red-iphone-7s

Here's a fishy rumor that doesn't seem to add up with almost everything else we've heard about the 2017 iPhone: Apple is apparently planning an iPhone 7s and iPhone 7s Plus upgrade to the iPhone 7, instead of a major iPhone 8 release, that will include relatively minor changes.

Mac Otakara suggests Apple won't move to a glass chassis and add bonus features like wireless charging. Instead, Apple is apparently planning to keep the design similar to this year's model and will include a new A11 chip. The report also suggested Apple is going to introduce a red version of the iPhone, something I'd personally be interested in picking up.

This all seems plausible, of course, if Apple is planning to release some sort of mid-year upgrade, something it hasn't ever done before. Otherwise, most reports and pundits seem to be convinced that Apple's next iPhone is going to introduce sweeping design changes, an edge-to-edge display with a built-in fingerprint reader, a glass chassis, wireless charging and more. Today's report suggests almost none of that is in store.

I'm not sure I buy this iPhone 7s rumor

It wouldn't surprise me if Apple went with a more conservative upgrade, as it did this year with the iPhone 7, but it's going to need to step it up with compelling new features in some way if it wants to continue to fight off the competition. In some ways, Apple got a bit lucky this year that the Galaxy Note 7 was recalled and canceled entirely. Samsung may have rushed it out the gate before features were fully finished, but my guess is it won't allow that mistake to happen again.

Apple's new iPhones are expected sometime next September, so there's plenty of time for these rumors to change several times before then. Take this one with a grain of salt, alright?