iPhone Xs: what we know about the three Apple phones expected next week
The iPhone X had been out in the wild for less than a month when we first reported rumours of Apple's likely line-up for 2018: three new full-screen iPhones, one of them a straight replacement for the X, one a bigger version of that and one a less expensive model that sits somewhere between in size.
The proceeding 10 months have seen everything from Apple's supply line to its internal marketing leak like a sieve, muddied somewhat by the usual baseless speculation, but the line-up of three phones has remained relatively constant. At this point, it seems all but assured that, when Tim Cook takes the stage next week at Apple's big iPhone event (Thursday, AEST), he'll be introducing these three phones. But what do we know about them?
According to 9to5Mac, which also uncovered official images of the phones, the new flagship pair will be called iPhone Xs, a name that seems to prove once and for how silly it was for Apple to inject a Roman numeral into its naming scheme. The company will most likely insist on pronouncing it "the Ten Ess", but most of us will end up reading it as it's written and referring to it as "the Excess".
The smaller of the two phones is expected to sport a 5.8-inch OLED screen, making it the same size as last year's iPhone X. The larger phone is expected to have a mammoth 6.5-inch OLED, giving it just slightly more real estate than Samsung's Galaxy Note9. Also, like the Note9, it's been rumoured to be coming with up to 512GB of built-in storage.
Interestingly both BGR and 9to5Mac cite insider sources as saying the larger phone may not be called the iPhone Xs Plus, but rather the iPhone Xs Max, both of which only make it more difficult to imagine the word "ten" being in there anywhere.
Multiple outlets have also reported that the phones will be offered in a new gold colour, which was not offered for the iPhone X, but, as the "s" suffix would indicate, the phones will probably be quite similar to last year's model.
Images of the phones leaked last week reinforce this, and some recent rumours - such as the fact that the new iPhones would support the Apple Pencil stylus, or that they would be able to sense your fingerprints through the glass - now seem fairly unlikely.
The third new iPhone has the potential to be the most interesting. While in 2017 there were two regular iPhones (the 8 and 8 Plus) along with the premium X, this year promises to contain two premium phones and one less expensive model.
This phone would keep the full-screen look, with no home button, but it would cut costs with a 6.1-inch LCD screen and only one rear camera. It may also feature less RAM and a different frame material (i.e. aluminium instead of stainless steel), but would feature the same next generation Apple processor seen in the Xs.
No names have surfaced for this mystery phone, although Apple could do me a personal favour and call it the iPhone 9 (not iPhone IX, please). That gap between 8 and X in the chronology is very strange.
But exactly how budget friendly would the new iPhone be? Not very, according to German site Macerkopf. If anything, it seems as though what many assumed to be a "less expensive" iPhone will be priced at regular iPhone level, with the Xs and Xs Max being more expensive.
Macerkopf claims to have obtained a price list that puts the cheaper phone at €799, and the iPhone Xs at €909 and €1149 respectively. This is what Apple charges for the base iPhone 8, 8 Plus and X in Europe, so if the site's information is good we in Australia could be looking at $1079 for the cheapest phone, $1229 for the iPhone Xs and $1579 for the iPhone Xs Plus. It's unclear whether Apple will continue to sell the iPhone 8, 7 or SE once the new phones arrive.
Apart from new phones, Apple's big hardware unveiling event is expected to include the wireless charger it showed off last year but hasn't yet released, an Apple Watch Series 4 with a larger screen, and new details on iOS 12, watchOS 5, and tvOS 12. The company is also working on a new version of AirPods that let you talk to Siri, a MacBook Air replacement and new Mac Mini, and new full-screen iPads, but it's unclear if any of them will turn up next week.