It’s the time of the year when the rumors begin about the new generations of iPhone 17 due out in the Fall and whether it’s worth upgrading to a new model. It’s a ritual that began ever since Apple introduced their iPhones eighteen years ago. Each year Apple tries to entice us to upgrade with new features such as a better camera with more lenses, faster processors, new materials, and better screens. And for many years many of us would upgrade every 2 years to gain some great new features.
This year Apple is back to their old standby, making their product thinner. It’s worked for other products in the past, such as the MacBookAir, so they are just rolling out an old story and promoting it with millions in advertising. They will turn on their their marketing machine to make all sorts of claims on something that is really quite minor.
Their featured premium model is expected to be the thinnest iPhone ever. The iPhone 17 Air, as it is rumored to be called, will have a thickness of approximately 5.5 mm. It’s achieved by reducing certain features, such as extra camera lenses, using a smaller battery, and utilizing a titanium-aluminum alloy frame. It really reflects a total lack of innovation and imagination on the part of Apple.
There are two big reasons why it’s so foolish. First it will have a shorter battery life and for many, the iPhone has too short a life now. Second, nearly everyone puts a case on their phone for protection that adds 2 to 4 mm in thickness and overwhelms a phone’s reduction in thickness. And with a thin phone, you can bet that there will be extra hefty cases to protect its greater fragility.
Apple seems to have forgotten what most users actually care about isn’t thickness. In numerous surveys they ask for better battery life. And paradoxically battery life and thickness go together. The real cost of thinness is measured not in design aesthetics, but in diminished battery capacity, earlier battery failure because you charge more often, and user frustration because some will need to carry chargers, cords, and backup batteries to get through a day.
So just what are they talking about when they promote thickness? When the iPhone 6 debuted in 2014 it had a thickness of 6.9mm. Today the iPhone 16 Pro Max is at 8.25mm, less than 20% thicker. The Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra is 8.2mm. And all Pixel 9 phones are are 8.5mm. They’re all lovely devices, but no one buys one more than other because of its thickness.
Manufacturers could use that same space to add 20–30% more battery capacity, which would drastically improve user satisfaction and phone life. Looking back at the history of phones, none of them stand apart because of thickness:
A Brief History of Smartphone Thickness
| Phone | Year | Thickness |
|---|---|---|
| iPhone 4 | 2010 | 9.3 mm |
| iPhone 6 | 2014 | 6.9 mm |
| Galaxy S6 | 2015 | 6.8 mm |
| iPhone X | 2017 | 7.7 mm |
| Pixel 6 | 2021 | 8.9 mm |
| iPhone 15 Pro | 2023 | 8.25 mm |
| Galaxy S24 | 2024 | 7.6 mm |
Batteries just haven’t kept pace with the needs of all the new things we do with our phones. We now have faster 5G cellular, brighter screens, faster video, and always-on displays. FOrtunately new processors reduce power consumption, but no iPhone has yet proved capable of running 12 hours for a moderate to heavy user.
Now imagine an iPhone, Galaxy, or Pixel that was 2mm thicker but lasted two full days on a single charge. That’s a device people many would upgrade to.