Apple unveiled its new product lineup ahead of the holiday season, introducing four versions of the new iPhone 15 and two updates to its Apple Watch on Tuesday.
In a prerecorded presentation streamed on the Apple website Tuesday, CEO Tim Cook and a team of executives showed off the latest updates to some of the company’s most important products.
After three consecutive quarters of declining iPhone sales, Apple is betting that new improvements to existing iPhone features, from cameras and chips to sleek new titanium material, will entice consumers to upgrade. But while rivals like Google and Samsung are experimenting with phones featuring foldable screens, Apple is keeping the basic design and capabilities of the iPhone—which accounts for roughly half of its revenue—relatively unchanged.
Wall Street’s initial reaction to the new products was not encouraging, with shares of Apple down 2.3% in midday trading, following the event.
Apple is saving its vision of a more radical product shift for the $3,500 mixed reality Vision Pro headset. Cook said Tuesday that the headset was “on track to ship early next year,” and teased that developers are “creating truly amazing experiences that wouldn’t be possible on any other platform.”
Still, the latest phones and watches in Apple’s product catalog bring a variety of new features and improvements. Here’s everything Apple unveiled on Tuesday.
IPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max:
Apple’s new iPhone Pro models have a new look (titanium), a new customizable “Action” button, a more powerful optical camera zoom, and the company’s most advanced chip ever.
The new Pro models come in two flavors:
The 6.1-inch iPhone 15 Pro, which starts at $999
The 6.7-inch iPhone 15 Pro Max, which starts at $1,199
The phones will be available to pre-order on Friday, and in stores on September 22.
While some analysts speculated that Apple would bump up the price for the Pro models, Apple kept the iPhone 15 Pro at $999 for the base model. For the Pro Max however, Apple eliminated the version of the phone with 128 GB, effectively raising the base price for the iPhone 15 Pro Max by $100.
Instead of stainless steel, the iPhone 15 Pro is made of titanium (the same material used on the Mars Rover, Apple says), making it the lightest Pro model. It also has the thinnest borders and toughest ceramic glass yet.
The iPhone Pros pack a 3-nanometer chip, the A17 Pro, which Apple says is the industry’s first processor at that level of advancement. The mobile CPU can process 35 trillion operations per second, while the GPU is 20% faster and supports ray tracing, which more accurately represents light in graphics on video game and AR applications.
Apple is also replacing the ring/mute switch, and giving the Pro models a new “Action Button.” The button can still turn the phone on silent, but it can also launch other actions, like starting a voice recording or opening the camera.
The Pro Max camera boasts a 5x optical zoom, and allows for 120mm focal length.
IPhone 15:
Apple is launching the iPhone 15 and 15 Plus. Both phones have the so-called Dynamic Island, a screen design previously available only on Pro models. The screen extends further to the edges and gets twice as bright as the iPhone 14 in the sunlight.
The 6.1-inch iPhone 15 starts at $799
The 6.7-inch iPhone Plus starts at $899
Both versions of the iPhone 15 pack a 48 megapixel camera, and allow for continuous zoom during a video to look professional. The camera has 2X telephoto capabilities.
The phone detects when a user is trying to take a portrait and captures the image in portrait mode without the user having to select it. Users can now change the focus and apply portrait mode to a photo they’ve already taken.
The iPhone 15 chip is A16 Bionic, which first appeared on iPhone 14 Pro.
And say goodbye to the Lighting Port— the iPhone will switch to USB-C for charging.
Colors include pink, yellow, green, blue and black. The ceramic shield is reportedly tougher than any other smartphone screen. The enclosure is made up of 75% recycled aluminum, and it has a 100% recycled cobalt battery.
Apple Watch:
Apple unveiled two new versions of its Apple Watch on Tuesday: The Series 9 Watch for everyday users and the Ultra 2, aimed at outdoor enthusiasts and athletes.
Besides the hardware updates, the most important new feature is the “double tap” function, which allows you to control certain phone features by tapping your fingers together (more on that later).
The Series 9 Apple Watch starts at $399
The Ultra 2 Apple Watch starts at $799
The watches are available for pre-order today, and will be in stores on September 22.
Both smartwatches pack a new S9 processor on the inside, the most powerful chip yet for the watch. It can process machine learning tasks twice as fast and allows for 18-hour battery life.
Siri can now access health data using OS10. You can also log health data by telling Siri (i.e., log how much you slept at night).
The Series 9 Watch display goes to double the brightness of Series 8, and Apple is adding a new color to its watch palette, with the Series 9 available in Pink aluminum.
Double Tap: Apple introduced a cool new feature called Double Tap, which basically allows you to do control certain watch features without actually touching the watch. Simply tap your index finger and thumb together twice and it’s as if you pressed the main button the watch screen.
That means you can do things like answer a call, play music or silence an alarm with just one hand, by tapping your fingers together. Apple says the watch can detect these finger gestures through machine learning and accelerometers that detects change in blood flow and hand movement.
The watch is made up of a series of recycled materials, including recycled gold and aluminum and a new, 100% recycled cobalt battery. Apple has a goal of reaching carbon neutrality across all its businesses, with all its products having a net zero climate impact, by 2030.
To that end, Apple says it will no longer use leather for the bands in the Watch. Instead, Apple says it created a new “FineWoven” textile, made up of 68% recycled material and which it says feels like suede.
