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Apple iPhone 17 Professional deals36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts5GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts5GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts30GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts30GBdataThe coming of September heralds three inevitable issues: summer season involves an finish, the children return to high school (suckers), and Apple brings out a brand new batch of iPhones.This yr, it’s the iPhone 17 collection, and I’ve been out testing the iPhone 17 Professional. It’s been a very long time since a correct iPhone wheel reinvention, and the 17 Professional is just not that. It’s an iterative replace, including a beefed-up telephoto digicam and the improved A19 chipset for, supposedly, faster-than-ever efficiency. Look, it’s the brand new iPhone. If you happen to’re studying this, you doubtless know what you’re in for.I’ve used loads of iPhones earlier than in an expert capability for evaluations, group assessments and shopping for guides, although in my private life I’m a dedicated Android consumer, having owned a collection of Samsung Galaxies and, for my sins, Fairphones. Every time a brand new iPhone arrives, I’m all the time curious to see whether or not this would be the one which’ll tempt me to totally make the change (I lately kicked in a Home windows desktop PC for an M4 Mac Mini, so I’m nothing if not persuadable). Will the iPhone 17 Professional be the one? I spent a couple of days with it to seek out out.
(Picture credit score: Future)Apple iPhone 17 Professional: SpecsSwipe to scroll horizontallyChipset:A19 ProMemory: 12GBOS: iOS 26Screen:6.3-inch Tremendous Retina XDR OLEDResolution: 2622 x 1206Refresh fee:As much as 120 HzStorage: 256GB, 512GB, 1TBRear cameras: 48MP Fusion digicam, 48MP Fusion Ultrawide, 48MP Fusion Telephoto (permits 12MP 8x Telephoto mode)Entrance digicam: 18MP Middle Stage cameraConnectivity: Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, USB-C 3.2Battery:4,252mAhDimensions: 150 x 71.9 x 8.75mmWeight:204gDesign & screenI’ve lengthy felt that the Professional iPhones are completely sized – the Professional Max fashions I discover to be too huge for my arms and pockets – and at 150mm size and 204g weight, the iPhone 17 Professional feels excellent. The protruding digicam module attracts consideration to itself, however that’s just about a given for smartphone cameras as of late, and is the value we pay for all these subtle digicam modes we refuse to do with out.
Throughout this photoshoot I additionally inadvertently began testing whether or not the iPhone 17 Professional is certainly rain-proof (it’s). (Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)The physique, newly constructed from aluminium moderately than titanium, feels light-weight and powerful. The display screen is protected by Apple’s scratch-resistant Ceramic Protect 2, and in a primary for the collection, there’s now additionally Ceramic Protect safety on the rear of the handset too. I wasn’t allowed to take a corkscrew to the loaner to check this, however I did by chance go away it in a bag with my keys a number of instances, and it got here away scratch-free. It’s IP68 weatherproof rated, which suggests it ought to survive a hosing, however not a submerging.The display screen is after all a delight; it’s the identical 6.3-inch Tremendous Retina XDR we noticed within the iPhone 16 Professional. As soon as once more you’ve received these rounded corners that take off a little bit of efficient actual property, which means it’s a 6.27-inch display screen in actual efficient phrases, however I frankly don’t wish to meet the one who’s bothered by that. It’s buttery-smooth for gaming, TV watching, studying, no matter you love to do.As soon as once more, we’ve assignable buttons on both facet, together with the motion button that may be assigned to varied features, such because the torch or an AI-powered translation service.Day by day design information, evaluations, how-tos and extra, as picked by the editors.
The motion button sits simply above the quantity controls. (Picture credit score: Future)On the opposite facet is the digicam management button, which I like as a bodily shutter button, however discover a bit underbaked in any other case. Perhaps it’s as a result of I take advantage of so many correct cameras in my day-to-day, however I don’t discover holding it right down to activate video to be intuitive in any respect. The half-press to open zoom modes and double half-press to open digicam modes continues to be as fiddly because it was on the iPhone 16 Professional, and resulted in lots of unintentional photograph captures on my half. And as soon as the menus do open, I don’t discover them notably well-placed or straightforward to make use of on the prime of the display screen (I suppose I’m supposed to make use of my thumb? Don’t look after that).
The Digicam Management button (on the left facet of the pic; proper facet as you are holding it) is a good suggestion, however I am undecided the implementation is sort of there. (Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)Finally, the button simply doesn’t actually do what it’s clearly attempting to do – make the digicam expertise extra immersive and fluid. Love the thought, however I hope Apple takes one other swing at it.Options & performanceAs talked about, we’ve a brand new A19 chipset, upgraded from the A18 Professional on the iPhone 16 Professional, and it delivers the sort of stable, incremental enhancements you’d count on. Check out the benchmark scores under.iPhone 17 Professional: Benchmark scoresSwipe to scroll horizontallyGeekbench 6CPU single-core: 3,691CPU multi-core:9,325GPU Steel:45,701The CPU scores are stable, with the multi-core rating of 9,325 displaying almost a 15% improve over the efficiency of the iPhone 16 Professional (Apple usually guarantees enhancements of round 10-20% each time, so that is proper in line). The only-core efficiency rating exhibits a barely much less spectacular 11% bump over the iPhone 16 Professional, at 3,691, however hey, a bump is a bump.The Steel GPU take a look at gave a beefy rating of 45,701, which is a wholesome 38% improve over the iPhone 16 Professional, and is nipping on the heels of the iPad Air M3. If you’d like a telephone particularly for gaming, the iPhone 17 Professional goes to be a demonstrably higher expertise than some other iPhone save the 17 Professional Max.Battery life is superb. I spent a night taking part in Civilization VI (‘Sure, after all it’s for work, cease asking that.’) after a day of images, video and benchmark testing, and it was nicely previous my bedtime when the telephone lastly died. Apple claims it’ll last as long as 33 hours of video playback, and from my anecdotal expertise, I consider it.AIThe A19 professional chipset is meant to be Apple’s greatest in-phone structure but for powering AI, as tech corporations are all legally obligated to say with their new releases. With that stated, Apple has been just a little extra circumspect than another corporations with regard to its personal AI infrastructure, preferring to let others do the heavy lifting. Working example – you may combine Apple Intelligence with ChatGPT in that case desired, and also you don’t even want your personal ChatGPT account.I took it for a spin with the Visible Intelligence characteristic, which helps you to level the digicam at your atmosphere and ask questions on it. The outcomes: patchy, with some kinks that want ironing out and a few issues which can be simply baked in. As an illustration, I theoretically favored the way in which I might level it at varied crops and have ChatGPT inform me what sort of plant they had been. However, it has the issue that each one such generative AI features have – it’s simply guessing primarily based on its dataset, and I’ve no manner of figuring out if it’s really appropriate, so each reply comes with a giant honking disclaimer that it may not be correct and I shouldn’t use it for something vital. Actually the longer term is a magical place.
It is a pumpkin. (Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)The system doesn’t have a regular recourse when it doesn’t know a solution. It repeatedly didn’t establish a picture of the extraordinarily obscure and really not often photographed political determine Nelson Mandela, however moderately than giving me an ‘I don’t know’, it stored simply re-asking ‘What do you wish to know?’, sometimes spicing issues up with a ‘One thing went mistaken’.I additionally tried out the Apple Intelligence Stay Translation characteristic, which supposedly makes it doable to fluidly talk throughout language obstacles. When confined to textual content, it’s good, permitting you to rapidly translate screenshots and messages from one language to a different (even when it’s not all the time good, you’ll positively get the gist). I attempted the voice-translation characteristic, going from French to English and again, and… it type of works should you communicate very slowly and don’t use any uncommon phrases that sound like frequent ones. The concept that it might facilitate a fluid, real-time dialog between two individuals talking totally different languages – nicely, I’m sceptical, to place it mildly.CameraImage 1 of 11All photographs transformed to from HEIC to JPG, in any other case unedited.(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)Even in normal settings, photographs are punchy and shiny.(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)The telephoto digicam helps select extra attention-grabbing compositions.(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)I used to be genuinely impressed with how the low-light high quality held up on this dimly lit venue.(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)I discovered the macro mode’s automated characteristic to be annoyingly distracting whereas attempting to compose this picture.(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)The telephone’s close-up talents are perfect for ‘gramming your meals.(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)The selfie digicam has been bumped to 18MP.(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)The large new characteristic is that the telephoto digicam has been upgraded, going from 12MP to a 48MP Fusion module, the identical decision because the Primary and Ultrawide. In follow, this implies you will have much more zoom energy, with a high-quality 4x zoom mode, a 12MP 8x zoom mode, and even the choice to go as much as a digital 16x zoom, an equal focal size of 200mm (on an actual digicam, that may be a whacking lengthy lens).The zoom modes maintain up rather well when seen on a monitor. I’m usually not a fan of digital zoom, however truthfully the 16x isn’t unhealthy! There’s clearly a little bit of interpolation serving to issues alongside, however whereas the ensuing picture is grainy, it’s nonetheless usable. The digicam array additionally does nicely in low mild – I took the telephone to a live performance, and located that the 4x zoom gave me one of the best steadiness between high quality and closeness to the topic (although the 8x was no slouch).Picture 1 of 6A scene at 0.5x zoom.(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)At 1x zoom (normal)(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)2x(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)4x(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)8x(Picture credit score: Jon Stapley)16x digital zoom. Certain, it is just a little gritty, nevertheless it’s not unhealthy!(Picture credit score: Future)The close-up and macro mode makes use of the ultra-wide digicam to provide you a shallow depth of area. I’m not a fan of the auto-activation characteristic – supposedly it kicks in easily if you transfer your digicam near a topic, however in follow I discovered it stored turning itself on and off whereas I used to be attempting to regulate my composition, and shortly I misplaced persistence and locked it on.
The highlighted space is what the digicam will really seize; the greyed-out areas lined in display screen furnishings shall be cropped off. (Picture credit score: Future)Video has additionally acquired a hefty improve, aimed squarely on the professional market. The iPhone 17 Professional boasts options like: the ProRes RAW video codec; the Log2 flat color profile for maximising dynamic vary, thereby preserving element for the colour grade; and genlock for synchronising a number of video gadgets. Ninety-five per cent of people that use the telephone gained’t know what these issues are, and don’t have to know, however should you’re somebody who makes use of an iPhone for skilled video content material creation, I’d say the iPhone 17 Professional critically deserves consideration as an improve. There’s loads right here.PriceThe iPhone 17 Professional begins at $1,099 / £1,099 for the 256GB mannequin, rising to $1,299 / £1,299 for the 512GB mannequin, and topping out at $1,499 / £1,499 for the 1TB mannequin. You’ll be able to additional improve this worth with the Professional Max mannequin should you’d prefer to.Who’s it for?So, did the iPhone 17 Professional do sufficient to tempt this hoary previous Android consumer? Properly, I’m undecided if I wish to spend that a lot on a telephone proper now, however I actually loved my time with it, and shall be loath to provide it up. Informal customers get greater than they should pay for, notably by way of professional video options, however the iPhone 17 Professional options digicam upgrades and efficiency enhancements that can have content material creators and players swooning.Finally, the Android/iPhone dynamic is identical because it ever was. If you happen to hone in on a particular characteristic, you’ll virtually all the time discover an Android telephone that’ll do it higher (the Xiaomi telephones with 1-inch sensors are higher for images, the Infinix telephones are higher for gaming, and many others). However, the iPhone 17 Professional offers a smoother and extra polished all-around bundle than any single Android telephone, and given what number of duties we give our telephones as of late, there’s loads to be stated for that. Purchase it ifYou need one of the best iPhone digicam systemYou desire a telephone with professional video featuresYou desire a polished, premium all-rounderDon’t purchase it ifYou personal an iPhone 16 Professional (or a 15 Professional, to be trustworthy)You wish to spend lower than 4 figuresYou don’t want a top-tier digicam systemApple iPhone 17 Professional deals36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts5GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts5GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts30GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts30GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata36 monthsUnlimited minsUnlimitedtexts1GBdata
