Why I’ll Probably Upgrade to the Base iPhone 17
The iPhone 17 is the most affordable of the four iphones that Apple was launched during its “AWE Droping” event in September 2025, and that automatically makes me the most interesting. It may seem the most “boring” at first glance, but as I pointed out when I compared it to the iPhone Air, the iPhone 17 is probably the best new iPhone for most people. It is well assessed, is filled with great new features, including a 120 Hz promotion screen, and it obtains most of the features generally reserved for more expensive iPhones. Here is everything you need to know about the iPhone 17 and why you may want to go.
Body, display and weight of the iPhone 17
Credit: Apple
The iPhone 17 is the most colorful option among the four iPhones launched in September 2025. You can choose from five different finishes, including lavender, sage (a green shade), blue mist, white and black.
You get the 120 Hz promotion display on this phone, which will make navigation and smoother animations and has been reserved for pro models so far. You can also use it when playing games or watching videos, and the phone can always delete the 1 Hz refreshment rate when you don’t use it to keep the battery.
The iPhone 17 also has a slightly larger XDR Super Retina screen with a ceramic shield 2 for better scratch protection. Thanks to this 1Hz support, the phone also works with the screen still on Apple, which means that you can quickly check the time without turning on the screen.
Apple says that the iPhone 17 is water resistant to a depth of 6 meters up to 30 minutes too. This means that if you put your phone in the water, it should be sure as long as it is within these limits.
Apple still managed to keep this phone fairly light, 6.24 ounces (177 grams). This makes it heavier than iPhone air (5.82 ounces or 165 grams), but it should always be reasonably easy to handle.
iPhone 17 processor
Credit: Apple
The iPhone 17 is delivered with Apple’s new A19 chip, and it is the only one of the four new iPhones to use it. All other phones launched in Apple’s event in September 2025 use the A19 Pro chip. The A19 has a 6 -core processor and a 5 -core GPU with neural accelerators. When writing the editorial’s moment, the first geekbench scores give us a good idea of the performance of the A19. It seems to mark about 7 to 8% more than the iPhone 16 chip A18. According to the same report, the iPhone 17 A 8 GB of RAM. Apple does not make RAM specifications public, but comparative analysis tools are a reliable indicator for this metric.
This phone supports 2 esims and does not have physical SIM slots in the United States. In some regions, such as India, the iPhone 17 has a physical SIM location and an ESIM. In China, the iPhone 17 does not take charge of Esims at all and ships instead with two physical sims.
iPhone 17 cameras
Credit: Apple
Apple included two rear cameras on the iPhone 17, alongside the front camera on stage. The big news is that you no longer have to rotate your iPhone for landscape selfies. The central camera, which has an 18 megapixel sensor, uses AI to automatically adjust your frame to include more people in the plan if necessary. This can take selfies of portraits and landscapes.
What do you think so far?
The configuration of the rear camera has a main 48 megapixel sensor and an ultra-related lens of 48 megapixels. This means that you can take photos in 0.5x, 1x and 2x shooting modes. The iPhone 17 also supports the double capture, which allows you to record videos with the front and rear cameras at the same time. The rear cameras support macro-photography and they can record videos in Dolby Vision up to 4K at 60 frames per second.
Author of the battery of the iPhone 17
Credit: Apple
You can expect your iPhone 17 easily to last a full day on a single load with moderate use. Apple says that the device lasts up to 30 hours with continuous video reading, which is higher than iPhone air (27 hours) or even the iPhone 16 Plus (also 27 hours). The iPhone 17 supports the Magsafe and Qi2 wireless load. You can load it from 0 to 50% in 30 minutes using an adapter of 30 W or more associated with a Magsafe charger. If you buy the Apple 40W load adapter, your iPhone 17 will go from 0 to 50% in 20 minutes.
The smartphone has a USB-C port, but it only supports USB 2, which means that the transfer speeds will not be as fast as those of the iPhone 17 Pro (which supports USB 3 with speeds up to 10 GB / s).
A good upgrade and an advantageous price
Credit: Apple
The iPhone 17 looks like a solid upgrade with a better screen, better battery life and better cameras. It is not a revolutionary product, but he will not disappoint anyone who passes from an older phone. If your iPhone 16 device works well, you can probably continue to use it for another year, but if you have an iPhone 12 Pro Max like me, or an iPhone 15 or more device, the 17th could be an excellent upgrade.
As a person looking to upgrade, at $ 799 for the 256 GB variant, the price of the iPhone 17 is particularly attractive for me given all the features it has. The iPhone 17 of 512 GB is at a price of $ 999 if you need more space, and this should be enough storage to manage everything you can start there.
