The iPhone 17 Pro has an aluminum case and vapor chamber cooling

While all eyes are likely on the iPhone Air this year, Apple is introducing several new features in the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max that should keep its more demanding users satisfied. The company says it went back to the drawing board to develop a new unibody aluminum case, a vapor chamber cooling system and the biggest batteries ever put into iPhones. There’s also a completely revamped rear design, featuring a new horizontal camera module and combination of aluminum and Apple’s Ceramic Shield 2 along the bottom half. The latter update should increase overall durability, while also allowing for MagSafe wireless charging.

While all of Apple’s new iPhones are getting massive camera upgrades this year, the Pro rightfully remains the most capable with a new 48 megapixel telephoto lens. That joins 48MP wide and ultra-wide sensors, as well as the new 18MP Center Stage front-facing camera. The telephoto camera can now shoot up to 8x “optical quality” zoom at 12MP (a fancy way to say it’s cropping) and 4x at its full 48MP. As usual, Apple shot its iPhone announcement event with its new Pro phone and it looked on par with a true professional camera. (Of course, it’s also assisted by lots of other gear to help with shot placement and stabilization.)

Under the hood is Apple’s new A19 Pro chip, a six-core CPU that offers “MacBook-level processing power,” according to the company. Strangely enough, the A19 Pro is also in the iPhone Air, but the iPhone 17 Pro’s vapor chamber cooling should allow for better sustained performance that’s up to 40 percent faster than the A18 Pro. (You can’t really push heat out quickly from a super-thin case, after all.) Also on the chip front, the iPhone 17 Pro features Apple’s new N1 networking chip, which delivers Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6 and Thread support. The company claims it also help make the iPhone 17 Pro’s Hotspot and AirDrop features faster and more reliable.

Not much has changed with the iPhone 17 Pro’s displays: There’s still the standard 6.3-inch screen, while the Max model has a 6.9-inch option. Both screens reach up to 3,000 nits of peak outdoor brightness, offer 120Hz variable refresh rate ProMotion screens and have always-on capabilities. They should be a bit tougher this time around thanks to Ceramic Shield 2, which has “3x better scratch resistance and improved anti-reflection,” according to Apple.

The iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max will be available for pre-order on September 12th, starting at $1,099 and $1,199, respectively. While the price has jumped up $100 since last year, Apple is also including 256GB of storage from the start. (The iPhone Air is taking over the $1,000 slot.)