Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max. What processor will power next year's iPhones?
The next iPhones could signal a new way for Apple to distribute its processors, according to a report from Jeff Pu, a highly respected industry analyst at Haitong International Securities. According to a report seen by 9to5Mac, the chips in the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro may not be what people had come to expect.
Right now, there’s a clear way of doing things. The Pro iPhone gains an all-new processor, while the regular iPhone inherits last year’s chip. So, for instance, the just-released iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max are powered by the Apple A17 Pro chip. The iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus, meanwhile, use the Apple A16 Bionic processor which was first seen in last year’s iPhone 14 Pro.
The regular iPhone gets a hand-me-down, then. This is not a bad thing as Apple’s chips are so fast that even one that is a year old can still offer remarkable processing power. It means that the iPhone 15 is a consistently fast phone.
So, it was assumed that next year’s iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus, if that’s what we see delivered by Apple, would have the current A17 Pro chip as their brains.
But the latest news from Pu is that both the regular and Pro versions of iPhone 16 will all use A18 chips.
Before you cheer that we’re back to the days when all iPhones had the same chips in them, it’s not quite that.
The fact that the current processor has the word Pro in its name meant some believed a non-pro version would be developed. While the A17 didn’t emerge, as there was no need given the A16 Bionic was in place on the iPhone 15, it now seems there will be two versions of the A18 chip.
Pu believes that one of the issues is that the A17 Pro chip may have contributed to the overheating issues suffered by some iPhones. I’m not sure I quite buy this, given that some of the phones suffering from overheating weren’t the iPhone 15 Pro or Pro Max with the A17 Pro in it.
However, I do believe that one of the benefits of moving from the N3B manufacturing process used for the A17 Pro to the N3E process planned for next year’s chips could lead to faster speeds and lower power draw.
So, logically, it makes more sense to move the next phones to a chip made using N3E, even if it’s not as powerful as the A18 Pro, if that’s what it’s called, will be. Maybe the regular iPhones will be blessed with a chip simply called A18.
We’re near enough to the overheating moment, which has now passed, for Apple to want to ensure it doesn’t happen again, and far enough away from the iPhone 16 series for the company to be able to address this.
So, does this matter? I think it’s important to remember that Apple will ensure that the processor is fast enough to do everything it has planned, but not so powerful it will have extra power that’s never needed.
If the regular iPhone doesn’t need the power of the Pro—and it probably doesn’t—Apple’s choice seems good. Mind you, there were significant economies of scale when all the iPhones had the same chip, or last year’s Pro chip was used in this year’s regular iPhone. For sure, Apple will consider those parts of the equation, too.
More as we have it.
