This is a very strange iPhone upgrade season. Pre-orders for the iPhone 16 range – a phone that Apple says is “built for Apple Intelligence” – start today, but it doesn’t look like Apple’s AI tricks will be available when the phones land in stores on September 20.
Apple’s website states that select Apple Intelligence features “will be available in beta next month as part of iOS 18.1.” So will consumers rush to pre-order a phone that doesn’t yet have the feature, or will there be more of a wait-and-see attitude toward the upgrade this time around?
In this week’s episode of One More Thing, which you can watch embedded above, I go over the odd things to look out for in this product upgrade cycle and explain why I think the iPhone 16 wasn’t the star of the iPhone event. Apple’s updates to the AirPods 4, AirPods Pro 2, and Apple Watch Series 10 might be the bigger product hits this fall with all the health-focused upgrades.
The iPhone 16’s camera control button allows you to launch the camera without touching the screen.
The other unique feature of the iPhone 16 launch is the addition of a touch-sensitive camera capture button. I wonder how people will get used to the new button and how easy (or difficult) it will be to accidentally trigger it when grabbing the phone.
A button might be exactly what Apple is using to sell phones to people who don’t care about AI. A recent CNET survey found that most consumers are motivated to upgrade their phone for a better battery and new camera features –https://www.cnet.com/videos/the-iphone-wasnt-the-star-of-the-iphone-16-event/https://www.cnet.com/videos/the-iphone-wasnt-the-star-of-the-iphone-16-event/ and few are motivated by artificial intelligence.
Time will tell if Apple intelligence is the big incentive to make the iPhone 16 a popular upgrade year in 2016, or if consumers will need more convincing to trade in their current devices.
