Apple, please cease excusing your self out of fundamental iPhone options

Abstract

The rationale for conserving MagSafe off the iPhone 16e does not maintain as much as scrutiny, and is disappointing on a number of ranges.
Apple has a historical past of giving unhealthy excuses for withholding or breaking options.
For itself and its clients, the corporate must be dwelling as much as a better normal it units elsewhere.

One thing reviewers have been fast to level out with Apple’s new iPhone 16e is that regardless of maintaining with the iPhone 16 in some methods, it is lacking a function frequent to most iPhones for the reason that iPhone 12 — MagSafe. There’s wi-fi charging on the 16e, however crippled to a torpid 7.5W, half of what MagSafe can ship. By extension, you’ll be able to’t use any MagSafe mounts or stands with out a particular case, and also you may get lower than 7.5W in case your 16e’s charging coils aren’t completely aligned.

All of this could be comprehensible, given the iPhone 16e’s entry-level market, besides that Apple determined to cost $599 — $170 greater than the iPhone SE — and claims that most individuals in that market don’t use wireless charging, so it does not actually care a lot if MagSafe is lacking. Even when there are statistics to again that up, it is plainly apparent that it was both a profit-driven measure or needed for the corporate’s new C1 modem. The corporate is risking its status with these kinds of strikes, each when it comes to establishing belief and disappointing individuals once they open the field.

Associated

With the iPhone 16e, is Apple abandoning budget devices?

Some upcoming {hardware} refreshes ought to verify the place Apple is headed.

An unlucky custom

MagSafe is simply the most recent instance

Sadly, Apple has been making an attempt to excuse lacking or flawed iPhone options for effectively over a decade at this level. Think about the iPhone 4 — whereas it was in any other case a traditional product, one among Steve Jobs’ swan songs, it was initially tarred by the “antennagate” controversy involving sudden sign drops. Quite than admit it had made a design mistake with the antenna, Apple did all the pieces however, initially telling individuals simply to “keep away from gripping [the phone] within the decrease left nook.” It then moved on to blaming a software program error, and Jobs himself asserting free bumper instances for individuals who wished them. Some individuals have been nonetheless gunshy about iPhones by the point the iPhone 4s shipped the following 12 months.

Even at this time, USB-C help is not what it must be.

I may inform an analogous story involving the iPhone 6’s “bendgate” controversy, however let’s fast-forward to the iPhone 7, which was the primary mannequin to drop a 3.5mm headphone jack in favor of all-digital audio. On stage, Apple advertising and marketing govt Phil Schiller championed the transfer as a show of “braveness” — despite the fact that many purchasers owned and most well-liked 3.5mm audio equipment, one thing the corporate was pressured to acknowledge by bundling a Lightning-to-3.5mm adapter. The jack’s elimination was finally logical, given the shift in direction of Bluetooth headphones and the necessity for extra design house, however making an attempt to spin it right into a triumph was an unforced PR error, suggesting deafness to buyer calls for.

One thing Apple continues to be mired in is its therapy of USB-C. Although USB-C has been current on Macs and Android telephones for a few decade, it took till February 2025 — the launch of the iPhone 16e — for the corporate to utterly exorcize Lightning from the iPhone lineup. The corporate outright ignored frequent complaints about Lightning’s exclusivity and outdated information speeds, presumably hoping to stretch out accent gross sales and provide chain financial savings for so long as attainable. Solely European Union rules modified the sport. Even at this time, USB-C help is not what it must be — it’s important to pay for an iPhone 16 Professional or Professional Max to get something higher than Lightning’s USB 2.0-level information throughput, and no iPhone provides the 60W-plus charging on some Android telephones.

Five Lightning port cables in a row in different colors.

Associated

Apple’s Lightning port was groundbreaking – until it wasn’t

It is a lesson within the risks of prioritizing your personal ecosystem over what clients need.

Time to be trustworthy or ship the products

The erosion of fine will

An iPhone 12 on a Nomad MagSafe charger.

Different corporations pull this kind of trick too — making an attempt to justify the closure of apps you’ve got been utilizing for years, for example — however that does not excuse Apple. Certainly, individuals usually maintain Apple to a better normal, because it tends to ship on the subject of points like privateness, polish, and help. The corporate is even sticking to its weapons on DEI and environmental initiatives, regardless of the political factors it could rating within the US proper now. I want it wasn’t combating unionization, however hey — credit score the place credit score is due.

Each time Apple camouflages the actual causes for a function sacrifice or an outright mistake, it provides buyers cause to doubt guarantees it makes down the road — I do know I’ve change into more and more cynical through the years. Whereas I used to deal with each new iPhone as a revelation, disappointments and the slowing tempo of smartphone evolution have decreased my enthusiasm to embers. Even earlier than the iPhone 16 launch, I knew that Apple Intelligence would not be practically the revolution it was offered to be, and to this point I have been confirmed proper.

Folks usually maintain Apple to a better normal, because it tends to ship on the subject of points like privateness, polish, and help.

Higher nonetheless could be avoiding Scrooge-like choices within the first place. It is likely to be true that the majority entry-level iPhone patrons use wired charging, however that is in all probability true of Professional patrons as effectively, given how a lot sooner USB-C energy might be. For $599, it is a cheap expectation that you simply should not be reduce off from the world of MagSafe equipment, significantly when you should buy a used iPhone 15 Pro for practically the identical quantity. The 16e appears to exist solely to nudge you in direction of the common iPhone 16, making it one of many worst examples of Apple’s “value ladder” technique. It feels disrespectful to individuals who cannot afford something higher, provided that even Android telephones are transferring in direction of the MagSafe-based Qi2 standard.

Is there an opportunity Apple executives shall be extra upfront and/or rather less thrifty sooner or later? Presumably, however in all probability not anytime quickly. CEO Tim Prepare dinner does not appear poised to retire, and he has a powerful hand all through the corporate, significantly on the subject of sustaining revenue margins. The objective is to steer individuals in direction of “premium” merchandise, and that appears to imply paying lip service to extra inexpensive units.