It’s peak summer right now, though fall is just around the corner with back-to-school season on the horizon. With that also comes Apple’s annual iPhone event.
This year, we are definitely expecting the iPhone 15 lineup, as well as Apple Watch Series 9, and maybe a new Apple Watch Ultra. The rumors for the iPhone 15 series have been going strong for months, though there has also been a lot of back-and-forth too, mostly relating to the iPhone 15 Pro models.
However, as we get closer to the reveal, the iPhone 15 is becoming a little less exciting for me, especially compared to the great Android phones we’ve gotten so far in 2023. Even as a longtime iPhone user (I’ve been using iPhone since the original and every generation since), I must admit that the iPhone itself is getting a little drab and, dare I say, boring.
Still, there are two things in particular that I’m looking forward to once Apple announces the iPhone 15 Pro — assuming, of course, that the rumors hold up.
One cable to rule them all
EU rulings and regulations played a major part in getting Apple to make the jump to universal USB-C charging with the iPhone 15. Apple already switched the iPad lineup to USB-C across all models, as well as all recent MacBooks (though you can also charge those with MagSafe 3). So really, the only devices still holding out are AirPods and the iPhone.
I honestly can’t wait to have a USB-C iPhone. In the past few years, USB-C has become more prevalent across a multitude of devices, including tablets, handheld game consoles, controllers, headphones, and battery packs — basically, most of the devices I use right now have USB-C. That means I have a ton of USB-C cables around the house, which makes it super easy to just grab any cable and plug something in.
Everything except my iPhone, that is. I still need to have a Lightning cable to charge up my iPhone 14 Pro, as well as my AirPods Max and AirPods Pro 2, if I’m not using MagSafe.
I’m about to go on a family vacation in a few weeks, and I’m going to need to make sure I don’t forget a Lightning cable among all the other USB-C chargers and cables I have just so I can make sure I can charge my iPhone 14 Pro. And Lightning cables tend to end up getting worn out over time, so I have to try not to buy replacements right now, as it’s (likely) going to become obsolete in a matter of months.
The switch to USB-C for the iPhone can’t come soon enough. I hope that AirPods also follow suit, so then we can rid ourselves of unreliable Lightning cables forever and just use USB-C for everything.
Lights, camera, Action button!
Another rumor about the iPhone 15 Pro that has me excited is the supposed Action button that will be replacing the mute toggle. Though the mute switch has remained part of the traditional iPhone design for the last 15 years, it’s quite limited in use — it simply toggled the iPhone on and off silent mode. It’s time for a change.
Apple introduced the Action button on the Apple Watch Ultra, and from the sounds of it, the iPhone 15 Pro (not the standard iPhone 15) will be getting it. I’m actually excited about this change because it opens up a lot of new possibilities for making your iPhone even more convenient.
For example, a lot of Android phones allow you to press the power button twice to quickly launch the camera. I would love to have this kind of functionality on the iPhone, and if it is indeed getting a customizable Action button, that could be one of the settings for it.
The Apple Watch Ultra Action button is a little limited in scope, but I’m hoping that Apple extends the functionality on the iPhone 15 Pro. What I want is to have the default one-click of the button be for enabling mute, or you can change it to something else. And I would also like for there to be a double-press action to bring up a different function, and maybe even a triple press.
I know that some people may not be as thrilled about this possible change of eliminating the mute toggle switch, but in the end, I think it will be better for everyone. After all, people didn’t want the Home button to go away, but almost everyone has adapted to Face ID.
And I’m sure you could still set the button to mute the phone if you want to. But as someone who just keeps my phones in perpetual silence for all of eternity, I would get much more use out of an Action button instead.
Not much else to look forward to
Besides these two rumored features, there honestly isn’t much else about the iPhone 15 Pro that is exciting, at least for me. The rumored periscope lens that’s coming is supposedly only going to be in the iPhone 15 Pro Max model, which I don’t like because it’s simply too big for me. While I would love to see that come to the regular iPhone 15 Pro, which is likely the model I’m getting, it’s not very likely at this point in time.
And while Apple always updates the camera hardware to be better each year, it really won’t mean much until Apple stops the terrible oversharpening and overprocessing of images after you capture them with the native Camera app. The computational photography processes just don’t make photos look good, no matter how great the camera lenses are. As far as design, the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro seem to be on the same path as their predecessors. I’m getting bored of the same old look, and I wish Apple would do something new with the design to shake things up a bit.
That means there’s not a whole lot I’m looking forward to with the iPhone 15 Pro, but so long as the USB-C and Action button rumors are true, it’ll still be enough to hold my attention when it’s announced in just a few short months.
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