A new iPhone is imminent! How exciting! Except no, because it’s not September. The bit of the year before the sun disappears for six months in the UK is when eye-popping iPhones appear. But nowish is when Apple parps out its ‘whatever’ phones. These were once branded ‘SE’, which absolutely didn’t stand for ‘Stupendously Exhilarating’. We then saw a change with last year’s ‘cheap’ iPhone, which was called the iPhone 16e. Now Apple’s gearing up for the iPhone 17e. Which, if the rumour mill hasn’t accidentally copied and pasted most of what it predicted last year, is nonetheless going to look an awful lot like the iPhone 16e.
So what goodies is Apple going to shove inside the iPhone 17e to encourage people to part with their cash? Naturally, there will be a new chip, so the 17e can pretend to be part of the iPhone 17 lineup, despite wearing the skin of an iPhone from 2022. Still, an A18 will let this most affordable of iPhones (that is, still not terribly affordable) chew through anything you throw at it, given that it’s as powerful as the M1 chip still powering plenty of Macs.
Beyond that, there are two rumours: one likely and one teetering on the ‘maybe’ tightrope of doom. (On one side, cushions. On the other, HUNGRY SHARKS. No-one said the Apple rumour game was for the faint of heart.) The ‘maybe’ is that the 17e will get the swanky new selfie cam every other iPhone 17 received . The cert is that it’ll get MagSafe, which every other iPhone – apart from Apple’s cheap-o-option – has had since 2020. That isn’t so much cutting-edge tech, demanding a shower of praise and a fireworks show, as table-stakes.
E for effort
I’m not saying the iPhone 17e won’t be worth considering, nor that it’ll glumly limp down the street next month, while lines of onlookers yell “FAILURE!” in its general direction. Apple will sell a pile of the things, and anyone dismissing the 17e outright will be branded idiot faces unfit to bask in the glow of Apple’s majesty. But… that won’t make this iPhone anything other than the most routine of updates.
Perhaps that’s what we should expect. This is the iPhone that fills the gap at the bottom of the line. It’s never going to be a hive of innovation. And this year, Apple’s plans severely limit what’s possible, because last year’s best-buy iPhone (the 17) is getting another six months of action. Why? So the iPhone Fold can take the glory, the iPhone Air can get another crack at superstardom, and anyone who faints at the price tag/value combination of either of those might plump for an iPhone 18 Pro and make Apple’s exec team yell KA-CHING while even bigger dollar signs replace their eyeballs and float out of their heads.
So, no, the 17e won’t be getting a design that makes it look like an iPhone 17 (or, for that matter, even a 16 or 15). That means no 120Hz always-on display. No Dynamic Island. No Camera Control. But it will get a new chip, along with MagSafe charging that its predecessor – and even that device’s predecessor – should have had. That’s great if you want a new iPhone that looks like it wandered in, bleary-eyed, from 2022. For everyone else? Probably not a cause for celebration.
- Every Apple iPhone ranked in order of greatness
