Apple rates the iPhone 18 Pro Max at up to 30 hours of typical use and 45 hours of video playback, against 24 and 36 hours for the iPhone 18 Pro. That is a quarter more battery for $100, and it is aimed at a smaller group of people than the number of Pro Max…
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Siri AI's EU Exclusion Covers watchOS Too, and Apple Says It Is Working on a Path Forward
Apple’s newest and strongest wording on Siri AI in the European Union is not in a press release headline. It is in footnote 3 of the iPhone 18 Pro announcement, it covers three operating systems rather than one, and it ends with a sentence Apple has not used before. iPhone 18 Pro ships with iOS…
Live Rewind and Siri Recap Need an iPhone 16 or Newer, Apple's New Support Document Says
Apple published a support document on September 9 that gives a name to a set of Apple Intelligence features on its two newest watches, and it carries a requirement that is easy to miss. Two of the four features in the category need an iPhone 16 or newer, and the other two do not. Apple…
iPhone 18 Pro's 16x Zoom Range Is Not 16x Zoom: What the Number Means When You Frame a Shot
The 16x on Apple’s iPhone 18 Pro camera page is a range, not a magnification. Apple’s own wording is “8x optical-quality zoom in, 2x optical zoom out, 16x optical-quality zoom range”, which means the distance from the widest framing to the longest, not a shot that is 16 times closer than what your eye sees.…
Apple Watch Series 12 Aluminum, Titanium or Ceramic: What Each Case Weighs, and What Apple Has Not Priced
Choosing between aluminum, titanium and ceramic on Apple Watch Series 12 changes four published things: the front crystal, the weight, the case dimensions in ceramic, and the finishes on offer. It changes nothing about the chip, the sensors, the display or the battery. Series 12 comes in 42mm and 46mm cases, or 43mm and 47mm…
Apple Watch Readiness: What the Score Is Built From, and Whether It Is Worth a New Watch
Readiness is a single score between 0 and 10, produced once a day and updated as the day goes on, built from four inputs Apple names: recent activity, training load, vitals and sleep. It ends in one of four recommendations, Recover, Pace Yourself, Ready or Go For It. Readiness is listed on Series 12 and…
Apple Watch Series 12 Heart Sensors: What Changes If You Are Not an Athlete
If you are not training for anything, what the new Health Sensing System on Apple Watch Series 12 changes is how often the watch measures you and where those numbers surface, not what the watch is able to tell you. Apple’s figures are precise: heart rate every five seconds all day, and heart rate variability…
Apple Watch Ultra 4 or Series 12: The Three Numbers That Decide It, Starting With Your Wrist Size
Apple Watch Ultra 4 and Apple Watch Series 12 share the S11 chip, the same Health Sensing System, the same Readiness app and the same 64GB of storage, so this is not a health decision. Three published numbers settle it instead: the wrist range each case is designed to fit, how many hours the watch…
Apple Watch Series 10 to Series 12: What watchOS 27 Gives You Free, and What Needs the $399 Upgrade
Apple Watch Series 10 is on the watchOS 27 compatibility list, so every software feature Apple showed on September 9 lands on the watch you already own, free, on September 14. What the $399 Apple Watch Series 12 buys is hardware: the new Health Sensing System, up to 24 hours of battery instead of 18,…
The 2TB iPhone 18 Pro Is a Video Tool: Who It Suits, and the $1,000 Alternative
The 2TB iPhone 18 Pro costs $2,399, which is $1,200 more than the 256GB model and $1,000 more than the 512GB one, and it is the only tier in the range that is bought for one reason rather than several. If you are not recording professional video formats on the phone itself, the top tier…
Should You Wait for iPhone Duo 2? The Case For and Against a First-Generation Fold
There is no published case for waiting for a second-generation iPhone Duo, because Apple has not announced one, dated one, or hinted at one. The real question is narrower and answerable: is the first Duo finished enough to buy in October, given what Apple itself says is still to come. The 7.6-inch inner display, the…
Delivery or Apple Store Pickup on September 18: What Apple Publishes, and Why Your Trade-In Decides It
Apple’s published pre-order flow offers two ways to receive an iPhone 18 Pro on Friday, September 18: delivery, or pickup at an Apple Store. Apple has published nothing that says one is faster than the other, so the choice comes down to a single thing that genuinely differs, and it is your trade-in. Accessories can…
iPhone 16 Pro to iPhone 18 Pro: Is the Upgrade Worth $689 After Trade-In?
If you are carrying an iPhone 16 Pro, the straight answer is that the iPhone 18 Pro is a genuine upgrade in three places, a sideways move in a fourth, and a poor use of money in every other respect. Apple prices it at $1,199 for 256GB and its trade-in page currently estimates up to…
How Tough Is iPhone Duo's Hinge? Apple Published IP68 and 100 Components, but Not a Fold Count
Apple has published a great deal about how iPhone Duo is built and one thing it has not published at all: how many times the hinge is rated to open and close. For a $1,999 phone whose defining part is a hinge, that absence is the most important line in the specification. The inner display…
Will iPhone Duo's Crease Bother You? What Apple's Nano-Texture Claim Really Promises
Apple never says iPhone Duo has no crease. It says the inner display has a custom nano-texture finish that reduces glare and minimizes the visible crease, and those two claims are the same claim, because a crease on a folding screen is mostly something you see in a reflection rather than something you see in…
Ceramic Shield 2 in 2026: Which Apple Devices Get It, and Why Apple Only Claims Scratch Resistance
Ceramic Shield 2 sits on the front of the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max, on the outer display of the iPhone Duo, and on the front crystal of the aluminum Apple Watch Series 12. Every claim Apple publishes for it is a scratch claim: three times better scratch resistance on the iPhone…
iPhone Duo or iPhone 18 Pro Max? The Buyer Each One Is Actually For
If you spend your day in one app at a time and judge a phone by its camera, buy the iPhone 18 Pro Max and save $700. If you regularly wish your phone were a small tablet, iPhone Duo is the only iPhone that answers that, and the $700 is the price of the answer.…
Is iPhone Duo Worth $1,999? The Honest Case For and Against Apple's First Fold
iPhone Duo costs $1,999 for 256GB and $3,199 for 2TB, which makes the cheapest fold exactly $700 more than the cheapest iPhone 18 Pro Max. Our answer, drawn only from what Apple has published: it is worth the money if the 7.6-inch inner display changes what you do all day, and it is poor value…
iPhone 18 Pro Pre-Order Window: Six Days From September 12 to September 18, Country by Country
Apple opens iPhone 18 Pro pre-orders at a single moment worldwide, 5 a.m. PT on Saturday, September 12, and begins putting phones in hands on Friday, September 18. That is a six-day window between the tap that commits your money and the day Apple says the phone arrives. All four iPhone 18 Pro finishes, one…
IShowSpeed Becomes First Person to Backflip While Holding Apple’s Foldable iPhone Duo
IShowSpeed became the first person to perform a backflip while holding Apple’s new foldable iPhone Duo, with CEO John Ternus watching.
AirPods 5 vs AirPods 2: Upgrading From the Classic Lightning AirPods
AirPods 5 costs $129, or $149 with the Wireless Charging Case, and against the second-generation AirPods from 2019 it adds Active Noise Cancellation, an IP57 water and dust rating, the H2 chip and a USB-C case. The 2019 model launched at $159 with the Charging Case and $199 with the Wireless Charging Case, was cut…
Apple Watch Series 12 vs Apple Watch Series 7: Five Years On, Everything That Changed
Five years separate Apple Watch Series 7 from Series 12, and in that time Apple has changed the chip four times, doubled peak brightness from 1000 to 2000 nits, moved from 41 mm and 45 mm cases to 42 mm and 46 mm, added temperature, depth and water temperature sensors, and raised the battery rating…
Apple Watch Series 12 vs Apple Watch Series 8: watchOS 27 Drops Series 8, So Is It Time to Upgrade?
Apple Watch Series 8 is not on Apple’s watchOS 27 compatibility list, which starts at Series 9, so the 2022 watch stops at watchOS 26 while Series 12 launches with the new software, an S11 chip, a 2000-nit display, new heart sensors and a 24-hour battery rating. The starting price is unchanged at $399, the…
Apple Watch Series 12 vs Apple Watch Series 9: Three Years, Two Chip Generations and a New Sensor Stack
Apple Watch Series 12 is two chip generations ahead of the 2023 Series 9, moving from the S9 to the S11, and it adds a new Health Sensing System, a depth gauge, a 24-hour battery rating instead of 18, and 42 mm and 46 mm cases in place of 41 mm and 45 mm, all…