With seven months to go earlier than the launch of Apple’s subsequent era of flagship smartphones (and a new funds iPhone prone to seem lengthy earlier than then), we’re already getting a good suggestion of what to anticipate from the iPhone 17. For a begin, in keeping with the most recent report, we’re fairly positive that Apple goes to drastically change the design of the rear digicam module on the Professional fashions, and in what means. We simply don’t know why.
The digicam module on the Professional iPhones has remained primarily the identical (aside from a slight dimension improve from 12 Professional to 13 Professional) for six generations in a row: a sq. with rounded corners housing a trio of lenses in a well-recognized triangular configuration. However of late, pundits have fashioned a shaky consensus that 2025 would be the yr when it lastly modifications in a extra noticeable means.
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Since across the flip of the yr, the primary idea has been that the three lenses will as a substitute be organized in a horizontal line just like the Google Pixel 9 Professional, with the digicam module switching to a protracted centered bar stretching throughout the highest of the rear of the cellphone. However this idea is totally mistaken, in keeping with the YouTube persona and tech leaker Jon Prosser, who claims in his newest video that the inner structure of the Dynamic Island’s parts means that is “not potential. Some might say unimaginable.”
That leaves two choices, he argues. Apple might press on with the horizontal configuration, however carry it down decrease on the rear of the chassis so it doesn’t conflict with the Dynamic Island. Or it might hold the triangular design, which he says was initially conceived to maintain out of the way in which of the notch on the iPhone 11 Professional. However that will imply a seventh era of design stagnation, which the corporate is eager to keep away from.
The present main answer at Apple Park, in keeping with Prosser, is to maintain the triangular association of lenses however broaden the module wherein they sit so it spans the complete width of the cellphone. This gained’t be a skinny bar: it will likely be the identical top because the module on the 16 Professional, stretched to roughly twice the width. That’s a giant and really noticeable change that can guarantee everybody is aware of you’re utilizing an iPhone 17 Professional.
However aside from giving your mates critical FOMO and improve envy, would this redesigned digicam module present any precise advantages? Maybe, however Prosser for one can’t see what they’re. For the time being it looks like an answer that helps Apple’s advertising and marketing division, not iPhone prospects. Little doubt the September launch occasion will make the advantages quite a bit clearer.
It’s price stressing at this level that none of this must be taken as indisputable fact; these stay theories, albeit ones with coherent reasoning and sources. Plans might change between now and the autumn and Prosstradamus might simply have gotten this improper. He has type. And throwing some chilly water on the entire thing is a put up from Mark Gurman, who claims Prosser’s renders “seem like based mostly in a faux late January sketch.”
To maintain up with the most recent information and rumors associated to Apple’s late-2025 cellphone launches, we suggest bookmarking our commonly up to date iPhone 17 superguide. And should you can’t wait that lengthy, decide up a discount on the present vary with our roundup of the greatest iPhone offers.