Top Stories: Apple Event Recap With iPhone 16 and 16 Pro, Apple Watch Series 10, AirPods 4, and More - MacRumors
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Top Stories: Apple Event Recap With iPhone 16 and 16 Pro, Apple Watch Series 10, AirPods 4, and More

One of the busiest weeks of the year for Apple news has drawn to a close following Monday's event that saw the unveiling of new iPhone, Apple Watch, and AirPods models and Friday's start of iPhone pre-orders in dozens of countries around the world.

top stories 14sep2024
Read on below for the biggest announcements of this week as we take a brief break ahead of a flood of software updates early next week and all of the new hardware making its way into customers' hands a few days later!

Everything Apple Announced at Monday's Event in 13 Minutes

Apple's "It's Glowtime" event on Monday was a ~100-minute whirlwind of announcements, but we've condensed it down to a 13-minute highlight reel to give you a quick way to catch up on everything.

Glowtime Everything Announced Thumb 2
We've also pulled together all of our news coverage from the big day in one place, so make sure to check it out and read up on your favorite Apple products that got some fresh updates.

Apple Announces iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max with Larger Displays, New Camera Control, and More

Apple on Monday announced the iPhone 16 Pro and ‌iPhone 16 Pro‌ Max—its latest flagship smartphones—featuring larger displays, an all-new Camera Control button, and the A18 Pro chip.

iphone 16 pro colors 1
The ‌iPhone 16 Pro‌ has a 6.3-inch display, while the ‌iPhone 16 Pro‌ Max features a 6.9-inch display—the biggest iPhone display ever. The borders around the display are the thinnest of any Apple device, while the titanium frame now features a new blasted finish and comes in a refreshed selection of color options: a darker Black Titanium, brighter White Titanium, Natural Titanium, and a new Desert Titanium.

Apple Announces iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus With Action Button, Camera Control, and More

Apple also announced the 6.1-inch iPhone 16 and 6.7-inch iPhone 16 Plus, with a key new feature being the Camera Control on the side of the devices. As rumored, the Camera Control is positioned below the power button, and you can control various features in the Camera app by pressing or swiping on it.

iphone 16 lineup colors
Other features include the Action button introduced on the iPhone 15 Pro models last year, a "big boost" in battery life, brighter and more durable screens, Wi-Fi 7 support, and an A18 chip with up to a twice as fast 16-core Neural Engine for Apple Intelligence. The devices have color-infused back glass, with vibrant Ultramarine, Teal, Pink, White, and Black finishes available.

Apple Announces Thinner Apple Watch Series 10 With Bigger Screen Than Ultra

Apple at its event announced the Apple Watch Series 10, featuring a wide-angle OLED display that is larger than the Apple Watch Ultra's, with the company describing the new Series 10 as the "biggest display and thinnest design ever."

Apple Watch Series 10 lineup 240909 feature
The Series 10 is 9.7 mm thick, which is nearly 10% thinner than Series 9, and it weighs 20% less than the Stainless Steel Series 9. The Aluminum cases also weigh up to 10% less, while the Series 10 also comes in Grade 5 titanium, replacing stainless steel.

While we didn't get updated Apple Watch Ultra or Apple Watch SE models, we did get a new black finish for the Apple Watch Ultra 2, as well as an Apple Watch Hermès Ultra 2. Apple also introduced a new Titanium Milanese Loop for both colors of the Ultra.

Apple Unveils AirPods 4 With Two Models Featuring Improved Fit, USB-C, and More

As expected, Apple introduced two AirPods 4 models on Monday, a base model at $129 to replace the AirPods 2 and a higher-end model with Active Noise Cancellation and a case that supports wireless charging and features a speaker for Find My capabilities.

airpods 4 blue
Apple also revealed updated AirPods Max headphones at the event, but the only changes are new colors and a move from Lightning to USB-C for charging and connectivity. No other hardware updates are included.

iOS 18, macOS Sequoia, watchOS 11 and More Launching on September 16

With all of Apple's new hardware set to become available on Friday, September 20, the company is sticking to tradition and releasing its major new operating system versions a few days earlier.

iOS 18 on iPhone Feature
iOS 18, iPadOS 18, macOS Sequoia, watchOS 11, and more will all be available on Monday, September 16. It's important to note, however, that Apple Intelligence features will not be coming in this round of updates and will instead start rolling out in follow-on updates likely targeted for late October.

MacRumors Newsletter

Each week, we publish an email newsletter like this highlighting the top Apple stories, making it a great way to get a bite-sized recap of the week hitting all of the major topics we've covered and tying together related stories for a big-picture view.

So if you want to have top stories like the above recap delivered to your email inbox each week, subscribe to our newsletter!

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Top Rated Comments

ThomasJL Avatar
28 months ago
[sarcasm]
I am so happy that Tim Cook released products which will benefit shareholders more than customers. It's much more important to maximize profits to make rich shareholders even richer than to maximize products' user-friendliness for customers like me.
[/sarcasm]
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
28 months ago
It was a pretty disappointing event 😩😣
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
28 months ago
Nothing felt right about the introduction to the iPhone 16 Pro... the lack of detail and most of all, the lack of features on launch day makes me truly think twice about buying it. I had my finger ready to press the preorder button, but now I'm thinking, I've never seen Apple act this way during an expo and act this way for a launch of an iPhone with this many features not ready on launch day. I used to work for Apple, we had ONE situation like this with Siri, but... that was it... and instead of launching the phone without it, it was pushed to October. But this... the entire gimmick at this point was to promote the power to boost AI which you'll only get in December... and the rest of the world... sometime next year... EU? Who knows... So again we're back to "OOOH LOOK AT THE CAMERA"... okay nice but now more features use AI and it's not ready for launch day? I wish I didn't have to buy a new iphone and could wait to the 17 but then, that's what I said when 13 came out, and kept saying it till we reached 16...

My best functioning iPhone that to this day despite it not being supported anymore, was the iPhone 8. Which iPhone do you feel was the most solid, problem free iphone you've ever owned?

Long story short, my history working for Apple, seeing them this way, truly makes me wonder what is going on behind closed doors, sadly I know some of it... but not all of it, so I'll just say... I wish the iPhone 16 gave me that "OH WOW" feel... it didn't... not this time. But I have an iphone 12... it's become useless... so I will update to the 16 either way. Just wish it was under better circumstances and better promotion.
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
28 months ago

The only part I don't agree with you on is, "I agree with much of what you said. But the idea that the technology has matured is the biggest bull of bologna one couldn’t possibly regurgitate."

The smartphone market is contracting and even if that wasn't the case, how much more can you do with a smartphone that has real value? You have productivity features, automated home and car features, media consumption and production, phone and messaging, books and games, health and fitness, etc.

The only thing left is to do with the iPhone are incremental changes unless you do a serious redesign or add a different class of "iDevice" like a bi fold or trifold screen.

From what I recall even Tim Cook has alluded to this in his investor meetings that there's not much room left to expand on the iPhone concept. This is why they tried to dive into the automotive, media, and AR space. The era of the iPhone being a guaranteed hardware sales cash cow is coming to an end.
There is a lot they could do.
But they don’t take risks anymore.

And when they do it’s so expansive 9/10 consumers can’t even afford it.
Apple seriously needs to start embracing the affordable device economy.

I think I can say this, because I've not seen any prototype coming out of Apple for a few years now. But I can say that the idea of iPhone staying the iPhone forever was already discussed with Steve Jobs before his death. They had started towards his death to design the next best thing after the iPhone. In fact they had concepts from wearable phones to some that were so basic that the tech that would be used was still in its early stages but would be incredible if it ever got into our hands.

The tech I've seen in the meetings back in 18 were things I still don't understand why we don't have. I say that but I really do know why, I'd rather not mention it here. Let's say that the teams that used to get really creative longer has free range, no longer is allowed to produce them to show. Now there is a mission for an objective. If you look at Apple as a company, objectively, you can see the minute changes they made to their product lines in terms of look etc.

Back when Apple said "Let's shake things up a bit and introduce colorful Home Computers and make people want one in every home..." those days were the golden era of Apple. I miss it, I met the Woz and he was just the best, I learned a lot from him about Apple's origin and core values. I always wished he had stayed and been a moral compass to the company somehow. We'd have had an entirely different company today. Or at least that's what I dream about.

Long story short, part of me was left at Apple, and while I still keep in touch with some from the Farm, I don't recognize the place anymore, or their morals, values or goals...

What Apple had planned with tech in the 2020s never came to be, they were exciting and felt like a natural evolution to where we were meant to go. But in all honesty, even back in 18 where we were with Apple, was already in a form of delay given the lack of progress of anything we saw way back when... Sure the world changes, trends change etc. But looking at Android today, they take chances, much like what Apple did... now, the way Apple is, is starting to become a bit of an industry joke with their exaggerated claims and expos with no real substance... phones never really changing that much, no real wow factor anymore.

I guess I just miss the way Apple was. Back when I was there in the early days, everyone felt the energy and had a shared vision of where we were all going, opportunities and the excitement of it all.

Okay I'll stop here, I don't want this to become a confession booth.
I still have my old Apple tech ID and badge strung up on my board at the desk in my workshop.
I remember when I was working with Apple when the transition to the thin retina MacbooK Pros happened.

There was so much you could do with the older modular design. Working on those devices was a breeze, so simple and so straight forward.

But then the retina 15” hit.
I sat around a table with my old colleagues staring at this engineering sample.
….The ram is soldered ON TO THE BOARD?”

We all just shook our heads….
We knew that a significant point of failure had just become a significant disaster waiting to happen.

At that point Ram was the leading point of failure for the pre Retina MacBook/Pro lineup. And it was such an easy fix. But having the memory soldered to the board ment the turnover rate and repair rate for these devices would sky rocket.
And it did. And when we would push the concerns up the chain we never got even the simplest of excuses or replies to our concerns.
The best explanation I was given was basically this, and I’m paraphrasing.
“ The new cost of the retina lineup will offset any technical defects or turnover for repairs “
They incorporated the failure rate of the new onboard ram INTO THE PRICE OF THE DEVICE.
While they ended up being reasonably reliable devices, the statement still stuck with me.
….They designed it to fail just enough their turnover and repair costs were glued right into the price of the machine ….
I remember engineering samples with removable M socket graphics cards. But NOPE costs $5 more to socket them than to solder them in.
Turns out, no it wasn’t. Then millions upon millions of logic boards were replaced under a recall….

When I first started work for Apple something like this was unheard of. Just like you said, there was a sense of wonder.

And on my last day I felt that sense of wonder sucked right out of the ecosystem. Steve Jobs was gone, Jon Ivy was leaving…. The company felt like a stagnant money machine.

Apple seems to have continued down that path. And it’s terrible.
Investor first.
Consumer last.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
28 months ago
I think a bigger top story is FDA approves Apple AirPods Pro 2 to be used as hearing aids.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
28 months ago
Well an S10 Watch is coming my way for sure to replace the S5, going to hold off on the iPhone as it sounds like the ram will get bumped next year on the pro.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
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