Updated June 24 with more iPhone 17 series design details, including news of vapor cooling for the iPhone 17 Pro.
When Apple releases the iPhone 17 series, we already know it will come with the Liquid Glass software design overhaul announced at WWDC. Now, a new report from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman talks about the hardware and how much of a change is coming, while another report doubles down on what colors the new iPhones will be. And now, there’s been a significant exclusive from a respected leaker which suggests that an all-new design — vapor chamber cooling — is coming to the iPhone 17 Pro.
Apple iPhone 16 Pro: are the iPhones about to get a design revamp?
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Let’s start with that. According to serial tipster Majin Bu, the iPhone 17 Pro will introduce a vapor chamber system. “According to an internal source, new confidential information is emerging about the iPhone 17 Pro, revealing Apple’s efforts to enhance heat management. Central to these developments is the introduction of a vapor chamber (VC) cooling system, a first for the iPhone lineup. While this represents a significant step in thermal engineering, early indications suggest a design still evolving, with some challenges to address,” the leaker said.
They also shared a photo of what they claimed to be the copper thermal plate for the system. Vapor chambers are used to help phones from overheating when demands are made on the processor — playing games is a particularly processor-intensive activity on a phone.
And iOS 26 will introduce a new Games app, so hardware that can game better and for longer seems to tie in with Apple’s increased interest in gaming.
Although the iPhone doesn’t have a vapor chamber, and its introduction would be the first for Apple’s handsets, some other phones do, such as the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra. The system is said to work better than the graphite sheets used in iPhones to reduce temperature.
“The vapor chamber is a passive cooling system that significantly outperforms the graphite pads used in current iPhone models. It consists of a sealed metallic chamber with a small amount of working fluid inside. As the device heats up, the liquid evaporates in hotter regions and condenses in cooler areas, creating a continuous internal cycle that spreads heat more evenly across the surface. This mechanism enables faster temperature reduction and helps prevent thermal throttling, a phenomenon where performance is reduced to protect internal components from overheating,” Majin Bu explained.
They also said that the presumed vapor chamber design had a curios element, a section which would extend to the camera module. This suggests it could be used to dissipate heat from the camera, though as they point out, that is “a zone traditionally not associated with high thermal output. This could imply a secondary function: using the camera zone and metallic frame as passive heat dissipators,” as they put it.
Back to the color changes. Even if there’s little else in the way of significant design changes, Apple almost always changes the color palette. A new report from Tim Hardwick at MacRumors has rounded up what colors we should expect.
For the regular iPhone 17, there’s been one rumor so far. The current range of iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Plus colors consists of ultramarine, teal, pink, white, and black. The iPhone 17, it’s rumored, will be in new purple and green colors. If you asked me which colors they’d replace, I’d say teal and ultramarine. The report adds that only one of the two colors may make the final cut.
For iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max, the materials may be changing, in which case the colors definitely will. The new iPhone Pro models “are rumored to have an aluminum frame instead of titanium. The back of the devices will also reportedly have a new ‘part-aluminum, part-glass’ design,” MacRumors says, and hints that sky blue could be one of the new colors. Back to Gurman’s report.
There have been reports of faster-charging iPhones, good and bad news about display properties and display sizes, a thicker-than-ever iPhone 17 Pro Max, a curious design detail on the iPhone 17 Air, and worries about that phone’s battery life, to name just a few.
But now, industry heavyweight Gurman has more details of what’s coming. In his weekly Power On newsletter, in answer to a question of whether this year’s iPhone is considered a redesign, he answered, “Yes.” So, there we have it. No, wait, there’s more.
“Within Apple, this year’s iPhone lineup is considered an industrial design revamp compared to the iPhone 16 Pro Max, for instance. That includes the new skinnier iPhone 17 ‘Air’ model, as well as Pro versions with a redesigned back and camera area,” Gurman says. Note the quote marks around “Air,” presumably because Apple hasn’t confirmed such a name and so it’s subject to change.
“From the front, the new phones won’t look much different than recent models,” he adds. Since the phones are almost all-screen with thin bezels, that’s not such a surprise, though Gurman is saying there’s no change to the iPhone’s Dynamic Island, as he refers to this.
“The Pro changes on the rear are certainly noticeable. In any case, these tweaks are just a stepping stone toward next year’s upgrades. That’s when Apple will shrink the Dynamic Island, moving closer to a screen that truly covers the entire front of the phone, and roll out a foldable model. More changes will come in 2027, as I’ve earlier reported, with a Pro model redesign tied to the iPhone’s 20-year anniversary,” he concludes.
There’s a lot of detail there, particularly about the all-screen iPhone coming in more than two years’ time, even if we might have hoped for more concrete information about this fall’s look.
And there’s no mention of whether or not ProMotion will be on the new iPhone 17, or exactly how the camera area will change, though other analysts have consistently reported a wider panel on the phone’s rear. Or will the Pro Max be called the iPhone 17 Ultra? I’ll report back as more information leaks.
