Apple has unveiled its latest series of iPhone models, but things are a little different this year. The larger, top-of-the-range iPhone 15 Pro Max is a new super flagship iPhone, offering a slightly different camera setup to its smaller sibling.
Over the last few years, the Pro and the Pro Max models have offered the same in terms of design and specs, differentiated only by screen size and battery. However, that’s all changed in the iPhone 15 Pro Max, with this model standing as the new crème de la crème of the 2023-2024 iPhones. Here’s what I thought when I got my Pocket-lint paws on it during the iPhone 15 launch in Cupertino. Is this the iPhone 15 model everybody will want?
Apple/ Pocket-lint
Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max
iPhone 15 Pro Max design
The Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max’s design isn’t too dissimilar to what we have seen on the iPhone models since the launch of the iPhone 12 models and their move to flat, squared-off edges. Not at first glance, anyway. At first glance, you would be forgiven for struggling to tell the iPhone 15 Pro Max apart from its predecessor – the iPhone 14 Pro Max – but all is not as it seems from a distance.
Get a little closer, and the design has more differences than you might initially realise. I’ll start with the weight, as that’s the most noticeable difference in practice. The iPhone 15 Pro Max is built out of grade 5 titanium rather than stainless steel, which results in a significantly lighter device than the iPhone 14 Pro Max – the dimensions are also slightly smaller, so it’s a lot easier to hold, and I mean a lot. The iPhone 14 Pro Max has been my iPhone of choice for the last year, and I have gotten used to how heavy it is, but the titanium build of the iPhone 15 Pro Max is very refreshing and surprising, too.
The frame has a matte finish, rather than the glossiness you’ll see on the Pro models that have gone before it. The matte finish is lovely – it’s different, it screams premium, and I love it. On the rear, you’ll still find glass, and this, too, is a matte finish. There’s just something about matte compared to gloss that works, and that’s very evident here. You’ll still find the power button on the right edge, but the left edge has changed a little. The volume buttons remain, but in place of the silence switch that we have seen on the iPhone since its launch in 2007, there is a customisable action button.
This action button can do a number of things, from launching the camera app and taking a photo to starting a Focus, implementing a Siri Shortcut, launching the magnifier or switching between silent and ring. You can only choose one option, though there are several options within each, or you could create a Siri Shortcut to make it perform several functions if that’s what you want. In use, it’s great, and it’s easy to switch, too, with the customisation taking place in a dedicated Action button menu in the Settings app. Essentially, it replaces the long-standing signature feature with a much more useful and versatile one. Some of the actions you can perform with the new button can also be programmed with the Back Tap button, but the button is a much simpler and more accessible way of getting to some of those shortcuts.
Elsewhere – and specifically the bottom of the device – the Lightning port has been replaced with a USB-C port, and for the iPhone 15 Pro models, USB-3 speeds for transfer of data are supported, along with the ability to charge other devices, like the AirPods Pro 2nd Generation (which have also been updated with USB-C). This change overall will no doubt spark some outrage, but don’t be too quick to judge, as, in the long term, this is a great thing. It means one cable will not only charge your iPhone and your AirPods Pro but a number of other devices too, whether that’s your Mac, iPad, or perhaps a Fire tablet, for example. Trust me, overall, this is a change to be embraced.
The front of the iPhone 15 Pro Max looks very similar to the iPhone 14 Pro Max. There’s a lovely large display – more on that in a second – with Dynamic Island at the top again, but the bezels surrounding the display have been reduced, which is what has allowed for the same screen size but in a smaller footprint. They are still there, sure, but they are minimal, and the result is glorious.
On the rear, the iPhone 15 Pro Max has three lenses in the top left corner, but while they might look like the iPhone 15 Pro, there are some differences in the sensors here, which we will go into a little further down this hands-on. The design is familiar for now, but this super iPhone flagship has a couple of differences that wet the tastebuds enough to make it exciting.
When it comes to colour options, the iPhone 15 Pro Max comes in Black Titanium, Blue Titanium, White Titanium and Natural Titanium. They are serious colours – more so than the standard iPhone 15 models – but all four have plenty of depth, and there’s a lovely premium feel to all. The Blue and Natural options are the nicest – and none of them are quite as nice as the Deep Purple of the iPhone 14 Pro models, but hey, we can’t have it all.
iPhone 15 Pro Max display
Let’s talk about that display, shall we? There’s a 6.7-inch screen on board the iPhone 15 Pro Max, which is the same size as the iPhone 14 Pro Max, as well as the same resolution and same brightness. Overall, it’s a glorious display. The OLED panel delivers the same vibrancy and punch to the colours we have come to expect from the top-of-the-range iPhones, with plenty of pop, while blacks are lovely and deep and whites beautifully crisp. The slimmer bezels look great – a classic case of how we never realised we wanted slimmer bezels until we got them, and now we don’t know how we coped without them.
Dynamic Island is still going strong at the top too, continuing to deliver a useful alternative to the notch. For anyone new to the iPhone, Dynamic Island is what Apple calls the small, pill-shaped interactive element at the top of the screen that houses the front camera and Face ID elements within it. It’s clever, offers a number of features like Live Activities, and it adapts and responds to what is happening on your device. Use Apple Pay, and it turns into a square; use Apple Music, and you can press and hold it to change track quickly or pause a song. Add a timer, and it will split into two. It’s much more useful than the old notch design, and it works brilliantly in my experience – which I’d expect to translate for the iPhone 15 Pro Max, too.
The Always-On Display is present, too, for the iPhone 15 Pro Max. Always-On Displays are nothing new – especially not to Android users. Samsung and the like have been doing them for years, but they were new to the iPhone last year, and Apple executed it well. For the iPhone, it replicates what you choose on your Lock Screen, displaying useful information without unlocking your phone, and it’s a feature I have really enjoyed using over the last year. It might not be new technology, but it’s done right, and it continues to be for the iPhone 15 Pro Max, based on my first impressions.
Hardware and specs
Under the hood of the iPhone 15 Pro Max is a new chip – as you would expect, but Apple has taken it up a notch this year. It’s an upgrade to the iPhone 14 Pro models, moving to the A17 Pro (not A17 Bionic as you might have thought it would be called) compared to the A16 Bionic that you will find in the 2022 models. The chip is built on 3nm technology, and without getting too geeky (you can read our separate feature on it if you want the ins and outs of some of the technology within this chip), it’s expected to deliver quite a big performance jump. Apple says it offers a 10 per cent faster CPU and a 20 per cent faster GPU faster than a previous iPhone, though the company didn’t specify which. In a nutshell, you get a decent speed bump on paper here. I’ve yet to see what this is like in practice, but I’ll never argue with speed enhancements. It should mean day-to-day tasks are snappier, but also that things like gaming will be improved, with hardware-accelerated Ray Tracing on board here, too.
I never had any performance issues with the iPhone 14 Pro Max, but as I said, performance enhancements are always welcomed. Apple didn’t mention the iPhone 15 Pro Max’s battery life in terms of hours – only claiming an all-day battery – but the iPhone 14 Pro Max has done me well over the last year, always getting me through the day and evening without an issue and I’d expect the same from the iPhone 15 Pro Max. I’ll, of course, need to test it in the real world before I can give an opinion on that – you can’t test the battery from a demo area, after all.
As mentioned, the iPhone 15 Pro Max moves to USB-C, along with the rest of the iPhone 15 range. This is a move I’m welcoming as it gets a little tedious carrying around multiple cables all the time, which should reduce that. It’s slightly more advanced on the Pro models compared to the standard iPhone 15 models, though you may only make use of that if you’re planning on transferring files to your Mac or computer directly from your iPhone.
When it comes to software, the iPhone 15 Pro Max will run on iOS 17 and with that comes a range of new features, including Check-In, NameDrop and, Contact Posters, and plenty more. We’ve got an iOS 17 feature you can head to for all the new features that launch with this device, along with any compatible iPhone models.
Cameras
Here, we get to the good stuff. The camera department is where the iPhone 15 Pro Max sets itself apart from the iPhone 15 Pro and other iPhone models. The main sensor features a 48-megapixel resolution, though it’s a larger sensor than the standard iPhone 15 models offer. There’s enhanced focus and depth control on board, and you can switch between 24mm, 28mm and 35mm focal lengths by tapping on the 1x in the viewfinder. Selecting your default lens in the camera settings is also possible if you have a preferred option.
A 12-megapixel Ultra Wide sensor supports the main sensor, but there’s a new third sensor on board that offers a 12-megapixel resolution and 5x optical zoom at 120mm. It marks the biggest change to iPhone photography for quite some time, and it’s exclusive to this model for now. The last time Apple made a differentiation in its camera offering between its top-tier iPhone models was the iPhone 11 Pro and iPhone 11 Pro Max, so it’s been a few years since you had to buy the bigger, more premium phone to get the best features Apple has to offer.
The iPhone 15 Pro sticks with the 3x optical zoom that the top-of-the-range iPhones have offered for a number of years. You don’t get Samsung’s Space Zoom levels or Huawei’s zoom capabilities here, but it’s almost double what iPhone users have had up until this point, and that’s something to be celebrated. There are some other tricks in the camera department, too, portrait mode specifically. When a person is detected in a shot, you will automatically be given the option to add portrait mode to an image after the fact, as well as adjust the depth of blur. Based on what I saw during my hands-on time, it worked great in action, so I’m looking forward to testing that out. I wasn’t able to test the full camera capabilities of the iPhone 15 Pro Max during my hands-on time with it, of course, but I’ll be sure to do that as soon as I have the device in for review.
First impressions
The Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max is the new super iPhone flagship, and it’s bringing a number of new tricks to the party. It still looks like an iPhone, but there are a number of key refinements in this model that make it more exciting than your average yearly update.
The slimmer bezels around the display look great, the lighter build, thanks to the move to titanium, is refreshing, and the programmable action button gives us a new feature to play with – like Dynamic Island did last year. Top that off with the new camera capabilities, along with the chip upgrade, and you have yourself an iPhone that sets a new standard for Apple users. I’ll bring you my full review as and when I get the device in, but for now, the iPhone 15 Pro Max is the iPhone 15 model to watch.
Apple/ Pocket-lint