.52/m
AU$115.20/m x 24
AU$3,906.72
However, if you intend to remain on that Optus plan for three years anyway, all three options cost exactly the same over 36 months: AU$3,906.72. With the 12-month option, you'd simply pay $205.56/month for year one, then $60/month for years two and three.
Vodafone also has some attractive offers, with monthly device payments for the iPhone 17 Pro starting at AU$47.18/m. Once again, you’ll spend the least amount of money if you pay off over 12 months.
Repayment
Device/month
Months 1-12
After month 12
Total during device term
12 months
AU$141.58
AU$186.58
Device paid off
AU$2,238.72
24 months
AU$70.79
AU$115.79/m
AU$128.79/m x 12
AU$2,934.72
36 months
AU$47.18
AU$92.18
AU$105.18/m x 24
AU$3,630.72
This is just a snapshot of the iPhone 17 Pro offers available right now, but if you want to take advantage, you’ll need to be quick, because once stock has gone, it’s gone.
The iPhone Duo status icon introduces a new approach to information that has occupied the top edge of the iPhone display for nearly two decades. Instead of treating Wi-Fi, cellular signal, battery status, and other indicators as a conventional horizontal row, Apple has created a flexible circular system that sits in the corner of the foldable iPhone’s display.
Apple officially describes the feature as a “circular, flexible system” within the status bar rather than one fixed icon containing every piece of information at all times. The distinction is useful: the area can adapt according to context while consolidating status information into a smaller visual region.
It is part of a much larger rethink of iOS 27 specifically for iPhone Duo. The foldable device changes the proportions available to software, particularly when its 7.6-inch inner display is open, forcing Apple to reconsider interface elements that have traditionally stretched horizontally across an iPhone screen.
The status system is one of the smallest changes visually, but it illustrates how extensively Apple has adapted iOS around the new hardware.
Image Credit: Apple Inc.
iPhone Duo status icon replaces the traditional horizontal approach
Conventional iPhones distribute system information across the upper portion of the display. Cellular strength, network type, Wi-Fi connectivity, and battery status typically occupy space around the camera hardware and Dynamic Island.
iPhone Duo approaches that area differently.
Apple says its circular status system nestles into the corner of the screen and presents relevant information including Wi-Fi, cellular strength, battery status, and more. Rather than requiring a long horizontal strip, those indicators can occupy a compact area that works with the device’s unusual screen geometry.
The change is closely connected to the way iPhone Duo handles controls throughout iOS 27.
Apple has moved several interface elements to the side of the display. App navigation, toolbars, the Home Screen Dock, and some Lock Screen controls can use vertical space instead of occupying the familiar horizontal regions found on other iPhones.
The status system therefore becomes part of a vertical interface column rather than an isolated redesign.
This arrangement lets content use more of the display’s height while keeping frequently referenced system information visible. It also creates a consistent location for status details as users change how they hold or fold the device.
A flexible status system suits a foldable iPhone
A foldable phone presents an interface problem that a traditional slab-shaped iPhone does not have.
iPhone Duo can operate through its 5.4-inch outer display or its substantially larger 7.6-inch inner screen. The device can be opened completely, partially folded, rotated, or positioned like a small book.
A static status bar designed around one screen size and orientation would be less effective across those configurations.
Apple instead built iOS 27 so that interface elements can move as the physical device changes. Content reacts to folding, controls relocate, and layouts adjust around the hinge and available screen area.
Apple’s developer guidance provides additional detail about this philosophy. On iPhone Duo, navigation and toolbar controls share vertical space with system elements such as the status bar and Live Activities. When available room becomes limited, application controls can collapse into an overflow menu.
That makes the circular status area part of an adaptive system rather than a cosmetic flourish.
Developers do not need to manually reproduce the status treatment inside their apps. Apple’s standard interface frameworks handle much of the adaptation, especially when applications use native navigation, toolbar, and tab-bar components.
Image Credit: Apple Inc.
Dynamic Island also moves to the side
The status area is not the only familiar piece of iPhone interface that changes position on iPhone Duo.
Apple has redesigned Dynamic Island so that it can sit vertically along the side of both the outer and inner displays. It can expand from that position to present alerts and Live Activities.
The relationship between Dynamic Island and the new circular status system is particularly interesting because Apple now has two dynamic interface areas operating along the same side of the screen.
One communicates persistent device information such as network and battery status. The other handles temporary activity, alerts, and live information.
Apple’s developer documentation refers to this section as shared vertical space. Application controls may also occupy it, meaning iOS has to continuously decide how much room is available and which elements deserve priority.
That is a major departure from the long-standing assumption that the upper corners of an iPhone screen simply contain a predictable row of small status symbols.
On Duo, those regions have become active parts of the interface layout.
Wi-Fi, cellular, and battery remain immediately recognizable
Consolidating status information creates a design challenge: efficiency cannot come at the expense of readability.
Users have spent years learning the meanings of Apple’s individual status symbols. Cellular bars indicate signal strength, the Wi-Fi symbol communicates wireless connectivity, and the battery icon provides an immediate indication of remaining power.
Apple has not discarded those familiar concepts.
Instead, the circular system changes how and where information is presented. The familiar status categories remain present while the container around them becomes more adaptable.
This is particularly useful on a device with two displays. Users should not need to relearn the meaning of basic connectivity information when moving from the outer screen to the inner display.
The same reasoning applies when iPhone Duo changes orientation. Apple can reorganize the status area without changing the fundamental visual vocabulary behind Wi-Fi, cellular, or battery information.
Image Credit: Apple Inc.
iPhone Duo pushes the status bar beyond a fixed strip
The new design suggests a different direction for one of the oldest pieces of smartphone interface.
Status bars traditionally behave like reserved strips of screen space. Applications work around them, and their icons occupy predictable positions regardless of what is happening elsewhere.
iPhone Duo turns that space into something more fluid.
The circular system can coexist with a vertical Dynamic Island, changing application controls, Live Activities, and layouts that respond to the physical position of the foldable display. It becomes another component that iOS can arrange rather than a fixed row placed permanently along an edge.
There is no indication that Apple plans to bring the same circular status treatment unchanged to conventional iPhones. Its current implementation is specifically tied to iPhone Duo and the interface requirements created by the foldable hardware.
Still, the design provides a glimpse at how Apple can rethink even deeply established iPhone conventions when the shape of the device changes. When iPhone Duo reaches customers on October 23, the small circular area in the corner will be one of the most immediately visible examples: cellular strength, Wi-Fi, battery information, and other system details occupying a shared adaptive space instead of stretching across the display.
iPhone 18 Pro is at the center of What Holds Us, a new photography exhibition built around three very different approaches to image-making. Alex Prager, Jack Davison, and Jimmy Chin shot the entire project on Apple’s latest Pro iPhone, using the device in environments ranging from a Los Angeles soundstage to a London warehouse and the high-altitude terrain of British Columbia.
Curated by Kathy Ryan, the former longtime director of photography for The New York Times Magazine, the exhibition examines connection through touch, shared experience, physical environments, and human relationships.
It also gives Apple a more ambitious showcase for the iPhone 18 Pro camera than a conventional product demonstration. Rather than presenting standardized comparisons or individual sample images. What Holds Us asks three established photographers to work within their own visual languages while using the phone as their sole camera.
The exhibition opens in New York City on September 18 and runs through September 20 before traveling to London and Shanghai in the coming months.
Image Credit: Apple Inc.
iPhone 18 Pro takes three very different photographic approaches
The project works partly because the three photographers have little stylistically in common.
Jimmy Chin took iPhone 18 Pro into the Bugaboo Mountains of southeastern British Columbia, working around snow, ice, steep climbing terrain, and winds reaching as high as 70 miles per hour.
His series focuses on trust and connection within climbing, with veteran mountaineer Conrad Anker appearing throughout the photographs. Some images place Anker as a small figure against vast mountain landscapes, while others move much closer to rock, snow, and glacial textures.
Chin used both the 48MP Fusion Ultra Wide and Telephoto cameras to shift between those extremes. The practical appeal was also straightforward: carrying a phone instead of a full conventional camera setup reduced the equipment required in an environment where weight and mobility affect every decision.
Jack Davison took almost the opposite approach. Shooting inside a former sugar warehouse in London, he created intimate portraits built around people interacting with clay and chalk.
Davison is known for high-contrast black-and-white imagery, and his contribution emphasizes texture, shadows, highlights, skin, and physical contact with the material. Some subjects appear partly covered in clay, while others manipulate it directly, leaving fingerprints and marks across the compositions.
For Davison, the smaller camera changed the relationship between photographer and subject. Without a large camera constantly positioned in front of his face, he could maintain more eye contact and work at closer range.
His use of slower shutter speeds, RAW capture, and multiple lenses also illustrates how Apple increasingly wants the Pro iPhone camera to function as a configurable photographic tool rather than simply a computational point-and-shoot system.
Alex Prager pushes the phone into large-scale production
Alex Prager’s section places iPhone 18 Pro inside a much more elaborate production environment.
Working on a Los Angeles soundstage, Prager created color-heavy scenes filled with crowds, confetti, staged city elements, costumes, and loosely choreographed movement. Some images use high viewpoints to turn groups of people into a continuous visual pattern, while tighter photographs isolate individual figures within the same constructed world.
The visual approach resembles film production more than spontaneous mobile photography, which gives the project another test for the phone. The camera has to preserve detail across numerous faces, costumes, props, highlights, and areas of movement while operating within scenes deliberately designed for large-format presentation.
Prager also treated the camera’s immediacy as part of the creative process rather than simply a convenience. The ease of moving between perspectives and capturing repeated moments allowed the scenes to evolve through improvisation instead of being locked into a single carefully prepared frame.
That approach aligns with a recurring theme across the exhibition: the phone becomes less intrusive without requiring the photographers to abandon their existing visual standards.
For Apple, it is a useful distinction. Professional photography campaigns built around smartphones can easily become exercises in technical proof, where the central question is whether a phone can imitate equipment already available to photographers. What Holds Us is more interested in how a smaller camera changes the way an artist works.
Image Credit: Apple Inc.
Variable aperture gives the project a new technical foundation
The exhibition arrives alongside one of Apple’s most significant physical camera changes in years.
iPhone 18 Pro introduces variable aperture on its 48MP Fusion Main camera. The lens can operate at ƒ/1.48, ƒ/1.8, ƒ/2.8, or ƒ/4.0, changing both light intake and depth of field.
A wider ƒ/1.48 aperture is designed for stronger low-light performance, while narrower settings can retain more detail across different planes of an image. Apple also lets photographers select aperture settings manually through new Pro controls in the Camera app.
Those controls extend to shutter speed and white balance, with a histogram available for monitoring exposure. ProRAW remains available for photographers who want greater flexibility during post-production.
The rear camera system also includes 48MP Fusion Ultra Wide and 48MP Fusion Telephoto cameras, providing focal lengths from 13mm at the wide end through an optical-quality 8x option.
What Holds Us does not reduce the exhibition to those specifications, but the technical changes help explain why Apple chose photography, rather than video, for this particular campaign. Variable aperture affects choices that photographers traditionally make during capture, especially around available light and how much of a scene remains in focus.
What Holds Us extends the Shot on iPhone idea
Apple has spent years using Shot on iPhone campaigns to demonstrate camera quality through finished work rather than charts and controlled tests. What Holds Us pushes that format closer to a conventional curated exhibition.
Ryan connects the three bodies of work through the idea of human presence, but each artist interprets it differently. Chin finds it through dependence between climbers in hostile landscapes. Davison uses physical contact between people and clay. Prager builds populated fictional environments in which individual expressions emerge from larger crowds.
The images therefore function as an exhibition first and a hardware showcase second, even though the production is closely tied to the launch of iPhone 18 Pro.
That balance may be the most effective part of the campaign. Apple does not need to demonstrate that a modern iPhone can produce a technically competent photograph. The more interesting challenge is showing where its smaller size, computational processing, lens flexibility, RAW workflow, and new manual controls can alter the photographer’s decisions.
New York visitors will get the first opportunity to see how those images hold up away from a phone or computer display when What Holds Us opens September 18. After its three-day New York run, Apple says the exhibition will continue to London and Shanghai, giving the iPhone 18 Pro photography project a physical life beyond the launch campaign.
Here’s the 17 family data as a percentage of overall usage for Widgetsmith.
Generally they followed the usual adoption pattern, and overall did very well ending at around 20% of total usage.
With the exception of the Air really struggling to find market share. For comparison the 16 Plus ended its first year at around 1.4% (vs the Air’s 0.3%).
This works out to about 6% of my iPhone users using the iPhone Air, or about 20x more proportionally than David's more mainstream app. Honestly, the numbers are pretty striking here, with David showing a pretty even split between the iPhone 17, 17 Pro, and 17 Pro Max, slightly decreasing in that order. Meanwhile, almost half of my users are on the Pro Max, another quarter are on the Pro, and the 17 is neck and neck with the Air. Clearly, my customers lean more enthusiast and are higher end buyers on average.
The apparent unpopularity of the iPhone Air is not what caught my eye. Instead, it is the percentage of iPhone 17e users: 0.5% of Widgetsmith users, and something like 1–2% of the total iPhone 17 generation in Birchler’s.
The iPhone 17e hasn’t been on sale for as long, though.
In the entire year since the iPhone Air was announced, I’ve never seen Apple advertise it. No billboards, no commercials. It raises a chicken/egg question: did no one buy it because Apple didn’t market it, or did Apple not market it because no one wanted it?
[…]
But the shame of these low iPhone Air sales reminds me, very much, of the late great iPhone 12 and 13 Mini — also a truly great design, also terribly disappointing sales numbers.
Quelque 67 % des Français qui utilisent les réseaux sociaux passent plus de 5 heures par jour devant les écrans, selon le Baromètre du numérique 2025. Derrière ce chiffre, il y a des corps qui souffrent en silence : douleurs, yeux secs, nuits hachées… Votre organisme lance des signaux d'alarme...
John Ternus has barely been CEO of Apple for a fortnight, and he's already caused quite the stir. Some of this is to be expected; Apple's September event is barely in the rearview, and the dust has far from settled following the announcement of the long-awaited iPhone Duo.
Still, it's one small interjection he made in a video interview with TechRadar and Tom's Guide (see below) that tells me a lot about his relationship with the company he now governs.
In addition to discussing the new devices launched this week, we had the opportunity to ask Ternus about his views on AI, wearable tech and becoming CEO of one of the world's largest and most eminent tech companies; plus, crucially, his view on innovation.
When our Editor-at-Large, Lance Ulanoff, asked about his plans to reinvigorate the brand's image when it comes to innovation, Ternus replied: "I don't think we ever lost innovation."
Is it ever enough?
The unavoidable truth is that the "iPhone moment" is, perhaps, once in a generation; and there's a lot more competition in the playing field now than there was back in 2007. That being said, it's hard to argue that there's been no innovation under Tim Cook's tenure.
From Apple silicon chips (2021) and Touch ID (2013) to Face ID (2017) and the world's first over-the-counter direct-to-consumer ECG in the Apple Watch Series 4 (2018), there's been plenty to shout about — even though recent years have maybe been a little quieter, barring the Vision Pro... but that's not much to write home about yet.
Of course, Ternus' quick retort garnered some reactions nonetheless, with commenters across our TikTok and YouTube accounts arguing that true product-level innovation had been lost at Apple for many a year. So, what do you think?
Cook had a difficult job, without a shadow of a doubt: huge boots to fill in the wake of Steve Jobs' passing, a grieving user base and fanbase, plus lofty expectations to steer the Apple ship through everything from a global pandemic to hardware supply chain chaos; and that's just in recent years.
Apple's still kicking, with a strong set of products, devoted audience and a seemingly optimistic future under Ternus' leadership. Only time will tell what's in store for this new era after the iPhone Duo.
Got your iPhone 18 Pro Max on preorder but can't quite decide on the perfect plan to pair it with? I think I've found a contender for the best overall option right now.
Even without the discount, Mint's unlimited plan is competitive and much cheaper than many competitors, so the deal is just the cherry on top. While you'll have to pay $180 upfront, you'll lock in an unlimited data plan for an almost unbelievably cheap $15 per month.
Overall, the Mint unlimited plan includes unlimited talk, text, and mobile hotspot. There are a few restrictions, such as 50GB of 5G data and 20GB of mobile hotspot, but these are still pretty generous for the price - especially at $15/mo.
Mint Mobile's latest deal for new customers
Mint Mobile unlimited data plan: was $360, now $180 Mint Mobile's latest plan deal is the perfect pairing for the latest iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max. Right now, you can get any of the carrier's plans for just $15/mo, including the high-end annual unlimited plan. Paying just $180 upfront, you're locking in a huge amount of value here for not a lot of cash. If you've been curious about trying Mint Mobile, then now's a great time to jump on board. View Deal
Note, if you're looking for a great all-in-one deal at Mint, then the carrier also has some great discounts on the latest Google Pixel 11 and Samsung Galaxy S26. If you're interested, I've attached further details just down below.
Also available at Mint Mobile
Google Pixel 11 series: $450 off, plus a half-price unlimited plan at Mint Mobile Mint Mobile's latest deal on the Pixel 11 series is the perfect pairing with Google's new flagships. Right now, you don't even need to trade-in to get an excellent $450 discount on these new devices. On top of that, you can also get a full year of unlimited data for just $180 - that's half the usual price. Put together, this is a great deal, although it's exclusive to new Mint customers. View Deal
Samsung Galaxy S26 series: $500 off, plus up to $400 off with a trade-in at Mint Mobile Mint Mobile's latest deal on the Galaxy S26 series is one of the best I've ever seen from the well-known prepaid carrier. Not only can you get a record-breaking $500 upfront discount on a brand new device, but you'll also get a full year of unlimited data for just $180 - half price. On top of that, you can also trade-in for an additional discount of up to $400 off, which is enough to cover the entire cost of the standard Galaxy S26.
Apple’s Siri voice assistant was famously bad for a long time, but the company turned a corner with the launch of Siri AI, an upgraded assistant powered by the latest generation of Apple Intelligence with better accuracy and more features. Siri AI was announced at WWDC in June 2026 and arrived with iOS 27 on September 14. But it isn’t immediately available to everyone: access depends on your iPhone model, software version, language, Apple Account region, and a temporary waiting list.
So how do you actually get it? Siri AI doesn’t simply appear on your iPhone; you’ll need to clear a few hurdles before you can turn it on. In this brief tutorial, we explain what might be holding things up and show you how to get Siri AI on your iPhone.
Install iOS 27
First, update your iPhone to iOS 27 if you haven’t already. Open the Settings app and go to General > Software Update, then wait while your iPhone checks for available updates. If you see multiple options, select the latest iOS 27 version and follow the onscreen instructions to download and install it.
Your iPhone will restart when the update is complete.
Make sure you have enough storage
Siri AI and the latest Apple Intelligence features require lots of space. Depending on your iPhone, Apple says you may need up to 14GB of available storage.
To check, go to Settings > General > iPhone Storage. If you’re running short, you’ll need to free up some space before Siri AI can finish downloading. See: How to save space on an iPhone.
Check if Siri is available in your Apple Account region
Has Apple made Siri AI available in your country yet?
If your Apple Account is registered in the European Union, you’re mostly out of luck. Apple has delayed the launch of Siri AI for iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch in the EU, claiming that it needs more time to comply with the Digital Markets Act. The EU disputes Apple’s interpretation of the law. There is some hope that the situation may change. In the meantime, EU users can access Siri AI on a compatible Mac or Apple Vision Pro.
Users in mainland China also miss out on Siri AI while, in Tim Cook’s words, “Apple works through regulatory requirements.”
Set the device and Siri languages correctly
Siri AI currently supports English only. Wherever you are, you’ll need to have your device language and Siri language both set to English.
Once Siri AI has been activated, it will continue working even if you travel to a region where it isn’t available. Eligibility depends on your Apple Account region and device, rather than simply your location.
Check your iPhone model: Is your iPhone (or other Apple device) compatible with Siri AI?
The next step is to make sure your iPhone is compatible with Siri AI, which makes substantial demands on the processor and therefore won’t run on older and slower hardware.
Siri AI supports the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max, every iPhone 16 model and later, and iPhone Air.
Here’s a list of currently available iPhones that can run Siri AI. Any phones that Apple launches in the future will also be compatible.
iPhone Duo
iPhone 18 Pro Max
iPhone 18 Pro
iPhone 17 Pro Max
iPhone 17 Pro
iPhone Air
iPhone 17
iPhone 17e
iPhone 16 Pro Max
iPhone 16 Pro
iPhone 16 Plus
iPhone 16
iPhone 16e
iPhone 15 Pro Max
iPhone 15 Pro
If you’re unsure which iPhone model you’ve got, open the Settings app and go to General > About then look for Model Name in the top box.
Is your iPhone on the list? Great! There are just a couple more steps to take. (Plus potentially a bit of a wait.)
Siri AI is also available on the following Apple devices:
iPad mini (A17 Pro) or any iPad model with M1 or later running iPadOS 27
MacBook Neo (A18 Pro) or any Mac with M1 or later running macOS 27 Golden Gate
Apple Watch Series 9 or later, Apple Watch Ultra 2 or later, or Apple Watch SE 3, running watchOS 27 and paired with Apple Intelligence-enabled iPhone
Open the Settings app and tap Siri. If Siri is currently turned off, enable it before continuing. At the top of the screen, tap Try Siri AI (Beta), then follow the onscreen instructions to choose a voice, complete voice enrollment, and review the privacy settings.
Once setup is complete, you’ll be added to Apple’s waiting list and the status will change to Joined Waiting List.
Now you wait. Some iPhone owners have gained access within minutes, while others have waited for hours or days. Wait times vary, but Siri AI will download automatically when access is granted. You’ll receive a notification when it’s ready to use.
Then you can start exploring the first truly capable version of Siri in years and all sorts of cool new features. Have fun.
Ausente no lançamento na Europa por incompatibilidade regulatória, a nova Siri AI continua a confundir os utilizadores que fizeram o upgrade para o iOS 27, fora do território europeu.
We've put the batteries in Apple's newest iPhones to the test
There are upgrades here, but not huge ones
Apple has been touting major boosts in battery life on these handsets
Sift through the press releases that Apple pushed out while announcing the new iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, and you'll see some big battery life increases touted — including "the largest increase in battery life ever" on an iPhone with the Pro Max model (compared to the iPhone 17 Pro Max).
We know that the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max come with 4,056 mAh and 5,391 mAh capacity batteries respectively (at least in Europe), but does that translate into much better battery life? We put both of these new handsets through their paces in the TechRadar labs (as part of our full iPhone 18 Pro review) to see if Apple's claims held up under some real-world testing.
Our standard test involves having the iPhone automatically cycle through a series of websites over a cellular connection, until the battery dies. Features like location services, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth are all turned off while the test is being run, and the battery management features in iOS are disabled too.
The iPhone 18 Pro managed 16 hours and 17 minutes in the test, compared to 15 hours and 21 minutes on the iPhone 17 Pro, a boost of around 6% overall. The iPhone 18 Pro Max managed 18 hours and 27 minutes compared to 17 hours and 54 minutes on the iPhone 17 Pro Max, an increase of roughly 3% in total.
Those increases are of course welcome, but perhaps aren't quite as impressive as Apple is making out, though there are a lot of different variables (like screen brightness) involved. Apple's own figures usually make use of video playback time — as in how long a single battery charge lasts when you've watching a video.
For the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max, Apple quotes 33 hours and 39 hours respectively, while for the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max those numbers go up to 36 hours (a 9% increase) and 45 hours (a 15% increase). That last jump is indeed significant, but may only apply in quite a narrow set of scenarios.
"All battery claims depend on network configuration and many other factors," explains Apple in the small print on its comparison page. "Actual results will vary. Batteries have limited recharge cycles and may eventually need to be replaced. Battery life and charge cycles vary by use and settings."
We can safely say that you should see better battery life on the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max compared to the models that preceded them, but based on our own testing, don't expect the kind of improvements Apple is promising unless you're doing nothing but watching videos in long stretches between recharges.
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max: Two-Minute Review
If the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max were a reinvention of the flagship iPhone, the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max see Apple carrying the flagship-iPhone baton forward with few, if any, missteps.
I’ve spent the last week with a Glacier iPhone 18 Pro Max and a Burgundy iPhone 18 Pro — both colors are striking new additions to Apple’s iPhone color palette — and Apple has mostly stuck to last year's winning formula, while updating key aspects of the experience to push things forward.
While the main camera array still carries the same 48-megapixel count across the telephoto, ultra-wide, and main lenses, the arrival of Pro controls in the Camera app breathes new life into the photo-taking experience, letting you get seriously creative whenever you want to.
You can also take advantage of the new variable aperture on the main 48-megapixel Fusion camera to shoot across ƒ/1.48, ƒ/1.8, ƒ/2.8, or ƒ/4.0, and capture unique visuals, including starburst effects from lights. Of course, you can also choose to let the Camera app take control, and in general it’ll capture a well-balanced shot that you can still edit after the fact.
All in all, after taking hundreds of photos and shooting dozens of videos, I’m impressed with the level of detail the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max can deliver. Some images match what you’ll get from the previous-generation Pros, but these iPhones can also deliver even better-looking images and video, especially when you take control.
Under the hood is Apple’s first 2-nanometer chip in an iPhone, the A20 Pro, and while it doesn’t run laps around the previous A19 Pro, or the chip before that one, its CPU, GPU, and Neural Engine do an excellent job of handling general iOS tasks, as well as more advanced AI features, including keeping Siri AI chugging along where it's available and powering Apple Intelligence features in Photos, such as Clean Up and Reframing. It also ensures that third-party experiences run well, and I’ll be shocked if you encounter noticeable slowdowns anywhere.
The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max can easily keep pace with any of the other best modern smartphones, and I suspect they’ll keep doing so for years. You can again choose between a punchy, vibrant, and crisp 6.3-inch or 6.9-inch Super Retina XDR display, and that’s the main difference between the two Pro iPhones, as Apple maintains feature parity across the lineup.
Another meaningful improvement is in battery life, with the iPhone 18 Pro lasting longer than the 17 Pro Max according to Apple, while it says the 18 Pro Max establishes a new iPhone battery-life record. Add in the improved thermal management, smaller Dynamic Island, and arrival of Siri AI, and there’s a lot of refinement here beyond the cameras and processor.
And that’s ultimately what the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max feel like to me: a refinement of an already excellent Pro iPhone, rather than a reinvention. If the iPhone 17 Pro generation was about Apple changing the formula, the iPhone 18 Pro is about taking that formula and making it better across the board, without messing with what worked.
It’s not night and day across the board, and if you’re coming from an iPhone 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max, you probably don’t need to upgrade. The A20 Pro feels largely neck and neck with the A19 Pro in daily use, the displays remain familiar, and the overall design is essentially unchanged. But I would bet that some iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max owners will want to make the jump anyway, particularly for the camera improvements. The combination of the variable aperture and, finally, a genuinely customizable Camera app with Pro controls enables a level of user input that I’ve wanted Apple to bake into the iPhone for years.
If you’re holding onto an iPhone 15 Pro, 15 Pro Max, or anything older, the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max represent a much more substantial generational leap. You’re getting bigger and better displays, way-improved cameras, better battery life, a faster and more future-ready chip, improved thermals, and a modern, durable design that Apple has now had a year to refine.
And that’s the thing about the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max: you don’t need any one of these upgrades to completely reinvent how you use an iPhone. Taken together, though, they make for a seriously capable flagship that feels ready for the next several years.
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max review: Price and Availability
Starts at $1,199 / £1,199 / AU$2,099 for 256GB
Both Pro models now offer 512GB, 1TB, and 2TB options
On sale September 18, with preorders open now
Apple made the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max official at its September 9, 2026, ‘Surprise and Shine’ special event; preorders are open now, with an on-sale date of September 18.
The iPhone 18 Pro starts at $1,199 in the US, £1,199 in the UK, and AU$2,099 in Australia, and the iPhone 18 Pro Max at $1,299 / £1,299 / AU$2,299, respectively. That means they come with a $100 / £100 / AU$100 increase in starting price over the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max, while, like last year’s Pros, starting at 256GB of storage. Both can be configured with 512GB, 1TB, and 2TB of storage, with the latter now an option on both Pro models. You can choose from Burgundy, Glacier, Silver, and Black.
Both phones officially go on sale on September 18, 2026.
Value score: 4 / 5
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max review: Design
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
The 18 Pro keeps the 17 Pro’s aluminum body and camera plateau
Burgundy and Glacier colors bring some welcome personality to the Pro lineup
A new vapor chamber and Nanotwin copper help keep things cooler under load
With the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max, Apple chose to dramatically reinvent the Pro-series iPhone's design. It swapped the left-side bump that housed the main camera system for a plateau that stretches across the back, went back to aluminum, and focused heavily on durability.
Given that, the odds of a major redesign for the next-gen Pro phones were slim, and the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max stick with a design that not only scored well in our reviews, but also won over a wider audience. I've been switching between the iPhone 17 Pro Max in Cosmic Orange and the iPhone Air for the last year.
The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max stick with the aluminum body and camera plateau from last year's models. That might seem like a safe choice, considering that the iPhone Duo is launching alongside these candy-bar-style phones in October, but it also shows Apple pushing forward with a working design — essentially the same trajectory it took from the iPhone 16 to the iPhone 17.
Still, to help the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max stand out from the crowd — and just to let people know you’re rocking one of Apple’s new phones, rather than a 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max — there are two entirely new colors, and I can't decide which is my favorite, and luckily I've been testing both. Burgundy is sort of a dark-red wine color that evokes a sense of high-class sleekness, while Glacier, which the event invite teased, is a mix of blue and silver that looks decidedly fresh. These are the two colors that pop, both much more muted than Cosmic Orange, but also a bit more vibrant than the Dark Navy from 2025. Those two join silver and the first ‘true’ black Pro model. It shows that Apple is listening, and I'm all for more Pro colors.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
The dimensions are the same year over year. The iPhone 18 Pro measures 150 x 71.9 x 8.75mm, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max comes in at 163.4 x 78 x 8.75mm — exactly the same footprint as their predecessors. The button placement is also identical, so if you've spent the last year with an iPhone 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max, there's nothing new to learn here: power and Camera Control are on the right, with the Action Button, and volume up and volume down on the left. Both phones are a little heavier than last year’s: the 18 Pro weighs 211 grams, up from 206 grams, while the 18 Pro Max jumps to 249 grams from 233 grams.
Even with the slight weight increase, both the 6.3-inch Pro and 6.9-inch Pro Max feel comfortable in the hand and are pretty well balanced. The Pro Max is still very much a two-handed phone for me, especially for texting, while the Pro is still the smaller, more portable option.
Then there's Ceramic Shield 2, which is sticking around. Judging by the coatings on my iPhone Air and 17 Pro Max, it's done wonders at preventing micro-abrasions and front-screen scratches, and even means that drops don’t elicit a gasp, since after a year my screens are still unblemished. In my few days testing the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, I haven't seen a scratch on the front or abrasions on the back, which is both aluminum and glass.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
The iPhone 17 Pro Max was known for getting warm, or at least warmer to the touch, during more intense activities such as gaming or long content shoots, and Apple has looked to address that issue with some new cooling tech under the hood. There's a new thermal architecture inside, which consists of a vapor chamber, the positioning of which has been tweaked, and which offers three times the surface area to better dissipate heat. Apple has paired this with an industry-first Nanotwin copper material, which is baked into the display plate to help keep that surface cool.
For the most part, this has kept the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max cool during my testing. They can still get warm, but nowhere near as warm as the 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max, and the heat is more spread out when it does become noticeable. I noticed it mostly heating up during longer capture sessions, especially when swapping between photo and video, but even then the heat felt more spread out and better regulated, and dissipated more quickly.
It's a subtle change, but one that matters when you're using the phone heavily. And that's really the story of the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max design: Apple hasn't reinvented the wheel this year. Instead, it's taken the design it introduced with the iPhone 17 Pro and refined the parts that matter — durability, thermals, finishes, and how the phone feels during sustained use.
Design score: 5 / 5
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max review: Display
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
Two sizes, same experience across both
A new anti-reflective coating joins 3,000 nits peak brightness and120Hz ProMotion
Smaller Dynamic Island with room for three Live Activities
Your main decision when choosing between the 18 Pro and the 18 Pro Max comes down to size, as there’s feature parity between the two, and that’s a good thing. The iPhone 18 Pro features a 6.3-inch display, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max has a 6.9-inch display. Both are punchy, vibrant, and a joy to look at and use for any task, be it FaceTiming with friends or loved ones, typing out comms, reading an email, browsing the web, scrolling your photos, watching video, or just navigating iOS elements.
Much of that comes from the fact that these are Super Retina XDR displays, which are OLED and always-on, meaning that even when the phone is locked, the screen dims down to still show you the time, widgets, and even notifications. Like the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max before them, the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max have a buttery-smooth 120Hz ProMotion refresh rate and top out at a maximum brightness of 3,000 nits. It’s unlikely the phone will always run at that brightness, but suffice to say that even on a bright, humid, sunny day — and I mean it was really beating down — in Orlando, Florida, enjoying the sights, sounds, and rides of Disney World, I had no issues viewing content on the screen.
There’s also a new anti-reflective coating on the display, and while this isn’t a full Nano-texture coating like you’ll find on some of Apple’s other displays and the folding iPhone Duo, it’s a noticeable step up when it comes to reducing reflections and smudges. It’s particularly useful outdoors, where fewer reflections mean less fighting with the screen to see what’s actually on it. Compared to older iPhones, like the iPhone 16 and earlier models, this feels like a much bigger display upgrade.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
There is one thing that really did catch my eye, though, and it’s the key change with the display: Apple has shrunk the Dynamic Island down on the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max. It’s about the size of an extra-strength Tylenol liquid gel, and much less of a distraction at the top, if you could even call it that. In addition to the reduced size, the other big change is to Live Activities — the Dynamic Island can now support three, rather than two. So maybe it’s directions, music playback, and a timer, or if you’re on a flight, maybe it’s United Airlines showing the seat number, Flighty counting down your arrival time, and music playing in Music or Spotify.
I’m not saying you need to rush out to upgrade just for this if you have a 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max — although that might be the case for the cameras or battery life — but if you’re a fan of using this space, it’s definitely a super-functional quality-of-life upgrade.
Display score: 5 / 5
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max review: Cameras
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
Pro controls finally arrive to let you adjust aperture, shutter speed, white balance, and more.
The 48MP Fusion main camera aperture is adjustable from ƒ/1.48 to ƒ/4.0
Better detail, strong low-light performance, and excellent 4x and 8x zoom
Alright, buckle in, because while the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max still boasts 48-megapixel main, 48-megapixel ultra-wide, and a 48-megapixel telephoto camera — similar to the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max setup — things are a bit different across the board, and especially in one specific area.
For starters, if you’ve been wanting Apple to bake more controls into the Camera app, your wish has been granted. There are now Pro controls that let you adjust the aperture, shutter speed, and white balance for the main camera, alongside a host of other tools, including improved Photographic Styles, with more granular controls, and the ability to bring up a histogram.
You can also customize which of these controls live at the top of your screen, in a similar fashion to designing your perfect home screen or Control Center. Changes to shutter speed and aperture are persistent if you have that enabled in Settings for preserving camera settings, but you can’t design exact presets with a specific aperture or shutter speed, although — hint, Apple — that would be a nice upgrade.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
Photographic Styles are also getting more flexible. You can still pick from the expected presets, but Apple now gives you more granular control over things like texture, including adjustments specifically aimed at skin. Push it in the right direction, and you can get smoother, more glowy-looking portraits, though there are times when that comes at the expense of some detail, particularly in lower-light areas of the frame.
That’s where I think Apple’s approach makes sense: the default Auto processing generally aims to strike a balance between detail, exposure, color, and skin tones, so you don’t have to think about any of this. But if you want to get more creative, the tools are there — and you can still make adjustments after the fact, rather than having to nail everything before you hit the shutter button.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
Here’s a look at the camera specs, right before the big change that has to do with the main lens:
48MP Fusion main with variable aperture of ƒ/1.48, ƒ/1.8, ƒ/2.8, or ƒ/4.0
48MP Fusion ultra-wide at ƒ/2.2
48MP Fusion telephoto at ƒ/2.8
With these, you can still shoot at 0.5x, 1x at 24mm, 28mm, or 35mm, 2x for a digital crop with optical-quality results, 4x (as a digital sensor crop), or an optical 8x, and stretch all the way up to 40x digital zoom.
The big change, though, is that the main lens — the one your iPhone is set to by default — has a variable aperture for the first time ever on an iPhone. With a fine eye, or another camera pointed at it, you can actually see the lens aperture adjusting, getting wider or narrower to let more or less light in. It also swaps the previous main aperture of ƒ/1.78 on 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max, as the 18 Pro’ now offering ƒ/1.48, ƒ/1.8, ƒ/2.8, and ƒ/4.0.
(Image credit: Jacob Krol/Future)
You can choose to ignore this new control, as well as the ability to adjust white balance or shutter speed, and let the iPhone and its image-processing pipeline automatically engage what it believes are the optimum settings to capture a great shot. And in my testing so far, it succeeds here, offering on-par quality with the iPhone 17 Pro or 17 Pro Max, but mostly punching above those phones with better details, more natural blurring and focus points, and excellent highlights.
The image-processing pipeline has also been updated. Performance still feels very much in line with what I’ve come to expect from an iPhone, but images are more detailed and sharper throughout, though at times they can pack a little more punch with colors thanks to some update on the image pipeline. Especially for 4x and 8x shots, I’ve found that these preserve more details generation over generation. It’s not a dramatic departure from the iPhone look, but there’s a clear refinement here in how the phone handles detail and brings a scene to life.
The 4x and 8x zoom continued to surprise me with how much detail they can deliver, namely with the former being a sensor crop and the latter being optical. Whether I’m picking out details around Disney World’s parks or zooming in on something far away, the results stay impressively detailed without looking like a processed digital crop.
The variable aperture gives the main camera more flexibility, especially when you want to control how much light comes in, or how much of a subject is separated from the background. The wider maximum aperture also helps make this excellent main camera even more versatile in lower-light scenarios, and because it’s the camera your iPhone defaults to, it’s likely the one you’ll navigate to first.
The Most Magical Place on Earth deserves the best camera on a phone on Earth, right? So I’ve done the bulk of my iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max camera testing around the Disney World parks in Orlando, and taken plenty of additional shots in New Jersey, California, and even up in the sky from the windows of planes. That means I’ve tested the cameras in just about every condition I could throw at them, from the beating Florida sun to nighttime attractions, indoor spaces, moving subjects, and everything in between.
Jacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/Future
I’ve been putting the low-light performance to the test around Disney World, too, including taking plenty of shots after the sun went down. Even in Auto mode, I found the iPhone 18 Pro could deliver detail-packed, appropriately lit shots in less time, with Night mode often requiring less time to capture a shot than on previous generations. This comes down to about one to three seconds, versus five to eight seconds for processing. And that means less waiting around for the camera to finish its exposure and, more importantly, less chance of a moving subject turning into a blurry mess. You can accomplish longer exposures if the iPhone detects it’s in a tripod as well.
When I wanted more control, though, I could jump in and adjust the shutter speed and aperture when shooting at 1x or 2x zoom, letting me decide how I wanted to capture the scene, rather than leaving it entirely up to the iPhone. If you’re willing to take the time to dive into the controls, you can really customize how the iPhone captures a scene, and get much more creative with your shots.
Jacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/FutureJacob Krol/Future
For instance, I shot the Magic of Disney Animation building at night at ƒ/1.48 and 1/30s, deliberately opening up the aperture and slowing the shutter to let in more light. The result is a detail-packed shot with rich colors and a dramatic nighttime look, as you can see above. It’s still an iPhone, so you can absolutely leave everything on Auto and get a great photo, but when you want to take more control, the tools are there to help you capture the shot you have in your mind’s eye.
The same Pro controls carry over to video, giving you more control over how you capture moving footage. There’s also a new auto-tracking feature, and I’ve found it particularly useful for fast-moving subjects.
I put it to the test at Disney World with Slinky Dog Dash, capturing the coaster as it came down the sloping track. The iPhone did a great job of keeping the front of the coaster in focus while the people blurred with the speed of the ride, and the lighting on the track moving alongside the vehicles stayed remarkably clear. The shot came out incredibly well, and it really shows what the iPhone can do with a fast-moving subject.
The 18-megapixel front-facing camera is essentially unchanged from last year, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as the Center Stage camera still uses that clever square sensor, letting you rotate between portrait and landscape framing without physically turning the iPhone. Better yet, it will still automatically adjust to fit more people in the shot.
The cameras are easily the most exciting part of the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, and as in years and generations past, it’s a big reason why folks go Pro. You get three capable shooters, and the ability to step back or step closer, depending on what you’re trying to capture. This year, Apple is giving you more control, and adding a genuinely neat upgrade to the main camera. The choice is ultimately yours: you can stick with Auto and still capture great shots, or make your mark with adjustments and shoot more intentionally.
Yes, third-party apps have offered many of these controls before, but having them baked right into the native Camera app can make a big impact, in my opinion. You don’t have to download another app or learn another interface to take advantage of them — they’re right there when you open the camera.
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max review: Software, Siri AI, and Apple Intelligence
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
Siri AI is here, in beta, and works across apps and personal context
It can use your current on-screen context to help answer questions
It's a major step forward, but it still makes mistakes and has rough edges
The iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max ran iOS 26 out of the box, and it's no surprise that iOS 27 is preloaded on the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max. It runs really well here, and the A20 Pro under the hood keeps things gliding along — more on that processor below.
Much of iOS 27 is about under-the-hood changes that speed things up, which is especially helpful for older phones, along with more ways to customize the Liquid Glass interface, including adjusting how much of that glass effect you want to see.
The real story, though, is that the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max come with the new, AI-powered Siri out of the box, in beta, in specific regions. It’s available now in the United States, though you’ll need to join a waitlist, and it arrives alongside some new Apple Intelligence features.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
For starters, Siri AI is much faster, and shows its work as it goes, which makes the experience feel more transparent. For instance, I’ve asked for details on my last flight and watched Siri AI dive into the right app — whether that’s Calendar, Flighty, United, or even Mail — to pull up the information I’m looking for. I’ve also used it to confirm my departure time, and ask how long it might take to get to the airport. It really does work, and it feels natural, and easy to get the hang of.
That doesn’t mean it’s perfect. Siri AI diving into some apps can cause mistakes, and at times it can pull up the wrong dataset or make the wrong assumption about what I’m asking for. But given how delayed this upgrade has been, and how limited the existing Siri has felt, overall it finally feels like Apple has delivered on the promise of a more capable assistant, while still putting privacy at the center as it works with your personal data and what’s on your device.
Siri AI can even be cued to see what’s on your screen, adding another layer of usefulness. Rather than having to explain everything you’re looking at, you can let Siri understand the context of what’s in front of you and go from there. It’s one of those features that sounds small on paper, but once you start using it, it feels like the direction Siri should have been heading in all along.
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
Apple Intelligence also brings a handful of other updates, including new ways to work with images, improvements to Photos and other apps, and more ways to put on-device intelligence to work. But Siri AI is easily the headline for me. After years of Siri feeling like an assistant that was increasingly behind the times, it finally feels like I’m actually talking to an AI assistant on an iPhone, rather than simply giving commands to a voice interface.
And while it’s still in beta, and there are clearly some kinks to work out, that’s an important distinction. Apple isn’t just talking about what Siri will be able to do anymore — on the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, I’m actually using it. It’s faster, more conversational, understands more context, and can work across the apps and information already on my phone.
For me, that makes iOS 27 feel less like a flashy annual software update, and more like the foundation for where Apple wants the iPhone to go next. The A20 Pro gives it the horsepower to keep everything moving, while Siri AI finally starts making good on the Apple Intelligence promise. And because it’s built into the iPhone, and designed around the information already on your device, it feels like a much more natural extension of how I already use my phone, rather than another AI chatbot I need to remember to open.
Software score: 5 / 5
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max review: Performance
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
A20 Pro is seriously fast
The biggest gains over the A19 Pro come in specific workloads and future headroom
Improved thermal management helps keep the phone cooler under heavy use
It might be no surprise, but the A20 Pro chip inside the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max is, as Apple claims, the fastest chip it’s put in an iPhone. And it’s actually more similar to an M-Series-powered SoC that Apple might opt for in a Mac than previous A-series chips.
With the A20 Pro, the SoC actually sits next to the DRAM, rather than having the memory stacked on top, as it has been in previous generations. It’s also built on a 2-nanometer process, just like the M6.
Inside the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, the A20 Pro is broken up into a 6-core CPU — two performance cores and four efficiency cores — a 7-core GPU, and a dual 16-core Neural Engine.
What does all of that mean for real-world use? Well, pretty much what you’d expect from a new Pro iPhone: everything is fast. Apps open quickly, jumping between them is fluid, games run smoothly, and even more demanding tasks don’t really give the A20 Pro much pause.
Take video exports, for example. I’ve been exporting 4K videos with graphics, text, and transitions in both Edits and CapCut, and the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max handle them quickly. It’s the kind of task where you can really feel the combination of the new chip and all that processing power, especially when you’re working with more complicated edits.
Gaming is another area where the A20 Pro flexes a bit. Real Flight Simulator runs smoothly, with environments rendering quickly as I’m flying around. The same goes for Wuthering Waves and Genshin Impact, both of which seemingly put a pretty serious load on the phones, which they seemingly handle without issue.
Multitasking has also been a non-issue. I’ve had plenty of apps open, jumped into FaceTime while playing a game, and bounced between multiple text conversations without the iPhone 18 Pro or 18 Pro Max missing a beat. That’s probably the less exciting side of performance, but it’s also where you notice the power of the A20 Pro day-to-day — you don’t really have to think about what’s running in the background.
Photo Clean Up is a bit faster than it was on the iPhone 17 Pro, for example, so removing an unwanted object or person from a shot takes less time. It’s not a massive difference, but when you use these tools frequently, those little speed improvements add up.
Additionally, the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max handle heat better, so sustained performance doesn’t come with the same uncomfortable warmth I experienced with the 17 Pro generation. The heat isn’t magically gone, but it’s distributed better, rather than sitting in one spot on the back, and dissipates faster.
It’s worth keeping some perspective here, though. The A20 Pro isn’t night-and-day faster than the A19 Pro in the iPhone 17 Pro or the chip in the iPhone Air, and you’ll likely only see more meaningful gains over something like the iPhone 16 Pro in specific scenarios. That’s not really the point.
The A20 Pro gives the iPhone more headroom for the future, especially as we run more and more AI-powered tasks on our phones, and, increasingly, other Apple devices. After spending this much time with it, the A20 Pro gives me no pause about getting several years of strong performance out of the iPhone 18 Pro or 18 Pro Max.
If you’re coming from an iPhone 15 or older, though, that’s where I think you’ll really notice the difference. You’re not just getting a faster chip; you’re getting a phone with considerably more processing headroom for demanding games, video editing, Apple Intelligence, and whatever Apple adds over the next few years.
Additionally, the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max will both feature the new Apple-made C2 modem globally. On my Burgundy iPhone 18 Pro connected to AT&T's network, I scored over 900MBps down in a jam-packed park, but the story is a little different with the 18 Pro Max in the US. The larger Pro iPhone in the States opts for a Qualcomm modem, but I didn't notice much of an issue with performance. I was connected to the Visible network and averaged about 350MBps to 500MBps down while in the parks and around New Jersey.
Performance score: 5 / 5
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max review: Battery
(Image credit: Future/Jacob Krol)
I averaged around 30 hours, with the Pro Max stretching further
50% charge in 15 minutes means you can get back in action quickly with wired charging
Alongside variable aperture on the main camera and the faster A20 Pro inside, Apple is making big promises about battery life with its latest Pro iPhones. In fact, the Cupertino giant notes that the iPhone 18 Pro will last longer than the iPhone 17 Pro Max, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max offers the longest battery life ever in an iPhone.
More specifically, it’s up to 36 hours of video playback on the iPhone 18 Pro, and up to 45 hours on the iPhone 18 Pro Max. These figures are based on Apple’s video-playback testing, and real-world battery life will vary depending on what you’re doing. Also keep in mind that these devices will need some time to index and get their bearings.
I’ll likely need to come back to this section in the coming weeks as indexing concludes, and I’m not shooting hundreds of photos and many minutes of video a day — after all, this is a review period. But with both the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, I’ve averaged around 30 hours of use before needing to plug in, and that stretches a bit further with the Max.
Even on an endurance day in the Florida heat, with hundreds of photos captured and nearly an hour of video recorded, the iPhone 18 Pro Max lasted an impressive amount of time before I needed a pit stop back at the hotel to recharge. It can drain quickly with heavy use, especially when you’re doing a lot of content capture, but in my testing thus far, both phones have been impressive.
In Future Labs' battery test, the iPhone 18 Pro lasted 16 hours and 17 minutes, while the iPhone 18 Pro Max ran for 18 hours and 27 minutes. That’s a good chunk less than Apple’s own video-playback figures, but my daily usage does stretch a bit closer to its claims.
On my last day of testing, I took the iPhone 18 Pro Max off the charger at 6AM and it hit 80% right before 11AM. With lots of app usage and some capture, it dropped to around 40% around 6PM with heavier use, but on average I got about 30 hours of use.
Apple also has improved fast wired charging, letting you hit 50% in just 15 minutes. I achieved that with both phones using Apple’s own Dynamic 40W charger, as well as a smaller Anker 45W Nano Cube. That means even if you do drain the battery, you don’t have to spend long tethered to an outlet before you’re back in business.
Battery score: 5 / 5
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max: Should you buy?
iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max scorecard
Attributes
Notes
Rating
Value
Even with the $100 / £100 / AU$100 price increase, both Pro models deliver enough meaningful upgrades to justify the premium.
4 / 5
Design
A similar design that's now refined with better thermals and two fantastic new colors.
5 / 5
Display
The Super Retina XDR OLEDs are still punchy, sharp, and smooth with ProMotion and Always-On functionality, and with a smaller Dynamic Island.
5 / 5
Software
Siri AI finally feels like the smarter, more capable assistant Apple promised, and iOS 27 is plenty smooth.
5 / 5
Camera
Apple finally gives you serious camera controls on the iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max, plus a genuinely useful variable aperture for the main lens.
5 / 5
Performance
The A20 Pro is incredibly fast, efficient, and ready for whatever comes next.
5 / 5
Battery
Outstanding endurance, with the Pro Max delivering the longest battery life on an iPhone.
5 / 5
Buy it if...
You want the best cameras
The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max take their three 48MP cameras to the next level, adding a variable aperture to the main camera and Pro controls across the board.
Don’t buy it if...
You have an iPhone 17 Pro
The iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max refine last year’s formula rather than reinvent it, so the upgrade is less substantial, especially if you're not interested in the changes.
Apple iPhone 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max: Also consider
Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra
If you're alright with Android and want an excellent mix of performance and hardware, plus far-reaching zoom that can rival the iPhone, Samsung's latest and greatest candybar smartphone is worth a look.
It won't arrive until October, but if you're after a design revolution from Apple, the iPhone Duo will likely fit the bill as Cupertino's first foldable phone. It offers the same excellent performance as the 18 Pro, plus an extra screen.
I’ve covered iPhones since the iPhone 8 generation, and the iPhone 3GS was my first personal iPhone. For this review, I spent a week with the iPhone 18 Pro in Burgundy and the iPhone 18 Pro Max in Glacier.
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I used both as daily drivers, covering everything from calls and streaming to gaming, work apps, photography, and video. I also ran performance benchmarks, tested multitasking and demanding workloads, and tracked battery drain across different usage scenarios alongside a standardized battery test.
For the cameras, I captured hundreds of photos and dozens of videos across Disney World — including Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios, and the resorts — as well as New Jersey, California, and from airplane windows. I tested every rear camera, multiple focal lengths, variable aperture, Pro controls, Night mode, Portrait mode, and video, along with the 18MP Center Stage camera.
I also compared the 18 Pro and 18 Pro Max with the previous-generation Pro models, the iPhone 17, iPhone Air, and other smartphones including the Pixel 11 and Pixel 11 Pro.
Ice cold. | Photo: Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
Last week, Apple announced an iPhone unlike any it has made in the past. An iPhone that has seemingly already led several other phone manufacturers to pursue entirely different designs for their flagship products. A remarkably distinct device with the kind of "I can't believe they did that" software touches that Apple sometimes pulls off when it's at the top of its game.
That phone is not the iPhone 18 Pro.
The 18 Pro and Pro Max are in the unusual position of being the second-most interesting iPhones that Apple is launching this year. The foldable iPhone Duo stole the show at Apple's launch event, but it's not arriving until next month. …
O Gemini Live permite que os usuários do aplicativo do Gemini para iPhones e iPads tenham uma conversa contínua e mais natural com a inteligência artificial — podendo inclusive interrompê-la quando precisar, bastando começar a falar enquanto ela responde em voz alta.
Porém, você pode simplesmente desativar esse comportamento, impedindo que o Gemini seja interrompido quando você fala algo em voz alta.
Apple hat mit dem iPhone 18 Pro und iPhone 18 Pro Max seine neuen Spitzenmodelle am 9. September offiziell vorgestellt. Das iPhone 18 Pro besitzt ein 6,3-Zoll-Display, während das iPhone 18 Pro Max mit 6,9 Zoll deutlich größer ausfällt.
Seit gestern können Sie Apples neuestes Flaggschiff vorbestellen. Erhältlich sind die neuen Modelle ab dem 18. September. Das iPhone 18 Pro startet bei 1.449 Euro, das iPhone 18 Pro Max bei 1.599 Euro. Hinweis: Das iPhone 18 Pro Max in der neuen Farbe “Burgunder” ist besonders begehrt – die Lieferzeiten sind mittlerweile nach hinten gerückt in den Oktober. Andere Farben und Speichergrößen werden aber noch vor Oktober geliefert. Hier können Sie die Apple-Flaggschiffe vorbestellen:
Amazon ist eine der ersten Anlaufstellen für viele Nutzer, um das neue iPhone vorzubestellen. Achten Sie unbedingt bei der Auswahl auf Farbe und gewünschte Speichergröße. Vor allem die neue Farbe Burgunder ist gefragt. Das Pro Max ist in dieser Farbvariante bei Amazon etwa nicht mehr verfügbar.
Das iPhone 18 Pro ist wie gewohnt das kleinere der beiden neuen Pro-Modelle. Es besitzt ein 6,3 Zoll großes Super Retina XDR OLED-Display mit ProMotion und bis zu 120 Hertz. Das iPhone 18 Pro Max kommt dagegen auf 6,9 Zoll. Beide Modelle verwenden die gleiche grundlegende technische Plattform.
Für die Leistung sorgt Apples neuer A20 Pro. Der Chip besitzt eine 6-Core-CPU, eine 7-Core-GPU und eine Dual 16-Core Neural Engine. Dazu kommt eine neue Dampfkammer zur Kühlung, die insbesondere bei längeren anspruchsvollen Rechen- und KI-Aufgaben für eine hohe Dauerleistung sorgen soll.
Eine der wichtigsten Neuerungen findet sich bei der Hauptkamera. Die 48-Megapixel-Fusion-Hauptkamera besitzt erstmals eine variable Blende. Dadurch kann das iPhone die Blende an die jeweilige Lichtsituation anpassen und zugleich die Schärfentiefe beeinflussen. Ergänzt wird das Kamerasystem durch eine 48-Megapixel-Ultraweitwinkelkamera und eine 48-Megapixel-Telekamera.
Bei der Akkulaufzeit unterscheiden sich die beiden Modelle deutlicher. Das iPhone 18 Pro erreicht laut Apple bis zu 34 Stunden Videowiedergabe, beim iPhone 18 Pro Max sind es bis zu 43 Stunden. Beide Geräte lassen sich mit einem geeigneten 60-Watt-Netzteil oder stärkerem USB-C-Netzteil in rund 15 Minuten auf 50 Prozent laden.
Beide Modelle verfügen außerdem über WLAN 7, Bluetooth 6, 5G, USB-C, Magsafe und Qi2. Die Geräte unterstützen zudem Apple Intelligence.
Beim Speicher haben Nutzer mehr Auswahl als bei früheren Einstiegsvarianten der Pro-Reihe: Sowohl das iPhone 18 Pro als auch das iPhone 18 Pro Max sind mit 256 GB, 512 GB, 1 TB und 2 TB erhältlich. Die Farben sind bei beiden Modellen auch identisch, Burgunder ist neu und ersetzt quasi die Spezialfarbe Orange aus dem letzten Jahr.
iPhone 18 Pro oder Pro Max: Wo liegen die Unterschiede?
Die Entscheidung zwischen den beiden Modellen fällt vor allem über die Größe. Das iPhone 18 Pro besitzt ein 6,3-Zoll-Display und wiegt 211 Gramm. Das Pro Max bietet 6,9 Zoll und bringt 249 Gramm auf die Waage. Die Gehäuse sind ansonsten beide 8,75 Millimeter dick.
Technisch liegen die beiden Modelle deutlich näher beieinander. Beide verwenden den A20 Pro, das gleiche Pro-Kamerasystem und dieselben Speicheroptionen. Die wichtigsten Vorteile des Pro Max sind deshalb das größere Display und die längere Akkulaufzeit.
iPhone 18 Pro
iPhone 18 Pro Max
Preis (256 GB)
1.449 €
1.599 €
Preis (512 GB)
1.699 €
1.849 €
Preis (1 TB)
2.199 €
2.349 €
Preis (2 TB)
2.949 €
3.099 €
Display
6,3“ Super Retina XDR Display
6,9“ Super Retina XDR Display
Auflösung
2.622 × 1.206 Pixel, 460 ppi
2.868 × 1.320 Pixel, 460 ppi
Display-Technologie
OLED, HDR, ProMotion bis 120 Hz, Always On, Dynamic Island
OLED, HDR, ProMotion bis 120 Hz, Always On, Dynamic Island
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