Updated March 10: article originally posted March 9.
It appears that Apple has decided on the look of the next iPhone. The latest leaked CAD files claim to show the final design decision. And there’s a big win for another Apple product in the mix.
Published by noted online tipster Majin Bu, the CAD plans for the rear of the iPhone 16 show the new arrangement of the camera island for the upcoming iPhone 16 (and presumably the iPhone 16 Plus). In a change to the previous diagonally arranged pair of lenses, the iPhone 16 cameras will be mounted vertically atop each other. The flash looks to be sitting at the side of the main and telephoto lenses.
One of the key benefits of this arrangement will be Apple’s mixed reality headset. The Apple Vision Pro can play stereoscopic videos. Apple has branded its version of this as Spatial Video. The vertical arrangments of the iPhone 16 camera will, when held in the traditional landscape mode for video recording, place the lenses alongside each other like digital eyes.
This is an arrangement the iPhone 15 Pro has, making those videos compatible with the headset, but it’s not an option available on the vanilla iPhone 15 or iPhone 15 Plus.
Update: Sunday March 10: Following the iPhone 16 CAD diagrams of the handset’s rear, the team at 91mobiles has published CAD diagrams for the larger iPhone 16 Pro model.
With the iPhone 15 Pro already supporting stereoscopic video recording thanks to the vertical alignment of two camera lenses, the iPhone 16 Pro continues with the same camera island design as the previous model. One addition that cannot be seen on the CAD diagram is the potential change to the telephoto camera, which reportedly gets the tetraprism telephoto lens that was previously an iPhone 15 Pro Max exclusive. This should offer x5 optical magnification.
The CAD diagrams also back up previously leaked details on the size of the iPhone 16 Pro; with a slight increase in all dimensions, the display size should increase from 6.12 inches to 6.3 inches.
While the Apple Vision Pro remains an expensive luxury with an ill-defined purpose beyond ‘defining a blue ribband product for Apple’s future,’ the company’s faithful community expects the headsets’ price to fall over the next few years and for the hardware to become more prevalent. When that happens, a new Apple Vision owner could have years of family memories and personal moments sitting in iCloud thanks to Spatial Video, all waiting to be played back in the virtual space.
That’s a powerful network effect that can sell future headsets.
Bu has only published the CAD view of the iPhone 16’s rear plate, so many design cues are not fully visible, but their impact on the design can be seen. Around the edge of the design can be seen the various buttons to control parts of the device. The action button, introduced on the iPhone 15 Pro, can be seen above the two volume buttons.
A fourth button can be seen on the opposite side of the iPhone 16. While it has not been confirmed, Apple is widely expected to add a second programmable button to the smartphone labelled the capture button. There was some discussion that this could be capacitive, but the CAD designs here suggest that Tim Cook and his team have decided on a physical capture button for this year’s iPhone.
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