iPhone 15 Pro Review: A Timeless Transformation
The iPhone gets its largest design update since iPhone X — and it’s the best one yet
When you build a new phone every year for 16 years straight, some years are bound to be boring. Others are bound to be exciting. Regardless, every year, you’re met with people on the internet making fun of you for “shipping the same design every year,” and competitors mocking you for “not being innovative,” or “recycling the same phone yearly,” even when they know they do the same. Phones are iterative in the 2020s. The rectangular, “candy bar-style” smartphone has peaked. Apple knows this, too, which is why it’s aiming to reinvent personal computing yet again with Apple Vision Pro. There are only so many ways to design a basketball before it isn’t a basketball anymore. You can switch up the colors, try new materials, change the size slightly, make the ball slightly more flat or rounded, etc. But if you go too far for the sake of proving you’re “innovative,” it’s not a basketball anymore. If you make a phone fold, it’s not a phone anymore — it’s an entirely new category of computer. And people don’t want an entirely new category of computer — at least not yet. They just want a phone that feels familiar to them. That phone is the iPhone. It’s predictable. People like predictability. Change the formula of Coke too much, and suddenly nobody is interested in it. Change the design of the iPhone too much, and people will hold on to their ancient iPhone 8s because they need a Home Button.
iPhone 15 Pro transforms the timeless, simple, and predictable design of the iPhone. It can’t make anyone angry — it’s the same iPhone, after all. The edges are flat, the volume buttons are still in the same place, the bezels are still rounded, and the body is virtually the same size. But from the moment you pick it up, it feels different. In a good way. It still feels like an iPhone, but it’s better. The last time I felt this way with an iPhone was with iPhone X. The phone felt remarkably different in the hand, yet it unmistakably was an iPhone. But that time, my differing experience was for obvious reasons: the back was made out of glossy glass, the corners were more rounded, and the sides were made out of a material Apple had never used on the iPhone before: stainless steel. The phone was bigger, the front glass was more curved, the Side Button was longer, and there was no home button. The iPhone X was a seismic shift in the design of the iPhone. By contrast, iPhone 15 Pro looks the same as any other iPhone post-iPhone 12 at a glance. But when you hold it, you think to yourself: This is what the iPhone should’ve felt like all this time. It’s a breath of fresh air. It’s an “aha” moment. This is what the iPhone needed.
iPhone 15 Pro is no massive spec boost. It’s no massive visual design overhaul, it doesn’t bring some gargantuan camera overhaul, and it doesn’t invent a breakthrough new method of interaction. Apple saves those mind-blowing experiences for new product categories altogether, because if you change a basketball too much, it’s not a basketball anymore. However, iPhone 15 Pro is the most refined iPhone ever made. It’s the most enjoyable iPhone ever made. Every time you use it, it’s delightful in a way that’s difficult to express to someone who hasn’t used it. It’s a perfection of iPhone design. I’m unsure if it’s the most powerful phone on the market, if it’s worth the money, or even if you should upgrade to it. I’ve never focused on those arbitrary, dynamic benchmarks reviewers seem to set. The goalposts change each year, and they vary from person to person. It’s impossible and reckless to pass a blanket statement as to whether a phone is “worth it” or not. “Worth” is self-defined. Innovation is self-defined. iPhone 15 Pro might not be “worth it” for many people, but it sure as hell is an enjoyable consumer technology product. It’s like a cone of ice cream on a hot summer’s day or a warm, freshly baked croissant on a cold winter evening — it’s just how it was meant to be.
Titanium
iPhone 15 Pro switches to a new material for its casing: titanium. If we’re being specific, the material is not entirely titanium, either. Instead, grade five titanium is bonded with aluminum through a process called solid-state diffusion, creating a titanium alloy that Apple uses. This makes sense: The internal casing of the phone that won’t be seen or touched by end consumers (unless they’re performing repairs) doesn’t need to be made out of the same premium material that the exterior is. Grade five titanium is expensive to mill, cut, and produce at scale, and is also heavier than aluminum, so avoiding it when it’s unnecessary is an effective way to cut manufacturing costs and weight. Apple says that the internal casing’s aluminum is 100 percent recycled, too, which is good for the environment (Apple 2030!).
Titanium is the best material an iPhone has ever been made out of — period. I attribute iPhone 15 Pro’s hand feel mostly to the new titanium alloy. The matte, brushed titanium that makes up the side rails of iPhone 15 Pro makes the phone feel a lot smoother, or in other words, more luxurious. You might think that weightier, glossier materials would feel or look more expensive and high-class, but I’d argue that that’s mainly true in jewelry rather than technology or other commonly used items. iPhone 15 Pro feels more — and I don’t negatively mean this — delicate, or sleek, in more positive terms. Though it might look like aluminum, it doesn’t feel like aluminum; it doesn’t feel “flat” and has some character to it that simply feels refreshing and… nice. The phone does feel a little slippery due to the matte texture, but I prefer it over the grippy texture of the glossy stainless steel. This most certainly comes down to personal preference, and I have heard complaints from people who think the matte texture is too slippery, but I think the brushed titanium makes the phone feel more comfortable and easy to handle while looking handsome. The best way I can describe it is that it’s like the texture of aluminum, but more premium and substantial; it’s aluminum with a twist. It strikes an excellent balance between the two materials, and I’m glad Apple chose titanium as the material on the Pro models this year.
The titanium alloy also addresses the weight issue of iPhones X and beyond. The stainless steel band — though snazzy — was unreasonably hefty to the point where it became unbearable to hold for long periods with one hand. If you support your iPhone X or newer with your little finger (the load-bearing finger) as support, you’ll notice that it becomes incredibly uncomfortable to use after a while. It feels exhausting and painful (I wish I were exaggerating), and your whole hand feels sore. If you wear thin sweatpants, stainless steel iPhones drag your pockets down and feel like they’re about to fall out all the time — it’s very unsettling. Watching a video in bed always gives you anxiety because “What if the phone falls on my face?” And when your stainless steel iPhone inevitably does fall on your face because your hands get tired of holding a brick heavy enough to kill a man, it hurts. Point is, the stainless steel — although pretty — was unusable. Titanium is a much, much lighter material, and thus, it’s noticeably more comfortable to hold for 10 or 20 minutes at a time. When I first took iPhone 15 Pro out of its box, my first physical observation was the striking weight difference. It’s astronomical, despite what the numbers say (19 grams as a measurement doesn’t do it justice). When I compared it to my year-old iPhone 14 Pro I had carried around for a year, the difference was night and day; I couldn’t imagine how I hauled the old one around for so long. My little finger can bear the weight of this phone without giving up in discomfort, and that’s a much-needed victory.
The edges of the new band are also slightly curved towards the screen and the back glass, which majorly contributes to how excellent the phone feels in hand. Before the iPhone 12 (and I guess after the iPhone 6), all iPhones had curved sides, but that changed in 2020 when Apple completely flattened the sides. While the flat sides are more striking and look better, they’re also sharper because they create exactly 90-degree edges. Boxy, sharp 90-degree edges don’t feel very good in the hand. When holding an iPhone 12 or newer, your hand starts to become sore after a while because the edges dig into the palm of your hand and your load-bearing finger. It’s like holding a sharp cube in your hand; it’s not pleasant. This was not a problem with the curved iPhones of yore because the sides were smooth and didn’t poke into your hand. Apple has struck a balance between looks and hand feel with iPhone 15 Pro (and iPhone 15): The sides, when looking at them horizontally, are flat, so the phone still appears visually distinctive. But if you look closely, the titanium band curves inwards right at the part that you hold meaning that the edges are now blunt, therefore alleviating the pain of 90-degree corners. My small finger doesn’t feel achy, and my hand doesn’t hurt using iPhone 15 Pro. It’s, dare I say, “worth it”; the curved sides make iPhone 15 Pro such a joy to use. They don’t look all that different, but they feel so good. So much so that I’m willing to make a rather bold statement: iPhone 15 Pro feels as smooth as iPhone X-era phones and, in some ways, feels more comfortable than iPhone X-era phones; Apple killed it.
The screen, like iPhone X-era phones, is also curved, albeit not by as much. The iPhone 12 and beyond had “2D glass,” which essentially meant that the glass was 100 percent flat. There was no curve at the edges — the panel was entirely flat. Pre-iPhone 12 (but post-iPhone 6) models used “2.5D glass,” which sat in between “3D glass” — which fully curved around the edge of the phone (the Samsung Galaxy “Edge” phones used this glass) — and 2D glass. If I had to describe iPhone 15 Pro’s glass, I’d say it’s “2.25D glass,” even though that isn’t a real term. The new, thinner bezels are just ever so slightly curved, and you notice it after a while. Again, like the curved band, the curvature isn’t immediately noticeable at a glance, but when you hold the phone and grip the edges, you feel and see it. When you look at the phone head-on in the light, light reflects off the dark bezels, highlighting the slight curvature. You also get used to the thinner bezels, even though the difference is only in the tenths of a millimeter. It’s a subtle difference on paper, but if you pick up an older iPhone after using iPhone 15 Pro for a week, it’s prominent. The curved band, curved screen, and smaller bezels all combined make the phone feel thinner, smaller, and sleeker, even though this year’s models are in fact thicker than last year’s. No joke, after using iPhone 15 Pro for two weeks, it feels like an old iPhone 6 or 7, in some ways. It’s not that much smaller, but it certainly feels smaller and thinner. It’s the same effect the tapered edges of the MacBook Air had.
The device feels delightful to hold and comfortable to use, unlike other modern iPhone models. Don’t be swayed by the minimal or unnoticeable differences in the product photography — iPhone 15 Pro feels spectacular. Like I said, it makes you think, “How did I live with phones that were more uncomfortable than this?” It’s what we’ve wanted for years. The matte texture makes the phone feel slippery and premium, the lightweight casing makes the phone more usable and less unwieldy, the slightly curved edges make the phone more comfortable and “soft” to hold, and the Natural Titanium color is chef’s kiss gorgeous. All four factors make iPhone 15 Pro the best-looking and feeling iPhone since iPhone 4, hands-down; fight me!
With all this said — and I realize we all are very opinionated tech nerds with strong feelings about phone designs — I truly do not understand why people are raising complaints about the titanium casing this year. It’s no secret that I think it’s fabulous. However, one of the more popular complaints against titanium has been a new “issue” (“issue” belongs in dick quotes) hilariously dubbed “fingerprintgate.” When Apple invited the press to its headquarters for the September event, a bunch of the demo units — especially the ones in darker colors (i.e. Blue Titanium and Black Titanium) — accumulated a bunch of fingerprint grime from all of the journalists’ hands. The grime appeared lighter than the frame, somewhat obviously, and a vocal group of imbecilic know-it-alls called this discoloration of the physical vapor deposition coating on the titanium. This is such a pathetic attempt at finding an issue with the new iPhones that I don’t even know where to start. Every iPhone since the original iPhone has had this issue. Heck, every object that’s not treated with an oleophobic coating exhibits this issue. If you take human sweat and smear it over something, then let that sweat harden, it will appear light. That’s what’s happening here. It’s common sense. It is not discoloration and has nothing to do with the PVD coating and how it’s applied to the titanium. I have experienced this “fingerprintgate” non-issue on my Natural Titanium iPhone 15 Pro, and I wiped the grime away with just a damp cloth. Nothing special; it goes away easily.
I’d also like to dwell on the Natural Titanium while we’re on the topic. The Natural Titanium is beautiful. Here’s how I’d describe it: imagine the gray skies of a mostly cloudy day, where you can see the warm sun just barely peeking through the clouds. It’s a warm gray. Now, imagine that color on a metallic, matte object. That’s Natural Titanium. It beautifully shines in the light, and I’m a huge fan. Don’t judge the color based on the renders on Apple’s website — it’s nothing like that in real life. Apple’s renders portray the color closer to gold than it really is. It is a warm color, but it’s not Starlight-like. When the official renders first came out, I thought, “Starlight!” But, it’s not Starlight — it’s not even close. It’s nothing like the wallpaper, to use a reference. If you’re a fan of the gold from previous years, I’ve got bad news for you: it’s not gold-like. But if you’re not a fan of warm colors, there’s nothing to be worried about here. It’s a beautiful color that looks like neutral gray 99.99% of the time, with a sneeze of warmth in the sunlight. Also, if you choose the Natural Titanium (or the White Titanium, I assume, but I don’t have experience with that color), you’ll barely notice fingerprints. Yes, “fingerprintgate” still exists to some extent (again, all objects exhibit this behavior), but unless you look closely, you won’t notice the fingerprints. When they do appear, they’re slightly darker than the phone’s body, and sometimes, grime accumulates around the buttons when the phone gets really dirty. It’s a non-issue and has been exaggerated on the internet.
The titanium casing on iPhone 15 Pro is the biggest update this year, and that’s remarkable because it’s extremely rare that I cite a physical change as the headlining amendment to the iPhone. But yet, here we are. This is the best refinement of the iPhone’s design ever. It just feels good.
Action Button
For the first time in, checks notes, forever, Apple has added a button to the iPhone. It’s called the Action Button, and it replaces the mute switch, a feature of the iPhone dating back to the original one introduced in 2007 — 16 years ago. The Action Button is another one of those features of iPhone 15 Pro that just feels like a natural progression of the iPhone’s design. In 2007, a mute switch was a breakthrough because, for something to make a noise on your phone, it had to be very important. The only things that would alert you in 2007 were phone calls, text messages, and emails from your VIP contacts. Those were the only apps on the iPhone that could send you notifications. Everything else had to wait, so a prominent mute switch was important for times when you didn’t want your iPhone to make even the most mandatory of sounds, like in a library or other quiet location. Now, many years later, every app under the sky wants to send us promotional offers, retention notifications, and advertisements to grab our attention and reel us in. Every mainstream app makes noise now, and there’s no way to get them to stop — even if promotional/marketing notifications are prohibited by App Review (it’s a shame that nobody at App Review cares about upholding App Store Review Guidelines). As a result, nearly everyone keeps their phone on silent mode, negating the purpose of a switch that takes up valuable room on the phone’s body. Apple recognized this and replaced the mute switch with a customizable Action Button — a feature borrowed from Apple Watch Ultra — and that was the right move.
At its core, the Action Button is simply a button that can do anything. It’s like a mini Stream Deck, but for your iPhone. Delightfully, instead of doing the typical Apple thing and limiting the utility of the Action Button by only letting it perform a set of system-defined actions, Apple allows you to run any shortcut you build with the Shortcuts app with just a press of the Action Button. This opens up a virtually limitless set of actions — everything from simply opening an app to fetching JavaScript Object Notation from a webpage. By default, the Action Button toggles silent mode on and off, and you change that from the bespoke, weirdly whimsical menu in Settings → Action Button. The menu shows a 3D representation of your iPhone model from the side, showing the Action Button with a colorful overlay that changes colors depending on the action you’ve chosen (red for silent mode, purple for Focus [you can choose a Focus mode], yellow for Camera [you can choose a Camera shooting mode that you’d like it to open], lavender for Flashlight, gray for Magnifier, and indigo for Shortcuts).
There’s no noticeable downside to using a button to toggle silent mode over a switch, or at least not one that I can think of. When you turn on silent mode, the phone vibrates in a series of three short haptic pulses. When you turn off silent mode, the phone vibrates with a singular less strong pulse. Even if you don’t remember the vibration pattern for each mode, it’s not hard to tell which mode you’re in just by touch. The “on” pattern feels like the vibrations are being “restricted” in a way, like a clapper — that’s the part of a bell that bangs against the sound bow, the part that makes the noise — that has been sound dampened, if that makes sense. (If it doesn’t, don’t worry — words are hard.) The “off” pattern feels looser and less strong, like a bell that can make noise; it feels more like a normal vibration rather than a haptic pulse. It’s hard to explain, but it’s intuitive once you use it; I had no confusion using it. The unique haptic vibrations were specially designed to make sense, and it works. It’s better than a switch in many ways. The Dynamic Island also jiggles around when switching to ringer mode, and simply animates in when switching to silent mode if you want a visual indicator.
If you program your Action Button to perform an action other than toggling silent mode on and off, you still can control silent mode via Control Center. The new silent mode toggle is like the one on the iPad (since that doesn’t have a mute switch either; it never has), and you can’t remove it from Control Center even if you want to. One amusing side effect of the new toggle is that the Screen Recording menu gets demoted to a “regular” Control Center item, so you can now remove it exclusively on iPhone 15 Pro models. Now that’s worth $1,000. Additionally, a little bell icon with a slash through it appears in the Status Bar to the right of the time/carrier when your phone is on mute (that’s to the left of the Dynamic Island in left-to-right languages). If the Dynamic Island is active with a Live Activity or if a Focus mode is enabled, the bell icon is hidden, but you can always check the status via Control Center. This indicator is meant to replace the sliver of red that appeared when the mute switch was in its muted position on prior iPhone models, and I’ve kept it on for clarity. If you find it annoying, however, you can disable it by going to Settings → Sounds & Haptics → Show in Status Bar (you can also enable/disable silent mode from this preference pane).
The most useful action, though probably not the most popular, is “Shortcut.” When you choose it, you’re asked to select a shortcut from your library or create a new one. To make the process less daunting for people new to Shortcuts, the “Create Shortcut” menu has some presets to get started, like actions to open an app, call a favorite contact, play a recently played song, set a timer, create a new note, or recognize music using Shazam. It also pulls App Shortcuts from your apps to allow easy access to those as well. The user interface of this shortcut picker is very distinct, almost visionOS-like. Every sheet and button is slightly translucent, items and buttons have drop shadows of their primary color, and the corner radii of sheets are more rounded. It’s a unique design aesthetic. If you create a shortcut through this Shortcuts view in Settings, it’s exclusive to the Action Button, meaning it won’t show up in your Shortcuts library, which I find nice to keep things organized. It’s more of an “advanced options” pane for the Action Button; most users will choose one of the system-defined actions I described earlier, but users who want to get their hands dirty a bit can do that without having to go to the extremes.
To activate your action — whether it be a shortcut or something else — you press and hold the Action Button from any screen on your iPhone, even if it’s off (the Dynamic Island will prompt you to authenticate with Face ID to perform your action if required). If you end up pressing the Action Button instead of briefly pressing and holding, it’ll alert you with a message that reads, “Hold for ‘[Action Name]’.” While many have said that the Action Button’s slight delay is short enough that it doesn’t bother them, I firmly disagree. Yes, the delay is short; it’s less than a second. But that delay makes the Action Button feel a bit slow. When you start holding it down, it takes a split second to begin working, and that’s not factoring in how much time it takes for the action to complete (complex shortcuts with multiple conditionals take seconds to run). While I wouldn’t go as far as to say it’s infuriating, it’s slightly annoying at the least. I wish there were a way for people who aren’t worried about accidental presses to disable the short delay. The sleep/wake button — or any other button on the exterior of the iPhone, for that matter — doesn’t have a delay, so why should the Action Button? It’s not like it’s any different, it’s just user-programmable.
As your action is running, you can release the button. You don’t have to hold it down while waiting for the action to finish running. The Dynamic Island shows you the accidental press waiting period by playfully animating in with an icon representing your action. After that, it displays your action’s status or progress. For example, if you launch the Camera, a little Camera icon animates in the Dynamic Island while it’s launching. When the Flashlight is turned on, it animates and appears in the Dynamic Island. As a shortcut runs, a circle fills to show you its progress (helpful for long shortcuts). I don’t know how the iPhone would show the status of your action if it didn’t have the Dynamic Island; it’s one of those instances of Apple’s hardware and software integration that makes for a delightful user experience. It’s amusing, whimsical, and an example of intentional and delightful design.
Over the past couple of weeks, people have been doing incredible things with their Action Buttons. It makes sense: Give people a button and let them do anything with it, and they’ll practically reinvent the world. Here’s how I think you should develop ideas for the Action Button: Think of a task that you perform on your phone constantly. Do you ask ChatGPT things throughout the day? Do you play a specific Spotify playlist? Do you add things to a specific document all day? Think about a repetitive, frequent task that you can’t perform via a widget; something that is laborious in that it requires multiple taps and swipes to do, but that is pretty important. If something, like adding a task to your task manager or checking your next calendar event can be done from a widget or at a glance, don’t use the Action Button for it. If you already have a way you do something that is ingrained into your muscle memory, don’t try to reprogram it to the Action Button and retrain old habits. For me, that action is launching the Camera. I’ve built up 12 years of muscle memory by swiping to the left on my Lock Screen to launch the Camera. I don’t need yet another method of accessing it. Think of a new task that has bugged you on your iPhone. Once you have, figure out how to write a shortcut to do that task quicker. Many apps have App Shortcuts that you can use as starting blocks for your own shortcuts. Be creative and try to reduce the amount of times you have to tap your screen.
As I thought about what I would use the Action Button for (through the line of thinking I just described), I realized that I wanted to do multiple things with it because I have multiple tasks I repeat throughout the day. When I’m in a meeting, I want easy access to PCalc, my calculator; when it’s bedtime, I want access to Midnight, my alarm app; the list goes on. I want the Action Button to be able to do multiple things depending on how many times I press it, how long I press it for, and most importantly, what Focus mode I’m in. The Action Button is heavily reliant on Shortcuts (it’s the only powerful way to use the Action Button), and Shortcuts doesn’t seem to be aware of that. As of the time of writing, it’s a one-way street between Shortcuts and the Action Button. There needs to be a better marriage between these two products. For example, I’d love a Shortcuts action that allows you to change the shortcut the Action Button activates (talk about word salad). That way, there’s two-way communication between Shortcuts and the Action Button. I could set up complex automations that use location data, date and time, charge state, or anything else under the sky to change what the Action Button does. Currently, the Action Button reminds me of the Always-On Display from last year’s iPhone 14 Pro. It’s good, but I wish there were more ways to automate it. “Average” users will set the action to open a commonly used app or the Camera, but nerdy users yearn for more options to change how the Action Button behaves.
It doesn’t just have to be automation or Shortcuts integration, powerful features that won’t even be touched by 99 percent of users. As I briefly mentioned earlier, I want an intuitive way to change the way the Action Button behaves depending on an active Focus mode. Stephen Robles, a YouTuber who makes how-to videos and reviews about Apple-related products, published a video where he described a hacky way to run different shortcuts depending on an active Focus mode, which involves using multiple conditionals (if-else statements) to read the current Focus mode’s name if there is one active. All of the conditionals live in a “master shortcut,” for lack of a better term, which you program the Action Button to run. While I guess this method does work, it’s messy to set up and modify in the future, and it requires technical know-how. In other words, it’s not very user-friendly. However, this is currently the only way to program the Action Button to behave differently depending on an active Focus mode, so we’re stuck with it. In the future, I would like a new Focus Filter called “Action Button,” or something that’s easily accessible to less-savvy users and that isn’t as computationally expensive as multiple conditionals running in a shortcut. I hope and think Apple will include this feature in an iOS 17.2 update this winter — it just makes sense.
I also mentioned that I wanted to be able to program multiple actions to the Action Button depending on how many times the button is pressed, or how long it’s pressed for. For example, double-pressing or triple-pressing the button should be able to trigger a different action, similar to the Back Tap feature from 2020, which was hailed as a “new virtual button for the iPhone.” Now, we have a real button where we don’t need to worry about accidental presses. Why the Action Button didn’t ship with double-and-triple tap features is beyond me. Pressing and holding (beyond the standard press-and-hold gesture used to trigger the main action) should also be an option. In the meantime, Federico Viticci, editor-in-chief of MacStories, a blog covering Apple, wrote a shortcut that tracks the time that the shortcut is run at to determine if it was run twice within seven seconds. The shortcut — although incredibly clever, as Viticci’s shortcuts typically are — is a bit cumbersome to use. Each time it’s run, the shortcut performs the so-called “primary action,” and to activate the secondary action (both actions are user-specified shortcuts you set when you first install the shortcut onto your device), you have to end the first shortcut using the system-provided “Cancel” button. Once again, it’s crafty, and I guess it does work, but it’s not fun to use. Apple should natively support double-pressing the Action Button instead — it’s not that difficult to understand why.
These modifications are minor software additions that I think are entirely possible for Apple to ship in an iOS 17.2 update later this year, like how it addressed feature suggestions and complaints from reviewers regarding the Always-On Display from last year’s iPhone 14 Pro.
Tentatively, I’ve set my Action Button to run a shortcut I’ve assembled, which uses conditionals to read which Focus mode my iPhone is in and perform an action based on its reading. When I’m in my “Meetings” Focus mode, it opens PCalc; when I’m in my “Sleep” Focus mode, it opens Midnight and dims the lamp in my bedroom; when I’m in my “Work” Focus mode, it runs a helper shortcut I’ve used for a while called “Stop/Resume Timer,” which either stops or resumes a Toggl timer in Timery, my time tracking app, depending on if a timer is running or not; and when I’m in my “Personal” Focus mode or no Focus mode at all, it opens my most recent document in Craft, my writing app. As I said, this is only tentative, and I plan on changing the action as the seasons progress and as my needs change or if I find myself inspired by other people’s shortcuts. I assume I’ll learn to use the Action Button more as I find the right action, too. Right now, I’m still so used to the space occupied by the Action Button previously being reserved for a mute switch I never used. Over a decade of muscle memory needs to be undone, and the perfect action will aid in retraining that old muscle memory.
Some other creative uses of the Action Button I’ve come across: Quinn Nelson, a YouTuber who runs the channel Snazzy Labs about Apple and other consumer technology, wrote a shortcut that changes its action based on the device’s orientation (it’s based on a shortcut John Gruber, writer of Daring Fireball, a popular blog about Apple and technology, wrote). Nelson and Gruber’s shortcuts read the iPhone’s orientation using a third-party utility called “Actions,” written by independent developer Sindre Sorhus, and perform an action based on it. If the iPhone is in its portrait orientation, the Action Button toggles silent mode, and if the iPhone is in its landscape orientation, the Action Button opens the Camera. It’s an interesting idea, and while I don’t see myself doing the same thing, it spurred a new technique: orientation-based automation. The options truly are limitless.
The Action Button on iPhone 15 Pro reels back around to my central point about how this year’s iPhones feel like a refinement of the iPhone’s design in a way that makes the iPhone more enjoyable, delightful, and useful. The Action Button is one of the best hardware changes to the iPhone in a very long time. It took advantage of changing usage patterns and consumer demands and gave people what they wanted: more customizability of their iPhones. People are different, so their iPhones should be different, too, and the Action Button gives every user — including the less technically inclined — the flexibility to make their iPhone theirs. The Action Button perfectly combines the simplicity of iOS with the versatility of a physical button attached to the exterior of the device, and it’s safe to say that it will be incredibly popular in mainstream media and on social media. I can’t wait to see more whacky, innovative ways to use the Action Button from bright minds all over the internet.
USB-C
In 2012, Philip Schiller, former senior vice president of product marketing at Apple, introduced the iPhone 5, the first device with a Lightning connector, replacing the 30-pin connector found on the last-generation iPhone 4s among other Apple mobile devices. Nerds and journalists alike hailed the Lightning connector as “futuristic” because it was a breakthrough at the time. The Lightning connector was 80 percent smaller than the 30-pin connector, leaving more room for better internals in cramped mobile devices, it was bi-directional, it was faster, and it had faster data transfer rates. For all we knew, Lightning was the connector that would lead us into the future of mobile computing. Schiller even touted it as the “connector for the next ten years.” We all had no reason to doubt him. Apple had always been a company of innovation; it never wanted to stick with the “old” design for very long, even if it worked just fine. The iPhone, like other mobile devices at the time, was changing rapidly each year. Each update included a new groundbreaking feature. Lightning was a natural progression forward, and one that was sorely needed. The 30-pin connector was a user-hostile, old, bad connector design, and it had to be rethought. The Lightning port was the answer.
In 2014, Apple worked with the USB Implementers Forum to develop a next-generation USB connector: USB Type C. Previously, the most popular USB connector was USB Type A, a uni-directional, larger connector design that had consistently been in use since 1996. If you were born any time before 2010, this is probably what you think of when you think of “USB.” It was about time for a new, faster USB connector that shared Lightning’s advantages, and Apple was happy to help develop it. USB-C, like Lightning, was bi-directional, thinner, smaller, and faster. Like Lightning was the future of Apple’s proprietary connector designs, USB-C was the future of USB. Apple was among the first to adopt USB-C, starting with the 12-inch MacBook announced in 2015 (nicknamed the “MacBook Adorable”). The 12-inch MacBook was the computer of the future. In fact, it was a bit too ahead of its time. It was razor-thin, featured an all-new butterfly keyboard mechanism, and used a new process to fit a larger battery in a small case. It was a breakthrough and showed the world the future of mobile computing, though it was also flawed in many ways. Most importantly, this futuristic computer had one single port on the left (barring a headphone jack): a 5 gigabit-per-second USB-C port, the same port that was meant to be the future of USB. Consumers, reviewers, and enthusiasts were all baffled and infuriated by this move. The world was not ready for USB-C, even if it might’ve been the port of the future. Apple continued pioneering the adoption of USB-C, though; the MacBook Pro from 2016 included four USB-C ports (and no USB-A ports), and the iPad Pro from 2018 switched from Lightning to USB-C.
Throughout this transition in the Apple world, Android phones predominantly used Micro USB ports based on the less-common USB Type B connector. Micro USB has been the standard connector used in portable electronics since the first Android phone in 2008. It was small, regulated by the USB-IF, and cheap; why wouldn’t it be built into everything? But as USB-C emerged in the late 2010s, it proved to possess numerous advantages over Micro USB, and it eventually took over as the new standard connector for portable electronics, including every flagship Android phone on the market. This change threw us into a convoluted mess of cables, adapters (affectionately called “dongles”), and connectors. Some cheaper products from China still had Micro USB ports, whereas modern, more premium devices had USB-C ports. New wall chargers came in both USB-A and USB-C configurations, and many people had a mix of both newer USB-C wall chargers and old USB-A wall chargers in their drawers. Some cars came equipped with both USB-A and USB-C ports, as people had both kinds of cables. Apple recognized this, and in late 2019, introduced the iPhone 11 Pro, which, for the first time, included an 18-watt “fast” charging USB-C wall charger in the box. Previously, all iPhones included puny 5-watt cubical wall chargers with USB-A ports, an embarrassing cost-saving measure that infuriated consumers who had to spend more money to purchase faster wall chargers. That issue was finally addressed, but the lower-end iPhone 11 still included the dog-slow 5-watt charger. It was a mess. Different devices had different ports and shipped with different cables and chargers, leaving everyone frustrated.
Eventually, users became fed up with the charger mismatch. If roommates or partners had different phones, they couldn’t share chargers. Uber and Lyft drivers had to keep two different kinds of chargers in their cars for customers. “Android charger versus Apple charger” became an internet meme. This infuriating situation was all caused by one company’s resistance to switch to the USB-C connector on its phones: Apple. Macs and high-end iPads had included USB-C ports years ago, and Apple had even aided in the creation of the USB-C standard if you recall. But the iPhone — and only the iPhone — used a nonsense proprietary Lightning-to-USB-C cable, a cable that could charge no other phone out of the box other than the iPhone 11 Pro which also included the needed USB-C wall charger in the box. Let me summarize how ludicrous the situation was: Apple shipped USB-A to USB-C cables, USB-C to USB-C cables, Lightning to USB-C cables, and Lightning to USB-A cables all in the same year. For less technically inclined users, the situation was convoluted, and enthusiasts were furious that Apple couldn’t just use the charging standard every other company used. Pressure was mounting on Apple to switch to USB-C, but it still wouldn’t budge. Some ballsy leakers even predicted that Apple would switch to a fully port-less iPhone design before it even considered putting a USB-C connector on the iPhone — it was that bad.
Multiple theories emerged as to why Apple was so reluctant to switch to USB-C on the iPhone, the biggest one being that Apple didn’t want to give up revenue from the Made for iPhone program. When an accessory maker wants to make an accessory using the Lightning connector, it’s required to pay Apple a sizable royalty for each product that it sells with the Lightning connector if it wants to be certified by Apple. The precise royalty percentage isn’t public, but the amount is beside the point. I think this theory is nonsense. Apple is a very egotistical company; it believes that it’s correct all the time and that every decision it makes is good for the consumer. Apple believed, and still believes to this day, that the Lightning connector is the best connector for the iPhone. It’s not about royalties, and if it was, it wouldn’t enable Qi wireless charging on every one of its iPhones. Apple made MagSafe, and it could easily make wireless charging exclusive on iPhones to MagSafe-certified products. The MFI program includes MagSafe accessories and has been since 2020. No, Apple continues to (wrongly) believe that the Lightning connector is the best connector for the iPhone, even when it evidently frustrates users. I still believe that Apple intended to continue shipping iPhones with Lightning ports until wireless technology got good enough that it could replace a physical port.
Enter the European Union, which in typical nanny state fashion, decided to impose regulation on Apple to force them to switch to USB-C. The European Union’s reasoning was straightforward: “Consumers don’t like Lightning, so it only makes sense to force Apple to switch to USB-C.” On December 8, 2022, it did just that. The European Union passed legislation that mandated the inclusion of the USB-C port on all consumer technology devices for charging and data transfer and set a deadline to comply: December 28, 2024. Companies that don’t comply by that date will have to stop selling their non-compliant products in the European Union. Essentially, the European Union’s law says, “Let us control your products, or get out.” The European Union is the second-largest market for Apple, so “getting out” isn’t an option for them. Apple has to comply, and so it is, reluctantly. In October 2022, Apple began the slow transition from Lightning to USB-C, starting with the iPad (10th generation) and Apple TV 4K (3rd generation). The end of the Lightning connector was near.
After much preamble, we get to the main point of this section: The iPhones 15 and 15 Pro — Apple’s most important products — include a new USB-C port capable of USB 3.2 Gen 2 data transfer speeds (that’s 10 gigabits-per-second [Gbps]) via a cable sold separately, and 27-watt charging via a wall charger sold separately. Of course. When looking at the new port in a vacuum, yes, it’s what we’ve wanted all this time. But iPhones don’t live in a vacuum, and there are two problems with this new port on iPhone 15 Pro: people and rivals. And it’s Apple’s job to work around these problems, not try to overcome them.
People are resistant to change, but change is inevitable. Change, in the world of consumer technology, is typically a good thing (except for those times when it’s not). I purposely neglected to mention one thing about the iPhone 5’s switch to Lightning: consumers hated it. Everyone — and I seriously mean everyone — threw a fit about the iPhone 5’s new port. The thing is, they weren’t unjustified in being upset. People have charging cables everywhere: at their desks at home, at their desks at work, in their cars, at their nightstands, in their kitchen, etc. Whenever Apple switches to a new connector on the iPhone, their most popular product, outrage ensues. People don’t want to have to switch out every single one of their cables when Apple changes the port “on a whim” (it’s not actually on a whim, but it sure does feel like that for people not tuned into MacRumors or 9to5Mac). When the iPhone 15 Pro was announced, the mainstream press coverage from outlets like The New York Times or CNN was mostly focused on the new port because they knew that was the change people would care the most about. The public sentiment was, “They changed the port again?” “Again?” The last time Apple changed the port was 11 years ago, everyone! Change is inevitable, and now you’ll be able to use the same charger for all your Apple devices! That point is not convincing the public. In their eyes, Apple changed the port because, “Since Steve Jobs died, there’s been no innovation at Apple, and all it’s doing nowadays is changing the port and rearranging the cameras.” That statement might sound ludicrous or irrational to you, dear reader, but it’s how the public feels. Apple knew it was going to be met with opposition here. It knew the headlines would come in troves and that people on TikTok would complain about how Apple is forcing everyone to buy new cables “again” to “bolster their profit margins.” This is why Apple didn’t switch away from USB-C.
It goes without saying to enthusiasts that the transition to USB-C is much less painful than the transition to Lightning was. USB-C is not a new connector, unlike Lightning was in 2012. Chances are, most iPhone 15 buyers have a USB-C product in their homes and at their workplaces already. That was the reason the European Union even forced Apple to switch to USB-C in the first place; it’s already a universally accepted connector. Most other Apple products come equipped with USB-C ports, most Windows laptops come equipped with USB-C ports, most Windows pre-built desktops have USB-C ports, and most wireless peripherals such as mice and keyboards use USB-C to USB-C cables. Like most Android original equipment manufacturers , those peripheral makers and OEMs have switched to equipping their products with USB-C ports years ago. But none of this will stop people from complaining and treating USB-C like it’s brand new. Again, people are naturally resistant to change, and it’ll take a lot of persuading to sell them on USB-C.
People need a change in mindset, but changing people’s mindsets is nearly, if not entirely impossible. No matter the marketing pitch or fancy promo videos, Apple is the villain in buyers’ minds. Instead, Apple needs to soften the blow, and there’s only one way to do that effectively: provide a noticeable upgrade for consumers. Everyone who owns a phone charges it. You don’t have to be a “professional” shooting 4K log footage to need to charge your iPhone. Everyone — except for a small subset of pedantic nerds worried about “battery health” — wants their phone to charge faster. If instead of effectively telling people that all of their old cables are now rendered useless Apple sold them a faster way to charge their iPhones, the USB-C port would’ve been a hit in mainstream media. This should’ve been the marketing pitch: “iPhone 15 Pro now has a 75-watt charging port using an all-new technology called ProCharging™, which allows you to go from zero percent to fully charged in less than 45 minutes. To enable this, we’re bringing the USB-C connector to iPhone, so now you can charge your iPhone using the same charging cable you charge your other Apple devices with. This is something only Apple can do.” I’m only joking about the last part, but the point remains: stun people with a capability they’ve never heard of, and they’ll hail it as innovation. I’m no MBA, so maybe my “ProCharge” fictional trademark wouldn’t be the best way to sell consumers on fast charging, but I do know what people like.
iPhone 15 Pro doesn’t charge at 75 watts, 50 watts, or even 30 watts. As I said earlier, it charges at only a measly 27 watts confirmed by an Apple Support knowledge base article. And that brings us to the second problem: rivals. I have said countless times throughout this review that flagship Android phones have had USB-C ports for years, and that their USB-C ports are more capable and better for the consumer. Apple seems to be merely focused on meeting the European Union’s connector requirement rather than doing better than what it requires, and that’s bad. The iPhone, since the iPhone X from six years ago, has charged at a laughably low 18 watts, whereas some Android flagships charge at 150 watts. This is seriously not a joke. They’re using the same port as iPhone 15 Pro, but iPhone 15 Pro only is capable of charging at 27 watts when Apple itself sells wall chargers that go up to 140 watts. It’s embarrassing. The USB-C port on iPhone 15 Pro is also remarkably slow when compared to the ports of its Android rivals. Apple, in another nonsensical move, has capped the port at USB 3.2 Gen 2 speeds, instead of opting for the faster USB 4 standard, which supports a transfer speed of up to 20 Gbps (recall that USB 3.2 Gen 2 supports a maximum transfer speed of only 10 Gbps). This is indubitably not as important as faster charging speeds are, as nowadays, most people never plug their phone into a computer to transfer data in the first place, but it’s another example of the USB-C port on iPhone 15 Pro being underwhelming. USB 3.2 Gen 2 is a standard from six years ago, and Apple should have equipped their latest flagship handset with a USB 4 port.
You could argue that a 20 Gbps transfer speed won’t affect Apple’s sales numbers, and so it was right to forgo supporting the USB 4 standard in favor of an older, slower one. You would be correct, but that’s not the point I’m trying to make. It’s about the marketing pitch. Currently, the proposition for USB-C on the iPhone is that you can use one cable to charge your devices. That pitch doesn’t resonate with consumers, and it won’t because the annoyance of replacing cables outweighs the potential benefit of a unified connector type in many consumers’ minds. Instead, Apple should’ve delivered an experience through the port that consumers will love. Think “1,000 songs in your pocket.” It failed to pitch the USB-C port as the delightful feature that it is to average buyers, and that’s terribly disappointing.
Now, for me personally (this is my review, after all), I’m ecstatic Apple finally switched away from the archaic, irksome Lightning port and brought the modern connector of the last seven years to the iPhone. Here’s a story that illustrates just how handy the USB-C port really is: When I was setting up my iPhone 15 Pro, I had to install some of my own apps through Xcode because they didn’t transfer properly from my iPhone 14 Pro. For some reason, the wireless connection feature didn’t work, so I had to connect my iPhone to my MacBook Pro with a cable. Due to years of trauma endured because the iPhone had a Lightning port, I immediately thought, “Alas, I don’t think I have a Lightning cable in this room. This is so inconvenient.” …Until I remembered that because the iPhone now had USB-C, I could unplug the USB-C cord from the wall that was charging my MacBook Pro and plug it into my iPhone. Bingo. Marvelous. It’s just such a nice thing to have.
The USB-C port also supports USB Power Delivery, which allows the port to charge other devices (any other devices, they don’t have to be Apple devices) at 4.5 watts. I tested this, and it works about half the time. The way it’s intended to work is that both products — the phone and the device you’d like to charge — are supposed to perform a “handshake,” where they read and communicate each other’s battery capacities and device types. This is so that the iPhone knows to charge a pair of AirPods, but to receive power from a power bank. In practice, however, the handshake seldom worked correctly, and results would vary each time charging was tested. Sometimes, simply reversing the connector would make one device charge the other when that shouldn’t have happened. Some iPhone 15 Pro users have reported that Anker power banks are “incompatible” with iPhone 15 Pro because the handshake between the two devices doesn’t initiate properly, causing the iPhone to charge the power bank. Yeah, that’s… not how it’s supposed to work. I still find it convenient, however, though I wish Apple brought reverse wireless charging to the iPhone this year as well.
Coming back to the central theme of this review, this is how it should’ve been all this time. The USB-C port is one of those niceties I find delight in using. It’s not the fastest or the most capable out there, and it shouldn’t have taken the European Union’s hand to force Apple to switch to it, but I’m very happy it’s here. I use it all the time, and every time I do, I feel thankful that Apple has given in to the pressure and did something good for iPhone users. It’s the same USB-C connector we know and love, but now on the iPhone. Yes, the masses will be briefly frustrated by the port change, and Apple should’ve learned from their mistakes from the iPhone 5’s marketing disaster and used USB-C’s prevalence to market the connector change better, but I can’t be frustrated by this move. We’ve been begging for it for years, and now it’s here, like a blessing from the heavens — except those heavens are the European Union. Here’s a sentence I never thought I’d say: Thanks, European Union.
Camera
Gone are the days of iPhone cameras changing drastically every year. Like it or not, it’s just the truth. Unless you’re viewing raw image files on a large, high-resolution computer screen, iPhone 13 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro photographs are nearly identical at a glance. You won’t notice a difference if they’re posted to Instagram or iMessage, where most smartphone photographs are viewed. It’s time we stopped focusing on shooting “higher-quality photographs” and started focusing on tangible end-user improvements to the experience. iPhone 15 Pro does just that. I have the “standard” iPhone 15 Pro — not the gargantuan iPhone 15 Pro Max with the upgraded “5x” “tetraprism” lens assembly — so the sensors are exactly the same between last year’s iPhone and this year’s iPhone. All of the improvements come by way of software and the system-on-a-chip, A17 Pro. Apple calls the combination of SoC improvements and software features “computational photography,” and it does a ton of heavy lifting. The new camera on iPhone 15 Pro boils down to three enhancements: more fake megapixels, more fake focal lengths, and more video modes. All three additions are geared towards professionals. If you don’t know what those words I just wrote mean, you won’t notice the difference between iPhones of years ago and the new iPhone. The focus this year is on making the iPhone feel more like a traditional camera. Professionals want flexibility, and iPhone 15 Pro gives them that flexibility.
iPhone 14 Pro featured a 48-megapixel main sensor for the first time on an iPhone, and it produced remarkable photographs… in ProRAW. When shooting with ProRAW, the iPhone used all 48 megapixels of the sensor. But when shooting a standard photograph in the High Efficiency Image Format, the phone binned photographs to 12 fake megapixels by combining every four megapixels into one binned megapixel (48 divided by 4 is 12). Pixel binning is advantageous for numerous reasons, the biggest being an improved signal-to-noise ratio. The more megapixels a sensor has, the less light each megapixel gathers, naturally. When pixels are binned, light from four megapixels is combined into one megapixel, so each faux megapixel receives more light. Therefore, noise is reduced. Pixel binning is a software feature, not a hardware feature, and on iPhone 14 Pro, it was powered by the A16 Bionic. iPhone 15 Pro, with its much more powerful A17 Pro SoC, kicks pixel binning up by multiple notches because it does more than just binning. iPhone 15 Pro is now capable of shooting 24-megapixel photographs. When a 24-megapixel photograph is taken (again, these are fake megapixels), the A17 Pro combines a 12-megapixel binned image with better light and colors and a 48-megapixel ProRAW image with more optical clarity and sharpness. Fusing them results in a 24-megapixel shot. It’s incredibly inventive.
There is only one notable downside to 24-megapixel photographs: they take up more space. A 12-megapixel photograph uses 2 megabytes, and a 24-megapixel photograph uses 3 MB. For this reason — and perhaps for this reason alone — you can turn off 24-megapixel photographs in Settings → Camera → Formats → Photo Mode. But unless you’re particularly worried about file sizes, or want the flexibility of shooting in both binning modes, I see no reason to turn them off. It’s remarkable how much more detailed photographs taken in 24 megapixels look when zooming in. Again, they won’t look any different when looking at them at 1x on your tiny phone screen, but when blowing them up and enjoying them on a high-resolution, large computer screen, compression is less noticeable, text is more legible from far away distances, and scenes appear crisper. I’d say those improvements — though minor — are worth an extra megabyte each. It doesn’t take a genius to know that higher megapixels equals higher resolution photographs, sure, but I’m more impressed by how Apple is achieving this. The “Photonic Engine”’s image processing pipeline is being put to good use here. Even with no sensor improvements, there’s a tangible difference comparable to what we’d get from a full camera upgrade. While not revolutionary, the main camera improvements this year that stem from the more capable A17 Pro are dandy.
However, the standard mode isn’t where the new image processing pipeline or the new fake megapixels shine. In my event recap, I wrote that I was curious about how Apple achieved two new fake focal lengths on iPhone 15 Pro and if there would be any difference when comparing them to iPhone 14 Pro. To summarize, iPhone 15 Pro has three fake lenses and three real lenses, adding two more fake lenses to iPhone 14 Pro’s singular fake lens: a “1.2x” 28-millimeter equivalent lens and a “1.5x” 35-millimeter equivalent lens. These focal lengths alone aren’t new; every iPhone since the iPhone 3GS from 2009 has been able to digitally zoom into the main lens by up to 2x. So, what gives? Why is this being advertised as a new feature? It’s thanks to the new clever 24-megapixel binning mode powered by the A17 Pro. When shooting a 28-millimeter or 35-millimeter photograph on iPhone 15 Pro, the device zooms into the 48-megapixel image and uses the color and light information from the 12-megapixel binned image, combining both frames to create one composite image taken at your desired zoom range. This effectively means you get all the optical benefits of the 48-megapixel sensor but with all the noise reduction and low-light performance benefits of the 12-megapixel binning mode.
The result is much sharper, more detailed 28-and-35-millimeter photographs, even when compared to the already good iPhone 14 Pro. The new focal lengths address one of my biggest pet peeves with modern smartphone cameras: the lack of high-quality zoom modes between 1x and 2x. 35 millimeters and 28 millimeters are hugely popular focal lengths for professional photography, alongside the “Nifty Fifty” 50-millimeter focal length. The iPhone now supports all three of these focal lengths, which is awesome. 35 millimeters is one of the most natural focal lengths, as it’s close to what the human eyes see. When you shoot in 35 millimeters, objects have little to no distortion, whereas shooting in 24 millimeters (the “1x” standard focal length) distorts some objects like walls and other straight lines (this is why Apple up until recently called the 1x lens the “wide” lens; it’s wider than a usual kit lens). Because these faux lenses are so close to optical quality — or at least much closer than before — Apple now allows you to select a default focal length for the 1x mode between 24, 28, and 35 millimeters. You can choose a default you want the Camera app to remember in Settings → Camera → Main Camera. There, you can also turn off the 28 and 35-millimeter focal lengths if you don’t want them (it doesn’t let you turn off the 24-millimeter one). In the Camera app, when you tap the 1x button, the phone switches to the next focal length in the list before cycling back to 24 millimeters. Apple now encourages you to use these more professional focal lengths because they look better now. They’re popular in the industry for a reason. It comes back to my main point about flexibility for professionals: These details will go unnoticed by 95 percent of iPhone 15 Pro buyers, but those who do know what they’re doing will love them.
I’ve been toying around with all three focal lengths, and I’ve tentatively set mine on 28 millimeters as I feel like it’s a good middle ground between 35 and 24 millimeters. 35 millimeters feels a bit too “zoomed-in” for my liking, and I’d rather use the 48-millimeter “2x” lens introduced last year to zoom in further. 28 millimeters reduces distortion while also looking crisp and natural. For testing purposes, I set my iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro both to 1.5x (though iOS doesn’t let you snap to 35 millimeters on older iPhone models for obvious reasons) and shot some photographs of mailboxes. I then pinched-to-zoom after the fact to pick out the details of far-away boxes, and text appeared remarkably sharper in photographs shot with iPhone 15 Pro. The new computational photography pipeline makes a drastic, noticeable difference. When shooting landscapes, little details like blades of grass, ducks in the water, and leaves on trees appear richer and less blurry or “clumped together.” Processing appears less intense, and artificial noise reduction gimmicks have been toned down slightly. iPhone photograph processing has gotten egregious in recent history, beginning with so-called “Deep Fusion” introduced with iPhone 11 Pro. Apple has, to their credit, taken steps to tone down that processing, beginning with iPhone 14 Pro’s larger, superior sensor. This year, the photograph fusion has improved substantially, making unpleasant post-processing much less of a problem. I’m very happy with this feature that’s so minor yet that makes such a big difference in day-to-day photography.
But let’s talk about videography now. In 2021, Apple brought ProRes video recording to the iPhone 13 Pro, the first iPhone that could shoot in the professional video format used in Hollywood and other productions around the globe. ProRes, unlike video shot in normal video modes (this isn’t exclusive to the iPhone), includes all of the data captured by the sensor in the video file. Apple describes ProRes as “visually lossless,” which, translated from marketing speak, means that the footage isn’t compressed in any way. The High Efficiency Video Codec, like HEIF for photographs, uses an incredibly efficient compression technique called inter-frame compression, which compares two consecutive frames for changes and instead of refreshing the pixels every frame, remembers which pixels remained unchanged and doesn’t refresh them. Tom Scott, a YouTuber focused on technology, linguistics, and so much more, made a video a couple of years ago explaining how inter-frame compression works, and Marques Brownlee, a YouTuber known as MKBHD who reviews consumer technology, made a video demonstrating what inter-frame compression does to a video. I recommend both videos — they’re outstanding. Inter-frame compression, though it cuts down on file sizes while retaining 99.99% of the video’s contents, isn’t good enough for Hollywood, which wants 100 percent of the video’s contents to work with. ProRes gives them that flexibility.
With that said, the iPhone’s ProRes footage — though it did include all of the information captured by the sensor — also included the information that the phone created by itself to make the video look better. When phones (and other cameras) capture video, they apply a custom look-up table to the video akin to a filter, which applies a set of custom colors to the video file. These LUTs take the raw video file, which is mostly uncolored, and make it more visually pleasing, adding skin smoothing, noise reduction, color effects, and so much more. For example, the green that comes out of the sensor without any effects added doesn’t look very green, so cameras add more green to the video to replicate real-world colors. While these effects are a good thing for essentially every smartphone buyer who just wants a video that looks like the scene they just shot, they’re not good for professional videographers, who send their footage to professional colorists who “grade” (color) the footage for artistic effect. Every movie or television show that’s professionally made has a custom LUT applied to it by a color studio so that the imagery appears as the director intended it to. To accomplish this, the footage must not be pre-colored by the camera or phone. If it is, it gets much harder to grade. This non-colored footage desired by professionals is shot in a logarithmic color profile, or “log” profile for short. iPhone 15 Pro now adds support for this heavily-desired ProRes log video in a proprietary format Apple calls Apple Log, or A-Log for short.
iPhone 15 Pro now lets you shoot ProRes video in three color profiles: high dynamic range, standard dynamic range, and log. The HDR mode isn’t new; iPhone 13 Pro and newer can shoot HDR ProRes at up to 4K 60 frames-per-second. But they can only shoot HDR ProRes. iPhone 15 Pro now gives filmmakers the flexibility to shoot in SDR and log. SDR for productions that aren’t in the Rec. 2020 color space, and log for Hollywood-level productions where flexibility is of paramount importance. To shoot log video, you must shoot ProRes as well. While I think that makes sense, I hate that there’s no way to quickly switch between log, SDR, and HDR ProRes. Because they all take up varying amounts of space on the disk and look very different from each other, the ability to switch between them quickly is important. The only way to switch between formats is via Settings → Camera → Formats → ProRes Encoding. Simply tapping the ProRes button in the Camera app only toggles ProRes on and off; there is no way to switch between color profiles in the app. There isn’t even a Shortcuts action like other settings that you could tie to the Action Button or a Focus mode. It’s unfortunate for people who don’t just use their iPhones to film one project.
When you film in log, video is in the expensive ProRes 422 HQ codec. ProRes 422 HQ has a higher bitrate than some of the other ProRes codecs (the “HQ” unofficially stands for “high quality”), which means that each frame stores more data than a lower bitrate file would. It’s essentially the least compression possible. Recording in ProRes 422 HQ, however, results in much larger file sizes. For example, a 17-second clip recorded in ProRes log on iPhone 15 Pro took up a whopping 677.2 MB. This is why I think there should be an option to change the codec in Settings. I do not think the iPhone’s sensor is good enough to show a difference between the two codecs. iPhone sensors are already quite tiny, so they capture much less light than a full-frame or Advanced Photo System Type-C sensor, where you can notice the difference. I understand Apple’s rationale in choosing ProRes 422 HQ being, “The most neutral color space should use the most un-compressed format we have,” but I don’t agree with that. The difference is most likely negligible. To address the larger file sizes, Apple only lets you shoot ProRes at 4K (for 256 GB and above models) or 1080p 30 fps (for 128 GB models) using the internal solid-state drive. If you want to shoot any ProRes at 60 fps — whether it be log, SDR, or HDR — you need to attach external storage via the USB-C port.
Luckily, attaching external storage is dead simple. If your storage drive is formatted using the Apple File System, just connect it to the USB-C port with the Camera app open. No adapters are required; thank the European heavens for USB-C. As soon as you do that, a little “USB-C” label appears at the bottom of the screen near the port, and the phone immediately starts recording on the drive. It’s truly a very intuitive design. In the background, iOS creates a folder on your drive that it names “APPLE100” where it stores all of the video files. It doesn’t fiddle with any of your other files, and you don’t even have to create the folder yourself. It’s dare I say… magical. Once you’re done recording, the video does not appear in the Photos app. Instead, it appears in the Files app. But the Camera app is clever about this; as soon as you attach external storage, the “preview” that appears in the lower left corner only shows photographs and videos from the APPLE100 folder. This way, you can preview files directly from the Camera app using the preview — no need to go to Files. Once again, it’s thoughtful. If you try to record ProRes at a high resolution/frame rate without external storage attached, the system prompts you with a dialog box telling you to attach external storage. Once you do, the dialog box dismisses, and you can go straight to recording. When you’re done, disconnect your drive from the USB-C port, and you’re golden. No weird prompts, no reformatting, and no “Disk not ejected properly” notifications. It’s just plain simple.
Are any “normal” iPhone 15 Pro buyers going to care about ProRes video? Of course not. But they also aren’t going to care about fake focal lengths or extra fake megapixels where the benefits only become apparent when you zoom in. And that’s the story of iPhone 15 Pro’s camera. No, it’s not revolutionary, and most people won’t notice the difference. It’s been like that for years, or at least since the iPhone 11 Pro. But the changes are good. They extend the iPhone’s lead in photography and videography even further and make it a more useful tool for people who can appreciate the minor details. iPhone 15 Pro is the best mobile camera for professionals as much as iPhone 14 Pro was. The iPhone’s camera lives in a vacuum. But now, it’s even better. Like the titanium finish, the Action Button, or the USB-C port, the minor changes and additions to an already good iPhone camera system make the iPhone experience as a whole more pleasurable.
That’s not to say there aren’t any new “consumer” features, per se. Take the enhancements to Portrait Mode, a feature used by tons of Instagram fanatics who want their photographs to look more “professional,” for example. You can now take a photograph and apply a fake bokeh to it after the fact. When capturing a photograph of a human or animal subject, iOS (most of the time) will show an f-stop (ƒ) icon in the lower-left corner of the viewfinder, which indicates that depth information is being captured, even if you’re not in Portrait Mode. Sometimes, however, the facial/object detection doesn’t activate, but you can get it to by simply tapping the frame. No matter what’s in the frame, the phone will always capture depth information if you tap the frame. Once you capture a photograph with depth information, you can convert it to Portrait Mode after the fact by just tapping the f-stop icon in the top-left corner of the photograph preview. If you want to disable this depth collection for some reason, you can do so by going to Settings → Camera → Portraits in Photo Mode. I don’t know why you would choose to do this, though. In my testing, photographs with depth information didn’t take up any more space than photographs without it; a regular photograph was 2 MB, and a photograph with depth information added was 1.9 MB. I find the new automatic Portrait Mode handy for those times that I choose to use Portrait Mode, but I’m still team “natural bokeh.” Portrait Mode looks way too artificial for my tastes.
iPhone 15 Pro’s camera has a little something for everyone. Amateur photographers will enjoy the automatic Portrait Mode, higher resolution images in normal photograph modes, and the new delightful little viewfinder when zooming in at long ranges; professional photographers and enthusiasts will find utility in the extra focal lengths, the ability to shoot 48 MP HEIF photographs, and toned down processing; and professional videographers and colorists will finally be able to breathe a sigh of relief because iPhone 15 Pro now shoots log and SDR ProRes video. When you shoot a photograph with iPhone 15 Pro, you’re not going to think, “Wow, this phone shoots photographs that are so much better than my old phone!” But you’ll be delighted by the little feature additions here and there that put iPhone 15 Pro’s camera in a class of its own.
Odds and Ends
Don’t we all love a good lightning round?
The iPhones 15 include a new option under Settings → Battery → Battery Health & Charging → Charging Optimization called “80% Limit” in addition to the “Optimized Battery Charging” option that’s been around for a couple of years now. Unlike for some reviewers, the option worked for me on the first night of my testing. But I’m not a fan of it. When you enable it, the phone charges to 80 percent, and just… stays there. Forever. It does not go up to 100 percent ever, even if you want it to. The reason why someone would want this is pretty simple: Some people are worried about their phone battery’s longevity, and keeping the phone charged past 80 percent for long periods (like at night) is supposedly bad for the battery. Without going on a debunk rant, this is nonsense and you shouldn’t be worried about battery health on iPhones. The battery management systems on newer models are incredibly advanced and capable of regulating battery life, and this is not something end users have to worry about. I’ve kept the feature off because there is no way to force the phone to charge past 80 percent, as of writing. Perhaps I would’ve kept it on if there were a button or something on the Lock Screen that forced the phone to resume charging, but the only way to get it to fill up all the way is by going back to Settings, switching the feature off, then unplugging and replugging the phone. It’s inconvenient, and that inconvenience outweighs the negligible benefits.
Battery life on iPhone 15 Pro is average at best, even after updating to the latest 17.0.3 version of iOS. It’s sub-par compared to iPhone 13 Pro, and it’s about the same as my year-old iPhone 14 Pro. I did pretty normal things on the phone for the first few days of testing: video watching, web browsing, noodling around with Shortcuts, writing some notes, and playing music in the background. Even though I used the phone more than I would when not testing, I only averaged about seven hours of screen-on time. I had hoped battery life would improve as time progressed, as the first few days are usually rough due to syncing, optimizations, and other background processes, but it didn’t. Screen-on time stayed at around six to seven hours per day on average. You might think that this is a lot, but it isn’t in modern times when people use their phones for everything. Add to that the fact that most of this testing was conducted on Wi-Fi, not cellular data, and it’s just disappointing. I’m no expert, but I think this has to do with the A17 Pro having more grunt than the A16 Bionic. Even though it purports to be more efficient since it’s built on a 3-nanometer process, each core uses more energy because each core is more powerful. I guess I can’t complain since the phone hasn’t gotten all that much thicker, but this is the one part of the otherwise amazing iPhone 15 Pro that I’m gutted by. I was hoping for a year of good battery life akin to the iPhones XR, 11 Pro, and 13 Pro, but that didn’t happen.
Embedded SIM connectivity once again continues to be a mistake. Since I live in The Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave, my iPhone does not have a SIM card slot; it only has the option to transfer an eSIM. On September 22, 2023 — iPhone launch day — AT&T customers across the country who just bought iPhones 15 Pro were met with an ambiguous error message when trying to transfer their phone numbers (eSIMs) to their new iPhones: “Your phone number could not be transferred to this iPhone. You can try again, or contact AT&T for assistance.” That was the whole error message, complimented with a “Continue” button at the bottom of the screen which just dismissed the sheet. It was infuriating. I tried each transfer method numerous times — and so did many others on the internet — but to no avail. AT&T was not having a good time that day, to say the least. In the end, it took AT&T five whole hours to get things working again, all thanks to Apple’s imbecilic removal of the SIM card slot. It was unbelievably maddening. Last year’s eSIM transfer process failed similarly for Verizon and Visible customers, and it all shows that the world isn’t ready for an eSIM revolution.
I ended that last section on a low note, but it doesn’t take away from the story I’ve tried to tell throughout this review: iPhone 15 Pro is the best refinement of the iPhone’s timeless design. It doesn’t change the shape of a basketball or the formula of Coke, but it just feels good. The titanium finish is smooth, soft, and comfortable to hold; the Action Button speeds up mundane tasks and opens up a whole new world of automation and customization while being simple, fast, and convenient; the USB-C port, while not perfect, makes the iPhone more versatile, improves interoperability, and makes the device less frustrating to use; and the improved camera system brings upgrades across the board that enhance the experience for professionals, enthusiasts, and consumers while retaining excellent picture quality and ease-of-use for everyone.
It’s updates like these that make me happy to be an iPhone user. Things were looking downhill not too long ago; as Android phones continued to push the boundaries of what’s possible in mobile computing, Apple stuck to its tried-and-true form. But that move paid off. iPhone 15 Pro doesn’t even try to reinvent the wheel. It can’t be classed as “innovative” by any definition of the word. But it is one thing for sure: best in class. It’s the little things that matter, not the folding screens or eight camera lenses pinned to the back of a 1-pound brick. iPhone 15 Pro is the iPhone we know and love, but built for the modern era. It’s lightweight, it’s premium, it’s customizable, and it’s powerful. But is it “worth it?” Well, that’s for you to decide, dear reader. 💣
