Apple iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max review: More than just a bold new look

The new 48-megapixel telephoto camera shoots at 4x (down from 5x in the iPhone 16 Pro and Pro Max). But because the telephoto camera’s sensor is larger, it’s able to offer an 8x crop zoom that Apple claims is “optical-quality” – though at 8x you are limited to 12-megapixel photos.

As a result, Apple says the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max have the equivalent of eight lenses. I don’t feel that’s an accurate description since five of those “eight lenses” are in fact crops, but that’s a rant for another day. Here’s a summary of the three cameras and the focal lengths that Apple says they can capture with “optical-quality” (all in 35mm equivalent).

As you can see from the sample photos above the new telephoto camera is a big improvement. Not only do I find the 4x 80mm equivalent focal length more usable (5x often feels too tight), but the photos that it takes are noticeably superior in terms of sharpness and detail. Furthermore, the performance at 8x is good. In fact, the images that this year’s Pro iPhones take at 8x are slightly sharper and more detailed than the 5x photos of last year’s phones. That’s how big a leap in image quality this year’s new telephoto camera delivers. Quality still drops fast when it gets dark, but Night mode helps mitigate this by a significant degree.

My only gripe with the Pro iPhones’ camera is the ultra wide camera is noticeably weaker than the main and telephoto cameras. Though it’s a 48-megapixel unit, the photos it captures are appreciably less crisp, less sharp, and less detailed than the main and telephoto cameras. It offers interesting perspectives with its wide field of view, and it has the ability to take incredible macros if you can get the lighting right, but the main and telephoto cameras are optically superior.

Pro iPhones have always had great video capabilities, and the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max are no different. The fact that Apple uses its own phones to record its event presentations should tell you just how good they are. Some pro users will lament that there’s no support for 8K, but since 8K is still far from mainstream, I doubt many will see it as an issue. What they will be happy to know, however, is that this year’s phones add support for ProRes RAW, which will unlock even more flexibility and options in post-production. Apple also added support for Genlock, which allows professionals to precisely sync multiple video devices to create special effects like bullet-time.

Though the on-paper improvements seem small, they combine to have a profound impact on the usability of the cameras of the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max. There’s no question that the telephoto camera is the standout, and I can definitely see myself using it more this year. However, the improved image processing pipeline with its seemingly less aggressive processing is just as, if not more important. It helps the main camera take more pleasing photos. Overall, the photo and video capabilities of these phones are strong and are only let down by the slightly lacklustre ultra wide camera.

Performance & battery life

Inside the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max are Apple’s latest A19 Pro chips. I’ve covered them extensively in a separate feature, so I urge you to check that out. But to put it briefly, it is one of, if not the most powerful chip you’ll find in a smartphone today. To give you a taste, just take a look at its performance on Geekbench’s CPU test.

These chips have 6 CPU cores and 6 GPU cores and employ a sophisticated vapour chamber cooling system to keep them cool. Not only is the vapour chamber effective at drawing heat away from the chip, but the chamber itself is also laser-welded in parts to the chassis, allowing heat to be transferred away from the chamber and into the rest of the body. The result is that the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max have performance that rivals an Apple M2 desktop chip.

To see the impact of the vapour cooling chamber, we ran 3DMark’s Solar Bay stress test on the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro. This test loops the intensive Solar Bay test over and over again for 30 minutes and records the scores the phones achieved. And as we can see from the results below, the iPhone 17 Pro’s dip in performance is less dramatic than the iPhone 16 Pro’s. That said, if given an intensive enough task, we can see that the vapour chamber will also start to lose its effectiveness at some point.

Apple has taken great pains to improve the battery life of this year’s models. The A19 Pro chip is more power-efficient, and the phones also feature larger batteries. Apple is coy about the batteries’ exact capacities, but reports say the iPhone 17 Pro Max’s battery is about 3% larger, whereas the iPhone 17 Pro has an 11% larger battery. This was how long the phones lasted in our battery test, which involves playing a 720p video at 100% display brightness, 100% volume, and with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on.

Unsurprisingly, battery life has improved appreciably. Both Pro iPhones have crossed the 10-hour mark in our test. In the real world, the battery life gains are equally noticeably. My days start at 6 am and often end near midnight. Even then, I found that the iPhone 17 Pro Max would have around 35% to 40% of charge left. With last year’s iPhone 16 Pro Max, that number was often closer to 20%. Charging speeds have also been improved. These phones can now get 50% of charge in 20 minutes (down from 30 mins), but this requires a compatible charger that supports the new USB-PD PD3.2 SPR AVS charging protocol.

Where’s the AI?

There’s one thing that’s glaringly missing from the new iPhones this year: any flashy announcement around and about Apple Intelligence. When Apple first announced Apple Intelligence back at WWDC 2024, it said it would have a “more personalised Siri” that understands you better and could take action based on your “personal context” and what’s showing on your screen. Sadly, Apple announced earlier this year that that incredible-looking feature has been delayed and hasn’t said much about it since.

Apple also didn’t make much noise about AI features during its iPhone unveiling. Image Clean Up is useful for cleaning up photos, and Writing Tools can help polish your emails, but rivals are doing arguably more interesting things where you can use conversational text to edit your photos, or voice commands to find and add events to your calendars. Granted, I don’t think anyone should be making their phone purchasing decision based on what AI features it has, but it’s also true that Apple is being very quiet on this front.

A good year for the Pro iPhone

This year’s iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max are the strongest updates we’ve had in a while. Taken individually, the updates don’t seem that exciting. But when viewed as a whole, this year’s phones present compelling reasons to upgrade. It really is a case of the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. It also helps that Apple has kept prices the same.

A large part of it probably has to do with the new design and, of course, that striking Cosmic Orange finish. But there’s no denying that this year’s phones also offer measurably better performance, cameras, and battery life. Even if you have last year’s phones, I’d say it could be worth upgrading for the improved image processing, the new front-facing and telephoto cameras, as well as the longer battery life.

But I have some gripes. To start, these phones are noticeably chunkier and heavier. The smaller iPhone 17 Pro remains manageable, but the larger iPhone 17 Pro Max puts considerable strain on my pinky finger. I suppose that’s the price to pay for a larger display and longer battery life. But at 233g, the iPhone 17 Pro Max must surely be one of the heaviest phones you can buy now. My other gripe is the ultra wide camera. Now that the telephoto camera has been improved significantly, I think the ultra wide camera should do better.

Ultimately, these are minor grumbles because the rest of the package is so good. Upgrading to a new iPhone is usually a tricky thing, particularly if you are coming from a fairly recent model – you have to weigh the costs against what’s new and decide whether it’s a worthwhile endeavour. Thankfully, I think the decision is easier this year, because these are simply some of the best Pro iPhones we’ve had in a while. If you can stomach their high prices, they are excellent phones to have.

What about the iPhone Air and iPhone 17?

I’m still in the midst of evaluating the iPhone Air and iPhone 17, but I’d say that the iPhone Air is a very different type of phone. Because of its super-svelte body, it demands some sacrifice from its users. The iPhone 17, on the other hand, is the best regular iPhone we’ve had in years, and I think it should be the iPhone most people should get.

Note: You can find the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max on Lazada, Shopee, Amazon and the Apple Online Store.

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