Photography is an important factor driving phone buyers' decisions, and Apple is acutely aware of this, usually introducing a camera upgrade to its iPhones with each annual update.
Despite this, one camera has been largely neglected since the introduction of the iPhone 11 back in 2019. That year, the front-facing camera jumped from 7 megapixels to a 12-megapixel TrueDepth sensor. While the iPhone 14 threw in a f/1.9 aperture and autofocus, the megapixel count on the iPhone's selfie camera has remained the same ever since.
That will change this year, according to analyst Jeff Pu. In a note to investors seen by 9to5Mac, the GF Securities analyst wrote that the camera would double its megapixel count to 24 in all four iPhone 17 models.
This isn’t the first time we’ve heard this rumor, with another analyst, Ming-Chi Kuo, making the same prediction for this year’s iPhones back in January 2024 — eight months before the iPhone 16 series debuted.
At the time, he added that the front camera would jump from a five-element lens to a six-element one, which should lead to brighter pictures with less distortion in low-light conditions.
Other upgrades
Elsewhere in the note, Pu has some other interesting insights about the upcoming handsets. The Pro models will receive a 48-megapixel telephoto sensor, up from 12 megapixels on the current models, he writes — something we’ve heard said before.
They will also feature the A19 Pro chipset, paired with 12GB RAM, which, again, has been reported previously.
All models will work with Wi-Fi 7, which is currently only supported by the Pro models, but interestingly, only the iPhone 17 Air is set to inherit the Apple C1 modem which recently debuted on the iPhone 16e.
That’s presumably because only the Air needs the space savings on account of its thin frame, though Pu reportedly thinks Apple may U-turn on this decision and put the new modem in all models.
Pu is skeptical about the Air’s chances of boosting iPhone sales “due to low-spec” compared to the Pro models, but interestingly he adds that it will be the only Titanium model this time around, with all three others built with aluminum.
As for something that may shift the dial on Apple’s annual revenue, Pu states that the first foldable iPhone will arrive in late 2026, with a foldable iPad/Mac coming the following year. Due to the rumored sky-high price of these foldables, Pu thinks these will shift the company’s average selling price upwards.
The iPhone 17 series is widely expected to arrive in September, given that’s the month when almost every numbered iPhone has been released for the last decade. The iPhone 12 was the one exception, arriving in October 2020 when the Covid pandemic was causing supply chain disruption all around the world.
