iPhone 17e

The iPhone 16e marked a welcome, much-needed return to a more budget-friendly price point for Apple, a manufacturer that is increasingly selling the idea of an ecosystem rather than a specific product. Precisely for that reason, there are more reasons than ever before to choose an affordable Apple product because so many of the benefits are consistent across their portfolio.

For that very reason, the iPhone 17e is, in many ways, something of a slam dunk for Apple. They can, in fact, lean back a little on the ecosystem's built-in advantages, and thereby create a smartphone with obvious flaws and shortcomings, but one that will undoubtedly appeal to a broad, broad audience.

Okay, so aesthetically, the 17e follows the design tradition of the iPhone 14 era, which means we won't be getting Dynamic Island again. It's a shame, there's no getting round it, as this isn't just a matter of aesthetics (even though the actual difference between a so-called "notch" and the small cut-out pill is minimal), but perhaps more critically, it's a software tradition that the 17e deliberately lags behind, which is precisely what Apple shouldn't be doing.

That said, it is IP68-certified, its battery easily gets you through a day and a half of use, there's Ceramic Shield 2 for scratch resistance, and now there's MagSafe with 15W wireless charging... finally. This is crucial, and we needn't use any more column space than to identify this as one of the major successes here.

Apple's A19 chip delivers a six-core CPU and a four-core GPU (along with an accompanying 16-core Neural Engine). I seriously doubt that a typical 17e buyer is concerned with performance metrics, and it's perhaps more accurate to state that you never have to wait on a 17e, whether you're playing Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket, taking photos with post-processing, or using Safari (or Arc, as I do myself). This is a seamless experience, and in all likelihood will continue to be so.

There is also 256 GB of storage to start with, which is certainly welcome, plus 8 GB of RAM, which also feels appropriate given where iOS is at right now. Let me say, however, that although this 6.1" Super Retina XDR OLED panel at 2532x1170 delivers rock-solid reproduction, smoothness, and saturation for my taste, I won't make excuses for the 60Hz. No, perhaps not everyone will notice it, but for me, 90Hz and even 120Hz have simply become the norm now, and there's no excuse for Apple not keeping up with the times.

Surprisingly enough, the camera has been downright brilliant despite having just a single lens here. It's a 48-megapixel Fusion lens at f/1.6 with 2x optical zoom, and I've gradually learnt to use it quite skilfully, partly due to extended time with an iPhone Air. Whether it's the gradual shift towards software-based post-processing like Google's, or the persistent fine-tuning of the same hardware across several generations, this single Apple lens is exceptionally versatile, and I'd happily rely on it even in tricky scenarios.

The 60Hz refresh rate is annoying, and the lack of Dynamic Island is also a major blow, but the most important thing is that the 17e occupies a comfortable place within the ecosystem's four walls, and through features such as MagSafe and the A19 chip, which will in future utilise both Apple Intelligence features (if they ever actually become useful, just like most other dedicated AI suites). Apple has broadly hit the mark with this budget-oriented iPhone.