iPhone 16 rumors: release date and price predictions, design leaks, and more

The unveiling of the iPhone 16 is now less than a week away, and we've been treated to so much information about Apple's upcoming handset that we already have a pretty clear image of what to expect when the company's "It's Glowtime" event rolls around — and the 3D renders to accompany it.

Apple's annual iPhone event is a staple of the tech calendar and this year's event falls on Monday, September 9, which is now only days away. Word is out that not only will the iPhone 16 be revealed, but it's set to be joined by the Apple Watch Series 10/X, Ultra, and a new SE model alongside new models of Apple's AirPods.

However, the star of the show is undoubtedly the iPhone 16 lineup, expected to continue its core, Plus, Pro, and Pro Max models (at least until next year). This year, the iPhone lineup will also be showcasing its AI potential through support for Apple Intelligence across each iPhone 16 model.

At Laptop Mag, we keep our finger on the pulse of iPhone 16 news, gathering the latest information from as many credible, reliable, and proven sources as we can. We monitor the opinions and claims from industry insiders and in-the-know journalists to reputable analysts and well-known leakers with proven track records — all to bring you the most up-to-date and accurate information surrounding the iPhone 16 that we possibly can. 

While Apple hasn't confirmed any of these details or rumors yet, they hint at what to expect from the iPhone 16 line-up and give us a clearer image of what's going on behind the scenes at Apple Park. Here's a look at everything we know so far, including price, release date, specs, and more. 

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iPhone 16 rumors: FAQs

• When will the iPhone 16 be released?
  We can't say the exact date for certain, but Apple typically opens pre-orders for their handsets either the following Friday or Friday thereafter. With this in mind, considering that Apple's "It's Glowtime" event takes place on September 9, the iPhone could be available for pre-order as early as September 13, or as late as September 20.
   
• How much will the iPhone 16 cost?
  If pricing remains the same as the iPhone 15, the iPhone 16 will be available for $799, the iPhone 16 Plus for $899, the iPhone 16 Pro for $999, and the iPhone 16 Pro Max for $1,199. Certain rumors point to the iPhone 16 Pro receiving a $100 price bump, which would result in the handset touting a $1,099 price tag at launch.
   
• Will the iPhone 16 look different?
  Based on early information, the iPhone 16 will feature a redesigned camera island on the back of the device and feature frame-flush capacitive touch buttons. Pro and Pro Max models will remain largely the same, although we can expect some new colors to be heading to both. 
   
• Will the iPhone 16 have new buttons?
  The iPhone 16 is rumored to bring the iPhone 15 Pro/Pro Max's Action Button to all models, as well as a brand new Capture Button for quick access to camera functions.
   
• Will the iPhone 16 have AI?
  Apple announced its new Apple Intelligence AI platform at WWDC 2024, which will be an (optional) feature baked into iOS. We're expecting iOS 18 to be released shortly after  the iPhone 16 is unveiled, and all models to support any new AI-backed features. However, it's worth noting that most of the new AI features won't arrive until iOS 18.1 or later.
   
• Will the iPhone 16 have a 120Hz display?
  The iPhone 16 is not expected to feature the long-awaited ProMotion 120Hz display, instead retaining the 60Hz refresh rate of the iPhone 15. The Pro and Pro Max models of iPhone 16 are expected to retain the adaptive 120Hz refresh rate of last year's models.

iPhone 16 rumors: Release date & price

Following the pattern of the last three iPhone release dates, the iPhone 16 will be unveiled on September 9, 2024. After the event, Apple is likely to make the iPhone 16 available for pre-order on the following Friday or the Friday thereafter, meaning the iPhone will be available to purchase from, earliest, September 13, and latest, September 20.

We can't speak on the price of the iPhone 16 this early on. However, should Apple maintain the same pricing of the iPhone 15, then we would expect the iPhone 16-series to be priced as follows:

That being said, the iPhone 16 line includes several upgrades that may raise the production costs of Apple's handset, and those costs could be passed on to customers. As such, there's potential for the iPhone 16 to see a bump in pricing upon release.

Rumors surrounding price changes for the iPhone 16 lineup generally point to the iPhone 16 Pro receiving a $100 price bump, resulting in a $1,099 launch price. From what we know so far, Apple appears to have put in the effort to closing the gap between its Pro and Pro Max models this year, and it would seem the same can be said about their prices.

The good news for budget-conscious iPhone users is that when the iPhone 16 launches, the price of the iPhone 15 and iPhone 14 will decrease. Apple typically has three generations of iPhones available at once, reducing the price of its older models by about $100 whenever a new generation launches.

Unfortunately, that also means Apple would be set to discontinue the iPhone 13 this year, but you'll be able to get the iPhone 14 at a lower price, so it's not a complete loss. 

iPhone 16 rumors: Design

From what we know, the majority of the iPhone 16 lineup will retain much of the same overall design as the iPhone 15 that came before it. The same goes for the Plus, Pro, and Pro Max models. 

However, there are a few notable changes. First of which is a slight difference in measurements for iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max models—not only in dimensions and weight but also in display size. 

Both the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max models will be fractionally larger and heavier than their iPhone 15 counterparts, but they're also rumored to feature expanded OLED displays of 6.3 inches and 6.9 inches in size respectively. 

Secondly, it looks like Apple will finally move away from pastels with a new line-up of colors for the iPhone 16. A photo leaked on X on July 30 supposedly revealing models for the iPhone 16, including the new colors. White and black are there, of course, but we're also getting darker, brighter shades of blue and green plus a light pink. 

Third, the iPhone 16 (and likely the iPhone 16 Plus) will feature a redesigned camera island, ditching the diagonal lenses for a horizontal camera array housed atop of an iPhone X-like pill-shaped block.

The reason for this change could have much to do with another Apple product released earlier this year, the Vision Pro. We've already seen that the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max can use their vertically positioned cameras to capture Spatial Video, ready for playback on Apple's mixed-reality headset. This new layout could be lining up the lenses of the iPhone 16 (and iPhone 16 Plus) to do the same.

The iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus models also appear to inherit the Action Button previously found in iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max handsets (which will naturally carry over to Pro and Pro Max models of the iPhone 16 as well). Normally an Action Button is customizable so you can assign it to do whatever you wish, some potential uses for it could include:

• Activating Siri or Apple Intelligence
• Turning Silent mode on or off.
• Opening the Camera app.
• Turning the flashlight on or off.
• Starting the iPhone's speech translation function.
• Opening an app or activating a shortcut.

It's also worth noting that the iPhone 16's action button will reportedly differ from the one found on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max models. In fact, it's claimed that all of the buttons on each of the iPhone 16 models could differ from the ones that came before it because the iPhone 16 series is set to feature a full suite of capacitive switches.

Capacitive switches ditch the mechanical component of a regular button, meaning these switches act in much the same way as the iPhone's touchscreen, or the trackpad of a MacBook.

The iPhone's adoption of capacitive buttons was a key rumor circulating ahead of the launch of the iPhone 15. However, it would seem that Apple needed a little longer to iron out some of the kinks, especially when it came to the Taptic Engines that generate haptic feedback on presses in place of the tactile bump from the actuation of a physical switch.

In celebration of this new tech's implementation, every iPhone 16 model will also feature a Capture Button, a capacitive switch intended for multimedia capture said to recognize swiping gestures and varying pressure levels to interpret different shortcuts to camera functions. If this rumor pans out, it's highly likely the gap on the right side of the case in photos leaked on X is for this new Capture Button. 

This time around, it seems like Apple is prepared to go full steam ahead with capacitive switches. Meaning the entire iPhone 16 line will be wholly free of mechanical buttons. This is a neat design update, but it should also help with waterproofing, dustproofing, and general durability.

Speaking of which, titanium will be returning to Pro models for the iPhone 16, and offering up a new golden/coffee-like colorway in "Desert Titanium" alongside white, black, and base titanium offerings.

The base iPhone 16 and 16 Plus are expected to drop the pastels for the most part, offering some more vivid options through blue, teal/green, and pink colorways along with more conservating white and black options.

iPhone 16 rumors: Display

Before the iPhone 15 launched, we got early word that Samsung Display had been brought on board to provide the iPhone 16 with new OLED panels featuring Micro Lens Array (MLA) technology.

MLA is a screen technology more commonly found in OLED TVs. It replaces the over-coating layer with a blanket of microscopic lenses (or lenslets). How microscopic? Well, LG Display claims that up to 5,000 of these lenslets can fit within a single pixel.

The benefits of switching to this technology for the iPhone 16 include a clearer, brighter picture with improved HDR performance without needing to increase the brightness of the pixels in the OLED panel (making it much more efficient) and without any increased risk of screen burn-in  — an issue the iPhone 15 has had its fair share of run-ins with.

Certain iPhone 16 handsets (likely the Pro models) are also set to feature far thinner bezels through Border Reduction Structure (BRS), which uses a more efficient layout of the display's circuitry to trim down the need for a more spacious border.

iPhone 16 rumors: Specifications

While we don't have an official look at the spec sheet or available configurations for Apple's upcoming iPhone 16, we have heard a fair amount of chatter about how its internal components may be improved.

Firstly, each iPhone model is reportedly set to don an A18 Bionic chipset, with the Pro and Pro Max handsets likely candidates for a more technically capable A18 Pro processor that may feature an upgraded NPU to aid with the on-device AI capabilities of the new Apple Intelligence platform, which will launch as an optional beta feature in iOS 18.

On-device AI features in Apple Intelligence may also improve the base configuration specs for Apple's iPhone 16. Apple officially announced Apple Intelligence at WWDC 2024, but it's still unclear how it will work on older iPhones or whether it will be able to at all. Apple clearly wants its AI features to mainly use on-device processing to minimize privacy risks, though, so new iPhones moving forward will likely feature specs capable of handling on-device AI. 

Rumors indicate that Apple's on-device AI plans will require each iPhone 16 model to feature 8GB of RAM at a minimum and that efforts to make use of NAND flash to run its local models could push the base storage capacity of each handset to 256GB.

This could mean Apple plans to increase the base configuration for RAM, storage, or both. However, if Apple were to elevate both then this may be something exclusive to iPhone 16 Pro models to take full advantage of the A18 Pro processor with its upgraded NPU.

If Apple does opt to upgrade the base RAM and storage in the iPhone 16, it could be a major upgrade for current iPhone users, even if you already have an iPhone 15. This is especially true given the minimum hardware requirements for Apple Intelligence, which currently exclude the iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Plus, and all older iPhones.

In addition to potential RAM and storage improvements, the iPhone 16 is also rumored to feature Wi-Fi 7 connectivity and a built-in 5G modem—however, it's unlikely to be the rumored in-house option currently being designed by Apple. 

The iPhone 16 will also launch with the new software features available in iOS 18, which include more home screen customization, a redesigned Photos app, new features in the Messages app, a major Siri update, Apple Intelligence features, and more. However, it's worth noting that most of the new AI features won't arrive until iOS 18.1 or later. 

You can try out an early sampling of some of these features in the latest iOS 18 public beta, although Apple Intelligence previews are only available on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max. 

iPhone 16 rumors: Cameras

The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max's camera array could include a new 48MP ultrawide, with the Pro Max's 48MP wide lens adopting a glass-plastic hybrid lens that allows up to 20% more light into its iris, resulting in much better low-light photography.

It's also possible that the 5x Telephoto lens of the iPhone 15 Pro Max could feature in both Pro models of the iPhone 16.

Apple will also use Atomic Layer Deposition coating on its lenses for the first time, which can counteract lens flare issues and better preserve image quality.

Outlook

The iPhone 16 has plenty of promise, and Apple is pretty consistent at delivering a quality handset year-in-year-out. There are a few key design changes to look out for, more than in previous years to be sure, and the new A18 processor promises even more potential when it comes to performance.

All in all, we could be in for a real treat, especially if Apple's iOS 18 update is able to deliver on all of the features unveiled at WWDC 2024. 

Apple's September iPhone event is right around the corner, and the company has let us know well in advance that it's Glowtime for its new lineup. Laptop Mag is following all of the latest news and rumors surrounding the iPhone 16 and will be covering the upcoming iPhone event in full, so stay tuned for more details. 

For news, rumors, and updates on all things Apple, iPhone, and tech, follow Laptop Mag on X, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Flipboard for the latest word as it arrives.

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