iPhone 17 Pro vs iPhone 16 Pro: A new age dawns for the iPhone?

The iPhone 17 series is the next big thing in smartphone tech, as some big changes are expected both in the hardware and software departments. According to the latest info, we're looking at a completely redesigned camera bump, which will be the first such big change in five long years.

Today we're going to focus on the iPhone 17 Pro. What new features will it bring to the table, compared to its direct predecessor, the iPhone 16 Pro? Do you need to upgrade if you already have the previous generation? We will try to answer these and other pressing questions in this iPhone 17 Pro vs iPhone 16 Pro preliminary comparison.

Design-wise, we're looking at some big changes, actually the biggest ones since the iPhone X. According to industry insiders, CAD renders, and even some leaked dummy photos, the iPhone 17 Pro will have a different camera bump on its back. It's expected to be a big rectangle, spreading almost side-to-side, similar to what the Pixel 9 Pro has but even more prominent.

The iPhone 16 Pro uses the old, tried-and-tested square camera housing that we've seen in the past couple of generations. It's fair to say that the positions of the lenses themselves on the new model aren't that different; it's just the whole bump stretching from side to side.

*speculated or rumored

We don't expect a big difference in size and weight; both phones feature the same display size, and even though the iPhone 17 Pro is expected to have slimmer bezels, this probably won't translate to a huge difference in dimensions.

In terms of building materials, there's a potential change coming to the iPhone 17 Pro. It's speculated that Apple might be reverting to aluminum for the iPhone 17 Pro frame, which will be kind of a downgrade, as the iPhone 16 Pro comes with Grade 5 titanium.

Let's quickly list the color expectations for the iPhone 17 Pro versus what we have available on the iPhone 16 Pro. At the moment, there's only one iPhone 17 Pro hue that's been spat out of the rumor mill.

There are no huge changes expected to the iPhone 17 Pro when it comes to the display. We will most likely get the same 6.3-inch ProMotion screen as the one on the iPhone 16 Pro, with a dynamic refresh rate between 1 and 120 Hz, and the same 1206 x 2622 pixels resolution, resulting in around 460 PPI.

There are rumors that point toward a new technology called LDTEE (Low-dielectric TEE) which improves efficiency and durability. It's unclear whether this new tech will offer any other potential benefits compared to the old LTPO+ tech on the iPhone 16 Pro, but judging from the rumors about an M14 material being used, some sources claim up to 3000 nits of brightness for the iPhone 17 Pro's display.

Another talking point in the past couple of weeks has been the slimmer bezels on the iPhone 17 Pro. We'll have to wait and see how slim those bezels really turn out to be, as the iPhone 16 Pro already has a pretty thin uniform bezel around the screen.

The iPhone 17 Pro is expected to get the next-gen A19 Pro chip. Initial rumors suggested that this silicon might be built on a 2nm manufacturing node, but more and more info points toward an updated 3nm technology with better efficiency compared to the A18 Pro.

The RAM situation is also expected to change; the iPhone 17 Pro is believed to land with 12GB of RAM, as opposed to the 8GB available on the iPhone 16 Pro. It's still unclear what necessitated this change, but one potential candidate might be Apple Intelligence and more hardware resources needed for on-device AI calculations.

In terms of storage, we don't expect big changes; the iPhone 17 Pro should offer the usual 128/256/512/1TB storage options. There's one rumor suggesting that Apple might get rid of the 128GB option and the base variant will start at 256GB.

As far as software goes, the iPhone 17 Pro is expected to launch with iOS 19 out of the box, with some big changes to the interface, the first in more than a decade. The alleged aim is to make the software more consistent throughout the ecosystem, including iPhones, Macs, iPads, and Apple Watches. The iPhone 16 Pro will, of course, get iOS 19 when it comes out, so this won't be a dividing factor.

Last generation, Apple upgraded the ultrawide camera on the Pro models with a 48MP sensor and also slapped a faster 48MP main camera inside for good measure. So, the iPhone 16 Pro already features quite a potent camera setup. However, there's one camera that could benefit from a better sensor—the telephoto.

The rumors about the iPhone 17 Pro's camera setup include a potential new telephoto lens with a 48MP sensor underneath. Another change, compared to the 12MP periscope zoom on the 16 Pro, is that the new camera on the 17 Pro will allegedly support only 3.5x optical zoom.

The front camera is expected to get an upgrade in pixel count as well. The iPhone 16 Pro has a 12MP selfie camera, while the iPhone 17 Pro is expected to double the pixel count at 24MP.

Apple is known for its conservative approach toward battery capacity and charging, and we don't expect this to change with the iPhone 17 series. There are no specific rumors about the battery capacity inside the iPhone 17 Pro, but industry insiders think Apple won't have the physical space to expand the capacity and will rely on efficiency gains to improve battery life.

The iPhone 16 Pro comes equipped with a 3582 mAh battery on board, which is quite modest compared to other flagships that are now sporting 5000+ (or even 6000 mAh) batteries, but the way iPhones handle tasks, apps, and day-to-day activity allows for smaller-capacity batteries to perform on par with much larger ones.

In terms of charging, which has been another weak point and source of complaints from Apple users, we expect the iPhone 17 Pro to upgrade the wired charging speeds to 35W. We need more tests to see how this upgrade will impact charging times. In comparison, the iPhone 16 Pro charges from zero to 100% in 1h 34m.

Here's a quick (preliminary) specs comparison between the iPhone 17 Pro and the iPhone 16 Pro:

It's still early days to give you a conclusive verdict, but some things are starting to take shape and form. The iPhone 17 Pro will have a different design, for better or for worse, and this might turn into a deciding factor for many people.

The upgrades also seem quite substantial—we have the new A19 Pro silicon, more RAM, a more efficient and durable display, a new telephoto camera, and potentially faster charging. These all sound quite good on paper, but we have to run all the tests to see whether or not they bring real-life advantages to the table.

The iPhone 16 Pro, on the other hand, remains a pretty potent and powerful device, even with the A18 Pro chip and its 12MP tetraprism telephoto (which comes with more zoom as well). The battery life should be very close between those two, and the big divider might turn out to be the price.

With Trump's tariffs swinging on and off literally every day, there's an uncertainty whether or not Apple will be able to keep iPhone 17 series prices intact. There's a real possibility for the iPhone 17 Pro to breach the $1000 barrier for the first time, something Apple has been trying hard not to do in the past couple of generations.

The iPhone 17 Pro will no doubt be a better device than the iPhone 16 Pro. But at what cost?