The Finest iPhone Worth in Years

Fundamental design

Take the iPhone 16 design, stretch it a teensy bit up, and also you get the iPhone 17. Which will sound harsh, nevertheless it’s true: the iPhone 17 is 5.89 inches tall versus the 5.81-inch iPhone 16. In some way it’s 0.01 inches narrower, although. It’s unlikely you’ll really feel that it’s 0.24 ounces heavier, both; I didn’t.

Should you have been hoping for extra materials change, you’re gonna be upset. I don’t suppose it’s price fretting over for the reason that iPhone 17 feels nice within the hand. Not that most individuals will care since they’ll slap a case over it.

Apple has caught with an aluminum body and gently curved sides that soften into the duvet and again glass. The again has a vertically aligned pill-shaped bump for the twin cameras. What you’ll be able to’t see with the bare eye is the improved scratch resistance for the display. Apple is utilizing Ceramic Protect 2, its second-gen cowl materials with elevated sturdiness, which Apple claims is 3x extra scratch resistant than the iPhone 16’s first-gen Ceramic Protect display. Apple additionally says Ceramic Protect 2 cuts down on glare. It doesn’t remove reflections from what I might see, and any discount in glare is minimal at greatest. Nonetheless, I’ll take the elevated scratch resistance. I requested Apple if Ceramic Protect 2 now signifies that keys or sand or pocket lint gained’t simply scratch it, however the firm clarified that its sturdiness claims aren’t for a single occasion the place there’s unlucky contact with some scratchy objects; it’s over time. Take that for what you’ll.

Colours are subjective, however for those who ask me, I believe the iPhone 17 colours are uninteresting. In addition to black and white, there’s lavender, sage, and mist blue. Sage seems the perfect to me, nevertheless it’s nonetheless a muted inexperienced. I believe it’s time for Apple to carry again crimson or coral or pacific blue. Give the common iPhone some soul to face out between the iPhone Air and iPhone Professionals.

A extra “professional” show

That 0.08 inches of additional top means Apple was in a position to squeeze in a barely bigger 6.3-inch display versus the 6.1-inch show on the iPhone 16. This is identical display because the iPhone 17 Professional, with the identical decision, identical 3,000 nits of peak outside brightness, the identical 120 Hz “ProMotion” refresh charge, and the identical always-on show. Finally, Apple’s common iPhone collection isn’t saddled with a 60Hz refresh charge.

To my eyes, there’s no seen distinction between the display on the iPhone 17 and the 17 Professional. Each Tremendous Retina XDR shows look crisp, have wonderful and broad viewing angles, and get greater than vivid sufficient indoors and open air. I uncared for to say this in my iPhone Air and iPhone 17 Pros review, however I actually want Apple would come with one thing akin to the “Aqua Contact 2.0 expertise” within the OnePlus 13 that makes the touchscreen extra responsive when there’s liquid on it or your fingers are moist. The slightest droplet of water on the iPhone 17 nonetheless confuses the display into considering you’re touching it while you’re not.

Almost professional efficiency

In contrast to Android telephones, the place efficiency can take a significant downturn if the chipset maker (Qualcomm, Samsung, MediaTek, and many others.) has structure or manufacturing issues, Apple’s A-series silicon simply steadily will get higher 12 months after 12 months.

I’ve lengthy stopped placing an excessive amount of emphasis on artificial benchmarks like Geekbench 6, however simply to see how a lot much less highly effective the iPhone 17’s A19 chip is in comparison with the A19 Professional within the iPhone Air and iPhone 17 Professionals, I ran the CPU check. The outcomes actually shocked me. Utilizing the common of three assessments taken on the iPhone 17, iPhone Air, and iPhone 17 Professional, the iPhone 17 was 1.6% extra highly effective than the Air and 1.3% much less highly effective than the 17 Professional for single-core duties.

The A19 Professional chip pulls forward of the A19 for multicore purposes, however not by a lot: the Air is 5% extra highly effective and 17 Professional is 9.48% extra highly effective than the iPhone 17. I assumed for certain with one much less GPU core (5 as an alternative of six) that the iPhone 17 Professionals can be extra highly effective by a bigger margin, however that doesn’t appear to be the case.

That’s nice information for those who’re nervous about getting FOMO from not having the A19 Professional chip within the iPhone 17. However there’s one other factor to contemplate: thermals and sustained efficiency. In comparison with the iPhone 17 Professionals, which have a vapor chamber that retains temperatures down and spreads warmth throughout the cellphone extra uniformly when apps push the GPU arduous, the iPhone 17 will get hotter quite a bit faster. And if it will get too sizzling, it takes slightly longer to chill down. Typically, my iPhone 17 assessment unit by no means acquired toasty, however for those who’re planning to play 3D video games like Genshin Impression or shoot a number of 4K video with the cellphone or do both below the solar in sizzling environments, you could run into the notorious “”iPhone wants to chill down” sooner.

The Middle Stage digicam is legit

The iPhone 17 has some stable digicam upgrades, too. The twin rear digicam is now a “Fusion” digicam consisting of a 48-megapixel foremost digicam and now a higher-resolution 48-megapixel ultrawide (up from 12 megapixels on the iPhone 16). Images look about the identical to me in comparison with the identical pictures taken with my iPhone 16 Pro. Even the ultrawide pictures look almost equivalent; okay, they’re barely brighter, however that’s nothing dialing up the brightness slider within the Images app couldn’t simply deal with. There’s no telephoto lens on the iPhone 17; in order for you that, you’ll must step as much as the iPhone 17 Professionals, which have a 4x telephoto lens that’s additionally able to 8x “optical-quality” pictures. You do get the 2x “optical-quality” lens from the primary 48-megapixel picture sensor, however that was already a characteristic on the iPhone 16.

As I stated in my iPhone Air and iPhone 17 Professionals assessment, the Middle Stage digicam is the largest improve for images and video since Apple first added a front-facing digicam on the iPhone 4. The 18-megapixel Middle Stage digicam is a sq. picture sensor, which might seize horizontal selfies even for those who’re holding the cellphone vertically. You too can take vertical photographs for those who maintain the iPhone 17 horizontally. The characteristic additionally works for video recording. It’s a really cool characteristic that everybody goes to understand, not simply Gen Z TikTokers. The Twin Seize mode that information from the entrance and rear cameras can be very enjoyable, particularly for reaction-type movies.

Because the iPhone 17 is just not a “professional” iPhone, it doesn’t have the extra superior recording options discovered within the iPhone 17 Professionals, like ProRAW for stills, ProRes for video, Apple Log 2, or genlock. Gradual-motion video recording can be restricted to 1080p at 240 fps in comparison with 4K at 120 fps on the 17 Professionals. Lastly, you don’t get the “studio-quality” microphones discovered within the 17 Professionals. I don’t suppose any of those “lacking” options makes the iPhone 17 a dealbreaker, nevertheless it does really feel like Apple might have included them if it wished to, aside from to feature-lock them to the higher-end iPhones.

And identical to I stated in my iPhone 17 Professionals assessment, I believe Digital camera Management remains to be largely wasted. It’s there, however no more helpful than as a shortcut to launching the Digital camera app. I a lot desire the digicam shortcut on Android, which has been a factor for over a decade: double-clicking the facility button.

Extra battery to doomscroll

No quantity of battery life is ever going to be sufficient, however I’ll gladly take extra hours gen-over-gen. Within the iPhone 17’s case, battery life has elevated by 8 hours in comparison with the iPhone 16—as much as 30 hours versus 22 hours (for native video playback, which is how Apple measures battery life). It’s 3 fewer hours than the iPhone 17 Professional, which will get as much as 33 hours.

Utilizing the iPhone 17 like a traditional human being (as a result of who’s insane sufficient to observe native video for 30 hours straight), I discovered the iPhone 17 lasted about so long as my iPhone 16 Professional, which Apple says will get as much as 27 hours for video playback. Give or take, I used to be in a position to go from off the charger at 8 a.m. to six p.m. on a single cost with round 20 to 25% left within the tank. That’s nice battery life and you’ll simply go two days with gentle utilization.

Extra for a similar cash

If all of that doesn’t sound like a adequate worth, how about double the storage (256GB versus 128GB) versus the iPhone 16—for a similar $799? That’s a superb deal. Yeah, inflation and all that, however that’s nonetheless a rattling whole lot for the whole lot that you just get.

There’s a $300 distinction between the iPhone 17 and the 17 Professional this 12 months, which is $100 greater than final 12 months. For most individuals, the iPhone 17 has greater than sufficient, and the additional $300 might be pocketed or put in the direction of an adjunct just like the new $250 AirPods Pro 3.

I actually couldn’t discover a lot to complain about on the iPhone 17. iOS is iOS. Should you don’t just like the “walled” Apple backyard, there’s nothing new to report right here, because it’s the identical deal. Apple Intelligence, sadly, remains to be underwhelming and we’ll have to attend till subsequent 12 months to see the brand new AI-powered Siri. If there’s something to actually gripe about, I want the USB 2 switch speeds for the USB-C port have been the sooner USB 3 on the iPhone 16 and 17 Professionals.

Should you’ve reached this far and also you’ve been nodding your head in any respect the brand new stuff and don’t really feel an urge to leap as much as the 17 Professionals, congrats, perhaps the iPhone 17 is for you. Should you nonetheless have an iPhone from latest years and it’s not having any points, simply update to iOS 26 (unless you really hate Liquid Glass). One of the best factor about iPhones is that they final a very long time and Apple helps them with annual software program updates for not less than 5 years, and safety updates for a couple of years after. You get quite a bit with the brand new iPhone 17, however you additionally might not want one if yours works simply high-quality. For individuals switching from Android—you’re both gonna love Apple’s ecosystem or hate it and crawl again.