Here it come , barrel down on us full steam : 2025 . Somehow we ’ve already burned through a fourth of this C . It ’s been a good twenty - five days for Apple , to be indisputable , and from all the early indication it seems like the next year will go on the trend , insofar as such things can be predicted with any certainty .
While there are plenty of hearsay about what Apple might do in the next 12 month , the simple truth is that the company only has so much meter and so much money . ( To be fair , it is alotof money . ) Not everything can be a antecedency , and not everything that gets talked about will in reality pass off .
Even amongst the thing that do hap , some will always abide out in terminal figure of their impingement on the company and its customers . Looking ahead to 2025 , I ’m thinking of a few that are most likely to have ramifications that move the phonograph needle — even if , in some cases , it may take a little time for the true effects to be find .
Perhaps the rumored smart home device Apple may release will take its UI cues from CarPlay or another existing Apple device.
Home, at your command
In 2024 , Apple released theVision Pro , a equipment that was decidedly thin edge , but carry such a high price tag as to be out of the reach of all but the wealthy Apple substance abuser — and for a company that tend to charge a premium for its product , that ’s say something .
Perhaps the rumored smart home gimmick Apple may publish will take its UI cue from CarPlay or another exist Apple machine .
orchard apple tree
Perhaps the rumored smart home device Apple may release will take its UI cues from CarPlay or another existing Apple device.
The newest Apple product line bruit for 2025 seems of a decidedly different knack . The company ’s rumored to be working on a “ home statement center ” that has variously been likened to a stationary iPad or a HomePod with a blind . Such a equipment would provide a cardinal style to control smart home tech , as well as video display ambient information like the weather or news program headline .
There are spate of question about the nature of this gadget . My ecumenical linguistic rule of thumb is that Apple ’s products are almost always bare and less ultra than you might desire . They ’re the kind of thing that , in hindsight , look obvious , given the engineering the troupe has already put out . Apple seldom reinvents wheels , and something like the Vision Pro is the exception , rather than the rule . So in this display case , front to affair like understudy mode on the iPhone , tvOS , or CarPlay as examples of templates for this kind of gimmick — and do n’t be surprised if the tech it uses is an outgrowth of one of those .
Whatever this home plate control center is , will still likely end up being a niche intersection like the Vision Pro , but even so , it will at least be one that the average user may be able-bodied to afford .
If you’ve always thought the iPhone was too thick, 2025 may be your year.
Depth charge
The iPhone remains Apple ’s cash harvest , but even as it continues to account for the large glob of the companionship ’s revenue Apple has sputter to figure out how to expand the line . The Pro and Pro Max have been significant hits , yes , but the attempt at broadening the low-pitched end — the mini and Plus phones — have fall more flat .
If you ’ve always thought the iPhone was too thick , 2025 may be your twelvemonth .
Chris Martin / Foundry
If cellular modems gets you excited, you’ll be thrilled with the upcoming iPhone SE.
Third fourth dimension ’s the charm : if you ca n’t change the distance or width , maybe profundity is where it ’s at . This twelvemonth Apple reportedly intends to introduce athinneriPhone , possibly call theiPhone 17 Airor Slim .
That tenuity is likely to come at a cost — in part literally . While it may be less than the $ 999 start price of the Pro lineage , it ’s probably go bad to be more expensive than the base $ 799 iPhone — which would seem to put it around the same $ 899 Mary Leontyne Price degree as the current Plus . And such a slim design could imply some trade - offs in capability , including a simple camera and perhaps lower battery life-time .
As always , the bountiful interrogation is the account Apple designate to tell about this equipment . Why does it survive ? Are people cry out out for a thin iPhone ? Will the trade-off be deserving it ? Or is the troupe simply hear to cash in in on the seal of having a fancy new exterior ? We ’ll discover out next gloam .
The call is coming from inside the phone
One of the biggest Apple success stories of the retiring decennium is the break to building its own processor . It ’s allow the company to not just elicit slap-up performance from its product , but also great energy efficiency . By having controller over the lowest stratum of the computer hardware , Apple can tie it all together in a package that was simply inconceivable to do with third - party chip .
If cellular modem gets you excited , you ’ll be exhilarate with the upcoming iPhone SE .
Willis Lai / IDG
It also speaks to a major part of Apple ’s philosophy : that if something is important to your bottom line , you do it yourself .
And so 2025 is reportedly going to see the next step along that path as Apple brings another key technology in - house : cellular modems . The party bought Intel ’s modem business direction back in 2019 , and rumor have sprung eternal that it would integrate its own cellular radios into its product ever since . But reports have also suggested that the engineering science has prove more complicated than anticipate , hence continued deals with rival Qualcomm to use their modems .
The time , however , may in conclusion arrive in the bod of an unassuming product : thefourth - contemporaries iPhone SE . The low - cost iPhone , expected to be announced in the outpouring , may be the first to feature an Apple - built modem . That ’s a canny move , since the SE is n’t subject to nearly the same scrutiny as Apple ’s flagship speech sound framework , and plausibly does n’t embark in the same bit of units . It give Apple time to shell out with unexpected problems without necessarily tanking its biggest product launching of the yr . And even if its modem performance in the SE does n’t tally up to the iPhone 16 line , well , SE customers are likely to be a less performance - witting securities industry than those buying the a la mode and greatest phones .
Eventually those modems will probably make it into other Apple products , including iPads and Apple Watches and maybe , for the first time , Mac laptops . But it all starts with the little iPhone SE that could .
The rest
Of course , 2025 will play the common other classification of Apple tidings . We ’ll see the last tranche of previously annunciate Apple Intelligence features , a likely revamp to thebase - story iPad , and the debut of the M5 central processor line . More recently we ’ve also seen rumor of an updated HomePod miniskirt and a revised Apple TV .
But the biggest questions that remain for me are about the futurity of Apple ’s software platforms . Will the impact of Europe ’s Digital Markets Act stay on to spread around the world , squeeze Apple to change some of its longstanding business practices ? Will we see the next step in the evolution of the Vision ironware , showing us Apple ’s program to push the line onward and contribute it to more customers ? And what will Apple focalise on in its platform updates this year — will AI still be the name of the game or will that bubble burst ?
2025 promises to be an exciting year for Apple and the tech industry , so clasp in : it ’s conk to be a rough ride .
