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Should You Buy an iPhone 17 Now or Wait for iPhone 18?

I recently bought a 17e with a SIM card slot as my travel phone but found it very disappointing so I just traded it in for 17 pro instead of waiting for the 18 pro with a bigger price tag.
 
Nibo10 said:
I’m wondering whether owners of the 17 or the Air will be able to trade in their devices for a new model once September rolls around. So far, trade-ins have only been available for devices that receive an update, so if these models aren’t updated, I’d assume they wouldn’t be eligible which seems so weird.
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I called and asked apple about that because i bought the 17e and wanted-to trade it in for a 17pro. I was told 17 trade in options would populate when the 18s became available for sale.
 
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davitur said:
If you were in the market for a phone today or soon, I would seriously look at anything with more than 8GB of system ram. Apple is clearly signaling that 8GB is not enough going forward (AI or not) with moving the base models to 9GB. If you are going to upgrade your phone every 2-3 years, then yes the base iPhone 17 is likely the sweet spot right now.

On the other hand, if you are the person who holds on to devices for up to 5 years (or more), then a lack of RAM is what is going to drive you crazy with future OS updates.
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Yep, I have an M4 iPad Pro which has 8GB RAM and an M4 iPad Air which has 12GB RAM, and the Air literally just functions better interpreting what I tell it to do when I'm speaking to it, and this was over a week. I'm thinking 12GB RAM is gonna be the minimum for Siri to be actually useful. If the iPhone 18 base has the rumored 12GB, then it'd be the obvious choice to wait for that.
 
erikkfi said:
My plan:

1) Buy the 17 Pro a few days before the event.
2) Fall in love with Cosmic Orange
3) Hate the new, typically boring deep red / wine / dark cherry color
4) Hate the $200 price increase
5) Keep the 17 Pro

The best-laid plans, however.....
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99% confident you will not be doing this.
 
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Well, my 13 Pro still goes well, even though I shoot occasional photos/videos I feel like it shoots 'good enough', and even when I upgrade some day it certainly wouldn't be 17 Pro which for me is just awfully looking.

If I upgrade 16 Pro is my default choice now, given that we don't know what 18 or 18 Pro will look like.
 
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Can they please not make my 13 pro max heat up with the recent updates? I don’t need another phone. Thanks! (Pass the message to Tom Cooked)
 
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kushner said:
Can they please not make my 13 pro max heat up with the recent updates? I don’t need another phone. Thanks! (Pass the message to Tom Cooked)
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I traded in my 13 Pro to get a 17 Pro. The 13 Pro heated up ALL THE TIME. The screen would dim whenever I updated apps. Check your battery health; that's a ~5 year old phone with a ~5 year old degraded battery that can no longer supply the on-demand voltage needed to do anything cpu intensive.
 
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I picked up the base 17 Pro for £949 a couple of weeks ago, upgrading my 15 Pro, which was becoming a pain due to the 128GB storage, which isn't enough when Apple is using half of it for the OS and system data! The camera is a big improvement and has a better battery life, even running the 27 public beta.

I upgraded my MacBook Pro M1 to an M5 Pro for just under £2000 about a month before the price increases, so I think I've managed to dodge most of the price rises and should be good for at least another 3-4 years.
 
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Bought my partner a 17 PM three weeks ago - did my part to move them away from Android 🤣. The thought of waiting did cross my mind as did waiting and then handing my 17 PM if I upgraded to 18PM but I didn’t.
 
Wx_Man said:
Do my strategy. I’ll replace my iPhone 15 Pro with a refurbed or used iPhone 17 Pro after the iPhone 19 is released next year in 2027. That’s a four year upgrade cycle from when I bought my iPhone 15 Pro. I’ll do the same for my 2023 M3 Pro MacBook Pro. When the M7 Pro MacBook Pro comes out next year I’ll get a refurbed or used M5 Pro MacBook Pro to replace it.

Buying new in this artificially hyper inflated world is for chumps or for companies who amortize such purchases for tax reasons.
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Sounds like wise idea. I especially like your last paragraph. I’m assuming you also price in a replacement battery costs into the equation?
 
One thing that people don’t really seem to be talking about, but I am quite curious about, is will the iPhone 17 price drop after the iPhone 18 is introduced? Apple typically leaves the prior gen on sale for a lower price. If the iPhone 18 gets an increase, will that mean the iPhone 17 stays on sale for the same price?
 
"With 9GB RAM, the ‌iPhone 18‌ won't support the iOS 27 Siri voice customization and dictation features, which require 12GB RAM." Seems to me they'd make it work. Why bother upping the RAM at all if not?
 
mudflap said:
I traded in my 13 Pro to get a 17 Pro. The 13 Pro heated up ALL THE TIME. The screen would dim whenever I updated apps. Check your battery health; that's a ~5 year old phone with a ~5 year old degraded battery that can no longer supply the on-demand voltage needed to do anything cpu intensive.
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New battery, 6months old, worked great aprox 3 months then it started to heat up. Running waze while driving goes into overheating. It never happened before, even browsing in the sun runs it hot in 10-20min, i suspect its the updates.
 
FasterQuieter said:
"With 9GB RAM, the ‌iPhone 18‌ won't support the iOS 27 Siri voice customization and dictation features, which require 12GB RAM." Seems to me they'd make it work. Why bother upping the RAM at all if not?
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You may be right. But Apple can also load a slightly larger local model that may be more accurate or have some additional capability but still not be able to execute the voice customization and dictation features. Or maybe Apple saw that general performance improved with 9GB vs 8GB for the base AI feature set. Apple is also working with PrismML to further compress larger LLMs to fit into 8-12GB of memory using 1-bit quantization among other techniques. If that tech pans out, it’s quite possible Apple will be able to load more advanced features into 8GB than they currently do.
 
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kushner said:
New battery, 6months old, worked great aprox 3 months then it started to heat up. Running waze while driving goes into overheating. It never happened before, even browsing in the sun runs it hot in 10-20min, i suspect its the updates.
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I have to ask, third party battery/replacement or Apple battery replacement?
 
A 17 pro max has 12 gigs of RAM.
It’s the obvious choice.
The 18 Pro Max will have an inflated price and not much to show for it
 
TruthAboveAllElse said:
One thing that people don’t really seem to be talking about, but I am quite curious about, is will the iPhone 17 price drop after the iPhone 18 is introduced? Apple typically leaves the prior gen on sale for a lower price. If the iPhone 18 gets an increase, will that mean the iPhone 17 stays on sale for the same price?
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I don’t expect to see the price drop on unlocked 17pros because of the price increases on the 18s. Except maybe from wireless carriers as incentives to increase the contract periods
 
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rbbloom99 said:
I don’t expect to see the price drop on unlocked 17pros because of the price increases on the 18s. Except maybe from wireless carriers as incentives to increase the contract periods
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Agreed. This is the same company that raised prices on REFURBISHED products. They’re not going to cut prices on new product even if the 17P/PM are one gen old. Carriers will likely be the best chance to get a good price on contract.
 
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