A new report into the ever-changing fortunes of the iPhone SE 4 claims the future budget smartphone from Apple is not, in fact, a 6.1-inch device based on the design of the iPhone 14, which was posited as the most likely design recently because the iPhone SE 4 would not in fact be a resurrected iPhone XR.
Confused? Us too. Let me explain...
Top analyst and insider Ming-Chi Kuo has today admitted that his February leak about the iPhone SE 4 may have been a bit wide of the mark. "I previously predicted that the iPhone SE 4 would be a derivative model of the iPhone 14," he tweeted Thursday. "However, my latest research indicates that this derivative model will likely be an engineering prototype for Apple in-house 5G baseband chip technology and mass production validation, and there are no plans for mass production and sales."
iPhone SE 4, what now?
So, according to Kuo, previous reports that the next budget iPhone will be a 6.1-inch iPhone based on the current iPhone 14 design are no longer the case. This leaves us asking what is in store for the future.
Kuo said in February that Apple had restarted its iPhone SE 4 project. However, the internal prototype he's referring to here has "no plans for mass production and sales." This could either mean that Apple is planning to release an iPhone SE 4 with a different design or that the iPhone SE 4 is once again off the table, again.
Earlier last year, insider Jon Prosser revealed that he thought the next iPhone SE would be a revival of Apple's iPhone XR, which would still be a major upgrade on the current iPhone SE, with a notch, Face ID, and better internals as well as a new camera.
In the meantime, Apple will definitely unveil its new iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro at a September Apple event later this year.
