Yeah, there’s a smaller Dynamic Island and fancy new colors, but you’d be hard pressed to tell the difference between the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max and the iPhone 17 Pro series at a glance.
Dig a bit deeper, however, and you’ll discover that the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max have some pretty big camera upgrades that photographers of all skill levels will appreciate. The main camera offers variable aperture for the first time. And there’s new pro controls that let you adjust everything from the aperture to the shutter speed.
Other sneaky awesome upgrades include a much faster A20 Pro chip, improved vapor chamber cooling for better sustained performance and much longer rated battery life. However, you’re going to pay $100 more for both models. And there’s some other drawbacks. Are these the best phones you can buy now? Here’s my first impressions.
What I like
Variable aperture camera
The main 48MP fusion camera on the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max have six laser-cut blades that can transition between different apertures on the fly. This allows the camera to automatically open and close the shutter based on the conditions to give you optimal control of depth of field and lighting.
Even better, you can manually change the aperture from four different ranges, allowing you to choose the optimal setting for the photo at hand. For example, you can choose f/1.48 for portraits and have more of the background out of focus or go up to f/4.0 if you want all of the scene to look sharp.
I tried this out in a simulated bar setting and I captured a glass with two different aperture settings and noticed a stark difference in the images. We’ll be doing a lot more testing to see if these flagships make our best camera phone list.
Seriously powerful A20 Pro chip — with better cooling
The A20 Pro is Apple’s first 2nm chip in a phone, and it promises a serious performance boost. The 6-core CPU has two super cores that are up to 20% faster than the A19 Pro, plus a new 7-core GPU that promises up to 40% faster graphics performance than the iPhone 17 Pro Max.
I tried out the new chip in the Monster Hunter game coming later this year, and the gameplay was super smooth. We’re talking up to 120 frames per second.
Just as important, the new larger vapor chamber cooling system is designed to deliver up to 40% better sustained performance than the iPhone 17 Pro. Apple also designed the A20 Pro chip so that the memory sits to the side instead of having a stacked configuration, which also helps dissipate heat.
Even longer battery life
The iPhone 17 Pro Max was already one of the longest lasting phones we’ve ever tested, ranking high on our best phone battery life list. But the iPhone 18 Pro Max could shatter endurance records.
Apple has rated this flagship for 45 hours of video playback and the iPhone 18 Pro for 36 hours. Compare that to 39 hours and 33 hours, respectively, for the iPhone 17 Pro Max and iPhone 17 Pro.
The charging on the iPhone 18 Pro series gets a boost as well. You can get up to 50% charge in just 15 minutes with a 60W charger. MagSafe charging can get you to 50% in 30 minutes
Siri AI is finally smart enough
While Siri has been the butt of jokes for years, the new Siri AI that comes with iOS 27 is pretty impressive. For example, with Visual Intelligence in the camera app, I could simply point the iPhone 18 Pro at a poster with dates on it and the phone instantly recognized them and could add them to my calendar super fast.
The new Siri also understands personal context a lot better. You can ask to pull up information like your upcoming flight and it will instantly pop up on screen. You can then go full screen if you like to ask follow-up questions.
What I don’t like
Higher prices
It’s simply a sign of the times at this point, but it’s not great that the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max both get a $100 price hike. The iPhone 18 Pro now starts at $1,099 and the Pro Max will run you $1,199.
To be fair, the Galaxy S26 Ultra also starts at $1,299, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.
Heavier designs
Maybe it’s the variable aperture camera, larger vapor chamber cooling area or bigger batteries — or all of the above. But the new iPhone 18 Pros are heavier than their predecessors.
The iPhone 18 Pro weighs 7.44 ounces (211 grams), compared to 7.27 ounces (206 grams for the iPhone 17 Pro. And the iPhone 18 Pro Max tips the scales at 8.78 ounces (249 grams) versus 8.22 ounces (233 grams) for the 17 Pro Max.
No Gemini Live equivalent
As much as I appreciate the new Siri, you can’t have a live conversation about what it’s seeing in real time as you can with Gemini Live or ChatGPT Voice mode. I feel like that’s a pretty big hole versus the leading AI assistants.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve used Gemini Live in particular to troubleshoot things on the fly or ask questions about things in front of me. I’d like to see Apple beef up Siri in this regard to make it even more conversational.
iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max: Outlook
The iPhone Duo understandably is getting the most buzz, but not everyone wants or needs a foldable phone — and certainly not everyone can afford its $2,000 price. The iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are for power users who don’t want to give up a traditional form factor or flagship features like a telephoto zoom.
In addition, the iPhone 18 Pros have longer rated battery life — especially the iPhone 18 Pro Max — and come with Face ID built in. You just have to be willing to live with a minor price hike versus the iPhone 17 Pros and heavier designs.
For my money I’d go for the iPhone 18 Pro Max for its better endurance and bigger display, but both of these phones are true pro-level devices.
Stay tuned for our full rated review.
