The all-new iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max were announced at Apple's "It's Glowtime" event on September 9. If you're a committed iPhone enthusiast or are looking to get the ultimate creative camera, audio, and video features for your iPhone, you're likely to be intrigued by the newly debuted Pro and Pro Max models. This latest generation adds a host of new Apple Intelligence features to help you more easily accomplish daily tasks with Siri as well as personal and professional projects (features only newer iPhones support, too). Below, we'll cover the new features and compare how they stack up to previous models.
iPhone 16 Pro & Pro Max Release Date & Pricing
Availability:
- Pre-order September 13
- Available September 20
Pricing:
While the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max add new features, they are priced the same as last year's models when they were first released:
- iPhone 16 Pro: Starts at $999 or $41.62/month
- iPhone Pro Max: Starts at $1,199 or $49.95/month
Pro Tip
Customers purchasing through Apple in the USA can get up to $800 off when they trade in an iPhone 12 or later model. You may find even better trade-in deals through your carrier. It's worth checking!
The iPhone 16 Pro & Pro Max at a Glance
- These models support Apple Intelligence, which gives you greater photo, video, and audio editing capabilities. While the iPhone 15 Pro and later support Apple Intelligence, the 16 Pro line comes with the A18 Pro chip, which is designed specifically to best handle AI requests.
- A new Camera Control button on the side of your iPhone lets you quickly adjust photo settings before capturing an image.
- The improved camera allows for better action shots, more detailed slow-motion video captures, and even more impressive macro photography and wide-angle shots.
- The new Pro lineup includes titanium casing and a more durable glass screen.
- The iPhone 16 Pro lineup displays are slightly larger than the previous iPhone 15 Pro lineup at 6.3" for the Pro and 6.9" for the Pro Max.
- This lineup is faster, more energy-efficient, and has a longer battery life than the previous Pro and Pro Max models, with up to 27 hours of video playback for the Pro and 33 hours for the Pro Max.
Size, Casing & Colors
The newly announced iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max models have the same durable titanium casing as the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max models. However, the iPhone 16 models now have the latest-generation Ceramic Shield screen. This upgraded screen is twice as strong as the glass on any other smartphone and offers significantly more protection. These models are offered in a range of professional colors: Desert Titanium, Natural Titanium, White Titanium, and Black Titanium.
The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max also have the largest displays ever offered on an iPhone. The new iPhone 16 Pro is 6.3" (compared to 6.1" in the previous generation), and the iPhone 16 Pro Max is 6.9" (as compared to the previous 6.7"). The larger display comes from a combination of a slightly larger iPhone casing, as well as the reduction of the black border around the edge of your iPhone screen, which continues to get thinner and less noticeable with each new release.
Storage, Speed & Battery Life
The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max have the new A18 Pro chip, which offers performance upgrades for better power efficiency, processing speed, and battery life. The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max are faster and use less power, while offering up to 27 (Pro) and 33 (Pro Max) hours of nonstop video playback before needing to be recharged. This is an improvement from the previous Pro and Pro Max models, which offered 23 and 29 hours of video playback, respectively.
Similar to the previous models, the iPhone 16 Pro storage options start at 128 GB and allow you to get up to 1 TB of storage. The iPhone 16 Pro Max starts at 256 TB and allows you to upgrade to 1 TB of storage. For context, a single image takes roughly 5 MB of storage space, meaning that 1 TB can hold about 200,000 photos. The 1 TB storage option is only offered for the Pro and Pro Max models, so if you often keep large amounts of photo and video files on your iPhone, it might be worth upgrading from the base model iPhones to get a larger storage capacity. If you're thinking of purchasing a new iPhone, you might also want to learn more about the new iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus.
Pro Apple Intelligence
The iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max were specifically designed to support Apple Intelligence, which is the artificial intelligence program developed by Apple. This system has been developed with data privacy in mind and uses a combination of secure on-device and server processing. Apple Intelligence is designed to help simplify daily tasks. It can summarize your notifications, help you put together professional-sounding emails, and makes Siri even smarter. By integrating Apple Intelligence, Siri can now better understand when you stumble over words and has improved language-understanding capabilities, making it feel more natural to communicate with Siri. Apple is putting a lot of emphasis on improving and developing this system for the iPhone, and it does offer a lot of beneficial ways to improve everyday tasks and enhance your creative projects.
While not yet available, there are a few fun Apple Intelligence features scheduled for release later this year, including some whimsical options like Image Playground, which allows you to type in a short description to generate playful images. There's even a new feature called Genmoji that allows you to create custom emojis on the fly by typing in a short description to generate a personalized emoji! You can read more about Apple Intelligence in our iOS 18 rundown.
Improved Camera for More Creative iPhone Photography
Let's talk about Camera Control, a new button included with all iPhone 16 models. The new Camera Control button integrates hardware and software to make your camera system feel more natural to use. It helps you perfectly frame your shot and adjust other settings, such as exposure, zoom, and depth of field. Something I appreciate is that the new Camera Control button won't only work for the Apple Camera app. It'll also help you frame and adjust your shots on third-party apps like Kino. Later this year, Camera Control will receive an additional update allowing you to click and hold the Camera Control button to look up things in the real world, like restaurant hours and menus.
The new iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max also include several hardware improvements that allow you to take even more detailed wide-angle and macro photography shots. Your slow-motion videos will be higher-resolution and more stunning than ever, and the shutter now has zero lag (meaning you can capture the movement of a dress of a person exactly how it was in the moment you took the photo). This is amazing for those who love action shots with a lot of movement!
Better Photo, Video & Audio Capabilities
For image editing, Photographic Styles offers a huge improvement over the previously offered photo filters. While filters apply a single color across a photo, Photographic Styles locally adjusts color, highlights, and shadows across a photo. It's better able to render skin tones and allows you to further personalize the aesthetic of an image. You can also more easily edit and adjust the style and exposure in a video, as well as adjust playback speed in slow-motion videos.
The iPhone 16 Pro lineup also gives you inventive new ways to edit the sound in a video. With Audio Mix, you can easily adjust the sound after a video is captured to remove background noise or make it sound like it was recorded inside a studio. The new audio capabilities allow you to use Voice Memos in new ways: now you can play a track, such as a guitar recording, and record yourself singing or playing another instrument at the same time. For calls and video recordings, new software also reduces unwanted background noise, like traffic, wind, and water. If you're someone who frequently takes calls while doing the dishes or walking outside, this is a significant improvement.
Final Thoughts
If you tend to only use your iPhone for basic tasks and the occasional photo shoot, the new models might not be worth the extra cost. I'd recommend sticking with the base model iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus, or not upgrading at all. But if you're someone who enjoys utilizing their iPhone for creative projects, or you just enjoy the powerful camera features for great family and travel photos, the extra Pro and Pro Max features are likely worth the upgrade.
